-Mark Twain-
As we have chosen the west, our travel days for the next
week are going to be short, which will make a nice change and I am looking
forward to getting some beach time and some rest before the next leg. I’m starting to feel a little tired, and I
think the long travel days add to that.
Even though you only sit there, the constant bouncing around and holding
on through the bad sections I think is what takes it out of you. In saying that I did get a great night’s
sleep last night. I was under a mozzie
net, I could have the windows open as they had screens and the power was left
on all night, so my fan in turn was also on all night, which besides keeping me
cool I also have in my head it helps to keep the mosquitos at bay also. Most of the guest houses have a generator for
power, so it doesn’t normally switch on until 7pm and then it would be off
again generally around midnight, so to get power all night is a little bit of
an unexpected luxury. What was even
better was having a shower, WITHOUT a bucket.
So I was able to wash my hair after 11 days, and as yucky as that
sounds, I only washed it because my head was getting itchy, my hair itself was
actually not looking too bad considering it hadn’t touched water in nearly 2
weeks!!! The water also in in the last
few countries has been so soft, my hair just feels like silk after it has been
washed, an instant trip to the hairdressers.
Add to that a flushing toilet and we really had the perfect
accommodation last night, well near perfect with the internet still down this
morning.
Breakfast was provided, but it wasn’t anything exciting
with a fresh bread roll and happy cow cheese, which looked just like a truck
lunch, but as long as they had coffee and hot water, then all was right with
95% of the group. Heaven rue the day
that my peeps don’t get their morning coffee, actually they only got coffee
this morning as Ellie had a bought a small box of the instant sachets from
home! Phew…. Talk about a close call to
a truck of feral campers this morning if not for that! As I don’t drink hot drinks, it doesn’t worry
me so much, but when I came out of my room this morning there was a local
artesian that had set up a small stall of handmade jewelry and wooden
statues. The statues look the same as
the last 4 countries and I already have one that I bought in the Ivory Coast,
so I skipped over them and had a look at the necklaces. I have to say I do love shopping for things
like this overseas and I do feel a little obligated to buy something as they
have taken the time to come out and set everything up, so I guess I am a
sellers dream and what some people would call a sucker. I did buy a necklace, which I did like and
not long after that when no one else was going to buy anything, he was out of
there quick as a flash.
It was interesting to ask Sam what these type of places
cost. Back in Australia they would be
lucky to have a 2 star next to their name, but here in Africa it is all you
need to have all the facilities and we have stayed in a little more ‘rustic’
places than this one and he said he paid 80,000 Leones, which is around 18AUD a
night, which included the bread roll and the happy cow cheese, and all things
considered I didn’t think that price was too bad. After packing the truck, we headed back into
town to use an ATM and for Sam to get some more bread. I thought it best I get some more cash, as we
still have over a week in Sierra Leone and there is nothing worse than falling
short in the cash department. Patrick’s
euros have come in handy, and I am so glad that I had the foresight to buy them
off him before he left. I still need to
transfer the money to him, but in my defence I haven’t had any internet access
and will do so the second I do. I am
usually a very avid budgeter. On my
world odyssey I had a small book that I kept track of what I had to spend, what
I did spend and if I was behind or in front on my overall budget. Since I left ALL my spending money and also
my kitty money back in Nairobi, that system just went out the door on this trip
and I really have no idea on what I have spent and if I am on track with what
budget I hadn’t bothered to make this trip.
Well I am sure when I get home and I have to balance to books and see
what bank fees were charged, as I had to rob Peter to pay Paul with all my
funds still in Nairobi, maybe then I will give a toss. Oh well you only live once and you certainly
cannot take your money with you. After using
the ATM and Ian acting as my bodyguard, we swung past the old RUF building that
is now home to the regions city council and then we were back on the truck for
our drive to the beach just before 10am.
Sam had worked out a new itinerary for our last days and
it was good to now have a plan in place.
As good as it is to say we are pioneers, sometimes it gets a little hard
to make a decision on what we should be doing and when no one knows the area,
and we are all flying blind, it can get a little tricky at times. But now that we do have a plan, with the
Bradt guide and the LP (Lonely Planet) we were as armed as we could be with no
internet and knew that things would just fall into place (and a little faith). It gives you a taste as to how travel used to
be before the age of the internet, and we still had the guide books to help us,
imagine if that resource was taken from us as well. People prior to 1980’s who traveled to these
kind of destinations were very adventurous and brave if you ask me!!! At 1pm, and only having to ask once where the
turn off was to the Beach Peninsular, forking to the left around an hour later
and passing a security checkpoint, we arrived into Kent Beach just after
1pm. We thought it would be nice to have
lunch here and then head a little further up the coast to Bureh Beach for our
accommodation. It was a good sound plan
and as we pulled up into the small fishing community of Kent Beach, we were
directed where to park and asked if we were looking for lunch. So Zoe asked the pertinent questions, what
was on the menu (fish and chicken) and what was the cost (35,000). It all sounded okay and we were walked across
a small estuary that fed into the ocean and we walked for about 500m to some
wooden deck chairs that were located under a thatched hut and a few round
wooden tables. There was nothing else
around, no facilities, no kitchen and no other people; we literally had the
whole stretch of beach to ourselves. We
were asked what we wanted to drink, the food orders taken with everyone having
fish except me, I ordered chicken, and then we kicked back and just enjoyed the
view. Australians are super lucky, we
have amazing beaches and my adopted country also has stunning beaches in the
south, so I am spoiled on both fronts, but I do have to say that Sierra Leone
also has some pretty spectacular beaches that would give Australia and Kenya a
run for its money!
Kent is on the sea. The beach is lovely and the
beach association is working hard on making sure it stays that way! Their leaders
are eager to improve tourism – hopeful that we may set up camping sites on the
beach, continue with our waste management program and open a restaurant –
beginning with cold drinks for people waiting to take the ferry to and from
Banana Island! The population is 1, 804.
Kent has a deep and rich history, and was an important location during the
slave era. Historically, the people of Kent supported themselves with fishing
and cattle rearing. There used to be
slave pens in the village (during the 17th Century) when the Portuguese were
busy buying and selling slaves. The pens held up to about 500 people at a time.
Slave boats used to come and carry slaves from the Kent port to Banana Island
where they were inspected and then sent on to other continents. During the abolition of slavery the British
positioned boats in two strategic areas to stop illegal slavers. They
positioned themselves at Emanuel Pond and put canons around the river mouth. After the slave trade was abolished, colonial
authorities resettled recaptives here – they were mostly Creole and
predominantly Christian. It was at that time, around 1819, that Kent became a
village. The founder of Kent was a Nova Scotian, Mr. Peter During. The
former slave pens have been converted to churches. In 1901 the first Anglican
missionaries converted the first one. Later, the other was converted to a
Methodist church by Reverend Dubai.
The history books will tell you Kent was founded in 1816
by Lieutenant-Colonel Charles McCarthy. It was settled by a West Indian
regiment of liberate Africans (who had served in the Napoleonic wars), who had
originally been captured in Nigeria.
While we were waiting it gave me a chance to take some
photos and when I picked up my camera off the table there were some ants making
a small nest near my control knob!!!
Talk about fast work, it had only been on the table for about 30
minutes. Well when I sat back down and
looked through my photos I noticed some marks on the photo. I had a spot on the lens from a few weeks ago
when my camera fell off the seat in the truck, but now there were 6 additional,
smaller spots and I first thought that the ants had done something, I couldn’t
budge them and they are definitely on the inside of the lens. BUGGER.
They seem more defined when I am in full zoom, so there is not much I
can do, but as long as the camera holds out for another 4 weeks I will just get
a new one when I go back to Oz. This
camera will be nearly 2 years old then and I have well and truly got my 300
bucks worth from it the last 2 years. I
would have taken over 70,000 photos in that time, and with a continual workout
like that, a few spots on a untarnished career I think is a good innings.
So we waited, and waited and waited for lunch and even
taking into account that TIA (this is Africa) the food came out finally just
shy of 2 hours waiting! Imagine. We are not sure if it had anything to do with
Zoe and Ellie getting up and heading back to the truck for our books that made
the food magically appear (maybe they thought we were leaving) but appear it
did, finally which was just as well as we were all starting to get a little
antsy (hungry) and after all that wait my chicken was not the best, it was a
little tough and not much meat on the fella and Ellie’s fish had been deep
fried all the way through and was not that tasty. BUT, we always make do with what we are given
and after wolfing down our meals, even though we could have stayed longer to
just enjoy the view, we still had accommodation to find for the night and just
after 4pm we headed back to the truck to settle our bill and leave. Well you can imagine our surprise when the
bill was presented and there was a charge on there of the parking of 25,000 and
even though that is only around 5 bucks for us, it is a crap load of money for
them and we were not told about the charge when we were showed into the parking
spot otherwise we could have parked on the road and walked down. Well that was not the end of it, there was a
charge on the bill for using the beach and their table and chairs, that again
we were not told about that came to 45,000, and again it is A LOT of money for
them and THEN to top it all off everyone’s fish meal did come to 35,000 as
discussed but my chicken meal was double at 65,000 (12 bucks). BLOODY HELL.
If had of been good chicken I may have been able to justify the cost,
but AGAIN we were not told about the cost difference and I would have chosen fish
based on that. The F@#ckers. So Zoe went into battle with the parking and
the beach costs explaining that she understands that they charge, but we were
not told about it and that it wasn’t good etiquette to be sneakily charging us
like that. He pushed the point, Sam and
Zoe stood together and with all that going on I felt bad if we were going to
quiz the cost of the chicken meal as well, so I just paid it, but in hindsight
I just wished I had of stood my ground for myself on the chicken front, but we
live and learn and we didn’t pay for the parking, I think something was given
for the ‘beach’ charge and I paid for the chicken. But like Zoe mentioned, she will not bring
the next group back here because of all the sneakiness, and now they are going
to miss out on business and referral for next year’s guides. Tourism is still new to Sierra Leone and they
have a lot to learn as I am sure, with beaches like Kent Beach, word will
spread and they will get busy, which for them as a country is grand, but they
will need to sharpen their tourism skills as to not piss people off from coming
back. It left a bad taste in our mouth
as we left, but we were still polite, which you would be too as the whole
village looked on during the ‘payment’ process.
Funny thing about safety in numbers, and that we did not have.
We only had to drive 10 minutes till we found Rakis Beach
Hotel at Bureh Beach which was another place that was found in the Bradt guide
and having driven down their very rough drive way, we parked and Zoe and Sam
went to investigate on the room and camping costs. We waited only a few minutes and Sam came
back and asked if we wanted to see the rooms, so we hopped out of the truck and
paradise stood in front of us. There
were mountains to the right of us that were covered on some dark rain clouds,
the sun was high in the sky and the beach was the perfect white sand splattered
with dark volcanic rocks left from some long ago volcanic eruption. The place was beautiful. The hotel itself was more like Doctor Who’s
tardis and when we went inside it looked a lot bigger than it did from the
outside. The second floor was under
construction, literally and the ground floor held all the rooms. We were shown a room tucked away at the back
of the building which had a running shower, power and a flushing toilet. We were all sold, but now Sam had to use his
bargaining prowess to get a good rate for us, for what we hoped would be for 2
nights. So after a few minutes of tense
negotiations, and Sam coming back to check with us at each stage, we go the
rooms for 120,000 (30AUD) a night and we saved a little money by taking out
their breakfast and deciding to do our own each morning off the truck. It would have been cool to camp on the beach,
but the downside of that is getting sand in everything, as no matter how hard
you try to dust it off, it just does, and then it never really leaves. From clothes to tents to electronic
equipment, as romantic as the idea sounds, I was happy to go into a room, even
if it was costing me a single rate of 30AUD where the couples get to share that
cost.
Even though I had to blog, my computer was charged and
the rooms were hot as an oven, so I took my computer outside and sat at the
deck chairs that were provided and the table and to the sound of the crashing
ocean and the dropping sun right in front of me it was a wonderful way to spend
the last of the day. The tide was coming
in and then some surfers went out to catch some of the last waves of the day
and as my computer then ran out of battery, I was able to watch the sun finally
set, with it not quite touching the ocean as it dipped behind some cloud cover,
but I am a sunset lady, I have seen some amazing ones in my travels and if I
was to have a highlight sunset it would be the one back in Australia, in
Darwin, which are renowned for their sunsets, but this particular one was the
day that I buried my mum. After we
attended the funeral and the wake, we made our way to the Darwin Surf Club,
which is located on peninsular and over champagne and a massive steak, it was
the most beautiful sunset I have ever seen and fittingly a magnificent way to
say goodbye to a woman who meant the world to me. So with this is mind, me being in Africa
because of her, watching another sunset it was appropriate that she was not far
from my mind.
There were some local kids who were particularly
interested in my typing and the little notebook that I had and with 5 of them
all crowded around me reading what I was writing, didn’t faze me at all, and it
is nice to know that I still have that approachability to kids, as they are
pretty smart cookies, like babies, I think they have a 6th sense for
good and bad people and they were great boys, not once asking me for anything
but having small talk till it got dark and they had to head back home for the
evening. I was getting paranoid about
mosquitos, so after some of the gang arrived; I went back to my room to drop
off my computer and pick up my insect repellant. I was NOT going to get more bites, after the scratching
faze I went through the last week. I was
now going to be proactive and slap so much repellant on that just flying by me
the mozzies will pass out. Try and get
to me now you miserable insects.
Dinner was preordered for 8pm, as we had eaten a late
lunch (by no means our fault) and the dishes arrived at 8.45pm. Talk about no sense of time around here! There was only chicken on the menu for dinner
tonight and it was so much more delicious and had loads more meat and would you
believe it was only 40,000 Leones. Yes I
was totally ripped off at Kent Beach and if you ever go there, agree on prices
first so that you know up front what things you will be charged. We made jokes all afternoon about the cost of
their air we were breathing, the cost of laying on their sunbeds, was there an
extra cost to use the cutlery etc……. As
I said we don’t mind paying if we were given the choice and told up front. Our saying for that is ‘we live and learn’
and we certainly do.
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