African Adventure Part 6: Keur Mesene to Koba

Aha! You weren't expecting an update today, were you? Well, I'm intending to devote tomorrow to the war on my liver, so I have dragged tomorrows update forward by a day. In fact, this will be the penultimate part of the story of my adventure, with the final part over the weekend.

We were resting up in huts at Keur Mesene. Excellent huts with electricity. Except that the electrics had a habit of overheating, so every couple of hours they would switch off the generator to let it cool off a bit for three quarters of an hour or so, then boot it up again. Possibly not meeting the minimum elf and safety standards in the UK, nor indeed the 'walk back to the hut and the lights suddenly go out' standards. The only upside being it was too dark for anyone to see me bugger over.

The next day we set off and headed for the border into Senegal. It was actually a really small border post on an off road track, so clearly we expected to get through rather quickly. Oh, that it were that simple! There was the small matter of having to provide ludicrous reams of data and information to the ever beaurocratic Mauritanian border guards/police/customs etc. I was also trying to get rid of my Ouigyas (Mauritanian currency), because there would be no opportunity to do so over the border. In the end, all of my remaining ougiyas and the small change I had in Euros purchased me a rather snazzy tee shirt in the Senegal colours that I am actually wearing as I type this entry. Have to say however, the inflation in Mauritania is frightening. Someone reported cans of coke for sale in the small hut there at 150 Ougiyas (40p or so), by the time I had borrowed 150 Ougiyas, they were after 500 for each one. Price gouging tossers. Should be a law against it. Oh, wait a minute, there is! Still, its Westerners 0 - 1 Price gougers. Oh well.

We had been at the small border post for 3 hours when Gert decided enough was enough. He growled something along the lines of 'I'll pay for us to get out' and went into the head honchos office. Literally one minute later we were being waved through with no further requirements. The system works. The system, in this case, being raw corruption and the power of the almighty euro. On the Senegalese side of the border we had to wait 20 minutes or so whilst we paid a toll for crossing the bridge into the country and that was that, we were on our way. Mauritania really doesn't help itself with its anal border bods.

We had a relatively short journey after the border to Saint Louis where we were going to have a day off from travelling to enjoy the sights and so on. Saint Louis was the old capital of French West Africa in colonial days and still has a rather colonial feel to parts of the city. We were staying at Zebrabar campsite, run by a delightful Swiss couple. The first thing to be done was to rush to the bar and there to slake the thirsts of about 70 Europeans who hadn't had beer for a realllllly long three days. A half litre of Gazelle, the beer of choice in Senegal. Well, a beer anyway.

The plan was to go and get hammered in Saint Louis, the centre of which was about 20km away, so we needed taxis. We ordered three for 12 of us, but there was a problem. The problem being the taxis turning up and taking others instead of us, so we were just hanging around getting steadily more irritable in the bar. Supping Gazelle. After about 2 hours, one taxi showed up, but by this point only five of us still wanted to make the trip into the city (Me, Fitz, Stan and the Rasta dudes), so five of us piled into the one taxi and off we went. About 5km into the journey we were brought to a shuddering halt by two other taxis. It was the other two taxis we had sort of ordered, kind of two hours ago! They weren't happy that they had driven 20km to find no fair. We were most understanding, and told them it was not our problem and to go and take it up with the guys at Zebrabar who had decided to stay put. We have, they replied. Excellent, we declared, and instructed our driver to drive on. Chutzpah doesn't always let you down.

We reached Saint Louis and headed for the Flamingo Bar, which I thoroughly recommend to anyone who strays that way. It still has the feel of a fifties colonial haunt in terms of the manner of service, the decor and the building itself. I had a most excellent catch of the day (which I think was Red Snapper) and we enjoyed a few beers. Then we set off into town to sample the nightlife. We found an excellent bar which was dimly lit, playing jazz and had its own cool jazz dancing man, dancing to jazz and being a jazz man. Jazz pissheads are way cooler than normal pissheads. It wasn't long before we had attracted the attentions of a prostitute. Basically, give it five minutes in Saint Louis as a European bloke and you'll have attracted the attentions of a prostitute. She latched on to me because 'he speaks a bit of French' and convinced me to buy her a beer. Which I did, because beer is a sacred trust, and I would never deny the thirsty. She then asked me if I would like to go somewhere for a 'massage'. I managed my best Will from the Inbetweeners impression and informed her that 'non, mademoiselle, tous est bon dans ma monde'. To be fair, she didn't stay and argue the toss. And, besides, what happens on tour stays on tour! Oh, the humanity!

It was after this that Jari Rasta wanted to return as he felt unwell and I became the sort of man I've always hated who for some reason had 'had enough drink' and also wanted to return to camp. So, we took our leave of the others and headed to the bridge to hail a cab. Accompanies, bizarrely, by the drunk jazz dude who was promising to show us a good old Saint Louis time. Right up until he got into the cab with us and was ejected with a stern NON! He was last seen latching onto someone walking over the bridge and appeared to be mouthing something about a good old Saint Louis time....

The next day was a rest day, which was fortunate as it was blisteringly hot and I was knackered. It did however feature a pair of Makak (spelling?) monkeys that I photographed and videoed and a beach of crabs that would scarper when you ran towards them which I similarly caught on film. And hornbills. Quite the fauna hotspot is Zebrabar. I also found a hammock in the shade of a copse of palm trees which I dozed and dreamed in for perhaps about three hours. One of those indetermiante periods of time that you just drift away and enjoy paradise. In the evening I tried to make up for the night before and tuck into a few beers.

The next day was mainly off road, and was quite complicated as we kept losing the track. I guess thats what makes it more fun, although I'm sure the local farmers who's crops we were destroying would not have had as much fun as we did. At one stage I got out and went to look for the track on foot, succeeding only in luring the cars deeper into crops and further from the actual track. North, South, same thing innit, really? We did have a nice lunch however and a chat with some local children who came over to investigate us. We ended up at our last but one camp, Koba. We had straw huts to sleep in, four to a hut with a fresh outdoor toilet and shower at the rear of each. All rather rustic and enjoyable, and the evening saw a long overdue piss up and party. There was booze, there was table wrestling, there was terrible karaoke. Table wrestling is where you start on top of the table and have to get under it and round back on top again without touching the floor. It is something I am pledged to conquer over the coming year. And there I will leave it. Next update is the final one, the trip to Dakar and the journey home... almost as sad typing it as it was leaving Africa behind.....