-Cheryl Crow-
I had another great night’s sleep and am happy to report
that Mr. Spider was exactly where he was last night. It had rained a lot and it was still a little
showery for our departure today from paradise, but hopefully our next
destination was also going to be paradise, so it eased the pain a little to be
leaving. I still had a serious job of
getting some more rays and topping up my cracking tan. I am addicted to the sun sometimes and I
haven’t been this brown since my trip to Las Vegas last year when Tarsh and I
lived by the pool all week in the Nevada desert sun and we were so dark it was
unreal.
As it was still raining a little when we convened at
8.30am for breakfast, Sam and Zoe had asked the hotel people if we could set up
our kitchen in the restaurant area where there were tables and chairs. Permission was granted and we when arrived
the kettle was on and Zoe was in the middle of preparing eggie toast again for
the second day in a row. You
beauty. The truck had also been moved so
it was right out the front, so I climbed aboard for my tube of vegemite and all
was well with the world for another day.
I really LOVE that eggie bread and will be something I can do when I am
back in Nairobi. It reminds me so much
of crumpets, which you can’t get there, so it will be a good way for me to
think I am having a crumpet when really I am not! I think sugar would also go great on them,
banana maybe and also cinnamon would be a real treat too, which I have all back
home.
We were all packed and on the road at 9.45am. I am enjoying the late starts when I sat down
in my seat on the truck, Ian was on the other side! What…..
I was sitting on the wrong side for the sun today, but as it was overcast
and both Ian and I thinking we were only travelling about an hour today I
stayed where I was. We were going to
stop at a few beaches on the way to our destination which was No. 2 River Beach
where we were planning on staying a night or two. After leaving the Bureh Beach area and
hooking back onto the main peninsular road we travelled on tarmac road for
about 25 minutes before our first stop called John Obey Beach. There was actually a eco-tourism place
located here called Tribe Wanted and Sam wanted to get some more information on
the place as an option to bring the new group back here when we leave Freetown
in a few days’ time.
Tribe Wanted’s priority is to build an initial network of
10 model communities that demonstrate, educate and inspire sustainability. To
achieve this, they plan to recruit 10,000 ‘tribe-members’ through a
crowd-funding co-operative known as a Community Interest Company.
How does it work?
1. Fund: We will tribe-fund our communities,
starting at £10 per tribe member per month. With every 1,000 members who join
we have seed funding to launch a new community chosen by our members.
2. Create: We partner with local stakeholders to
build, retrofit or renovate a community where up to 50 people can live
sustainably.
3. Experience: With our local partners we provide
stays at our communities from a few nights to several months. We share life on
the ground with our members online, sparking meaningful actions. It is a great project and we wish them all
the best in their endeavors and this is exactly what Sierra Leone needs to help
get back on its feet.
After we were shown some of the accommodations, the eco
toilets and the awesome bucket showers-that literally was a bucket that you
filled with a jerry can and then via a pulley system locked it onto place and
there was a shower head welded to the bottom of the bucket with a lever. Ingenious and something that should be added
to Madge for bush camps for sure!!! We
took a walk along their beach that also had a fresh water lagoon next to it
that was fed by mountain that was behind the property. It was a great looking place, it had a great
feel to it and it looked clean and tidy, especially as we had dropped in
unannounced, which is a great wrap for them.
The prices to stay the night seemed a little expensive, compared to what
we have been paying, but it includes full board, so when you take out our
budget for the food, I didn’t think the cost was too bad, but Sam will try and
contact the owner and see if he can get a better rate, but I do wish them all
the best and hope that their eco venture works out for them.
Walking back to the truck it was at this point I started
to feel a little lethargic. I slept well
last night, I did wake a few times just because the sound of the rain that fell
most of the night, but I think the combination of the heat, humidity and
travelling on the road now for nearly 7 weeks is just starting to take its
toll, I needed a total chill day and all going to plan I was thinking that
tomorrow would be the day, no matter what was on the cards for an activity, I
was just going to pass and relax to recharge what I could. When you travel for long periods of time, you
do have these days where you need to just stop and rest. I had about 7 of them in my 600+ days of
travel and I really don’t think they can be avoided. I totally had no energy at all.
We were back on the road again at 11am and about 20
minutes later, the road turned into dirt road that slowed us down a little and
then the dirt road deteriorated further to mud and scary bridges without rails
that apparently were constructed in the colonial days over 100 years ago. At one point a man was walking just ahead of
us and as we passed him, I waved and he indicated about giving him a lift. Well because the roads were that bad, he
basically over took us-on foot- and there he stayed for a further 40 minutes
until he reached the track that would take him off the main road that we were
travelling, where he waited for a minute for us to catch up and then waved and
continued on his way. Seriously if we
were in a race, he would have beaten Madge to that point, and he was
WALKING!!! By this time I was knackered,
so much so that I even stopped waving, I couldn’t even lift my arm and then I
tried to get some sleep as we bounced, weaved, skidded and slipped our way the
15km to Number 2 River Beach. I did wake
as we crossed some of the scary bridges where there was no room for error and I
did see Sam tense up at one point on a trickier bridge and I decided it was
just best that I went back to sleep and not look at the condition of the roads
or the skinny bridges that we did fit on.
To think this was part of the main peninsular road, but not much traffic
comes from south to north, as most people would be travelling from Freetown, so
at least we didn’t have to go back the same way and there was a promise of
better road conditions when we left and headed further north.
We finally made it to the village of Number 2 River Beach
just before 1pm. So much for the hour we
first thought it would take gut we made it on one piece, and we were in another
beautiful paradise. The first thing I
noticed when we pulled up into the beach/resort carpark was the souvenir stalls
and the lure of a possible purchase perked me up a little from my comatose
state. Lunch was off the truck as we had
food to use up so that it wouldn’t go to waste and tuna, onion and cucumber
rolls were back on the menu. We had 2
whole days with no tuna, and even though I do love tuna, to have a break for a
few days revitalizes the taste buds and they were ready for another onslaught
of what I would call the staple food of every overland trip I have done. South America it was also avocado and on my
East Africa trip it would had to have been Aromat, a tasty salt that could make
a bad meal taste good (not that we had any) but what a great spice that was to
have on a trip. After lunch, Sam went to
enquire about room and camping rates and we packed up the truck and after Sam
came back telling us the room rate was 60AUD and camping was 30AUD, he went
back in again to try and get a cheaper rate and in the meantime Ellie, Suzanne
and I went and thought we would have a look at the stalls and get some retail
therapy going to liven us up. Out of the
5 stalls, there was nothing that really stood out, but then I really wasn’t in
the mood to be looking too hard, when Sam came back and said he got the rates
to 45 bucks and they would throw in breakfast.
At that point I would have accepted anything, so we all agreed and 10
minutes later we were walked to our rooms which were individual bungalows that
faced directly onto the beach. What a
beautiful spot.
The bungalows were large and the beds were massive. Even
if I star fished the bed, I wouldn’t touch the ends of the bed that were
encased in a tile bed base, which made getting in and out if them a little
tricky. There was a running shower, a
toilet that flushed and I also had a ceiling fan that worked, so all in all add
that to the location and we were happy little campers. When the discussion came up about whether we
do 1 or 2 nights here, after the drive that we went through to get here, it was
definitely worth the 2 nights and to be able to recharge somewhere as beautiful
as here, I couldn’t get any luckier. By
now it was just after 2.30pm and the power was on, which Suzanne and I have
worked out they turn on when you get to a place to impress and then once we
have moved in they turn it off again until 7pm and generator time, and as the
track record went the same thing happened here as I was reading my book when it
went off just before 3pm, so I used that as a sign and decided it best for me
and everyone else around me that I had a sleep for a few hours. I set my alarm for 5.15pm, but as it worked
out I woke just after 4pm and grabbing my laptop and stepping 6 paces out of my
room and straight onto perfectly white
beach, a waiting table and comfy beach chairs, there wasn’t a place I would
prefer to be right at that moment. After
sucking it all in for a few minutes, I started to type using the beautiful
scenery as my inspiration. Where we are
located, there is a bit if a channel, so at certain times of the day it is
passable on foot and then when the tide comes in, if you’re not careful you
could get caught on the other side of the sandbar and have to swim back or use
the guy at the other end of the channel that runs a boat back and forth to get
you over during high tide. With all that
said the channel had a different current to the one of the ocean and it forms
an unusual meeting of the 2 at high tide and also some awesome looking sand
formations. So when my battery went flat
just after 5.30pm, I took a stroll and some pictures and then the rest of the
group arrived for us all to sit and take in and watch the amazing sunset over
the Atlantic Ocean. It had some beautiful colours and the suns orb was massive
and it disappeared behind the clouds before hitting the ocean and we thought
that was the end and then the orb popped out below the clouds and set into,
well what looked like, into the ocean and even after the sun had fully gone,
mother nature played some more colours for us with the clouds turning a fuchsia
pink for a few minutes and then the sky started to turn dark. It always amazes me just how quick the sun
will set and if you fluff around, you can miss it all together.
Dinner had been pre-ordered for 7.30pm and you could
imagine our surprise when the food came out at 7.35pm! What kind of timing do you call that!!!!
??? You could have knocked us all over
with a feather when the food tray was bought in! AND the meals were massive serves and my
chicken and chips was delicious. There
was a choice of fish (of course), lobster and shrimp. When I asked about the size, how many and
were they peeled-they came back and said they didn’t have any shrimp, so with
that decision taken out of my hands, it was chicken again for me, and again it
was done in a slightly different way and after the Yamoussoukro chicken, this
was clearly the second best piece of chicken I have had on the trip so far, and
I have eaten a lot of chicken to be able to make that call, believe me. Details and options were discussed for
tomorrow which involved a boat trip to see monkeys and crocodiles and then a
nature walk where the whole trip would take 2-3 hours and I made a decision
that I wasn’t going to go, and you know what?
I didn’t feel guilty about not going.
I was going to sit in my paradise for a whole day, with maybe a walk to
the next beach in the afternoon, but it was going to be a null day tomorrow and
I couldn’t wait.
It was our 3rd last day of this section and I
needed to recharge and what a great place to do it.
Number 2 River Beach is beautiful and we are lucky enough
to be here, in Sierra Leone. Who would
have thought!?
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