The Third of Three - in The Gambia

Laura and I are wrapping up three days spent on the Atlantic coast in The Gambia. We came for Gambia’s famous coastline, dotted with hotels and beachside resorts, to get some beach (or pool) time following the last week or so in Mali’s desert sun.

Someone out there once said, “Getting there is half the fun.” Well, that someone apparently has not tried to travel by public transportation from Dakar, Senegal to Banjul, Gambia. It took us 4 taxis and a ferry ride to get here. One of those taxi rides was a 5 ½ hour drive from Dakar to the Senegal/Gambia border in 7 seater station wagon probably older than I am. This is how the locals do it. OK, this is how just about anyone who doesn’t fly does it.

About ½ of the ride was spent not on regular, paved road, but on the absence of road – either pavement so pockmarked by giant potholes that there were more holes than road, or long stretches where the driver went off road through fields (this is why they also call them bush taxis), because the road condition was worse than off-roading.

Once we went through border control and were in Gambia we still had to take another taxi to Barra, to catch a ferry to Banjul. During this short taxi ride we could tell we were in a different place. The roads were, well, roads. Paved, maintained, even those nice little lines down the middle and on the sides. Light posts, even sidewalks in some areas. Cars drove the speed limit, within the marked lanes. No off-roading here. Homes along the way were still rustic, by our standards, but nicer than what we saw through most of Senegal. The ferry port was clean and relatively orderly.

The ferry ride was long, though. Almost an hour across the bay where the Atlantic Ocean meets the Gambian River. It was dark when we arrived. Morro was still with us. Coming off the ferry, it was a solid wave of people crushing through the small exit area all at once. As we were almost out of the port, I realized we needed our ferry tickets to exit. I had put them in my purse, in the same pocket as my camera. I pulled out the tickets, handed one to Laura, and got out of the port. As I sat down in our final taxi of the night, I realized my camera was gone. Someone with a deft hand took the opportunity of a few seconds when I was handing Laura her ticket, and found themselves a new camera. Damn. I have always been so careful, and in all my travels have never been pickpocketed before. The camera can be replaced. But pictures can not be.

It could have been worse, though. Luckily, Laura’s standard travel gear includes not just her camera, but a portable hard drive for periodic downloads. We had downloaded my pictures after our Dogon trek. I had lost just a few days, but that included our day in Timbuktu, including the video I made of landing in the airport.

After one night in a guesthouse that lost power and left us sleeping in a sweat box, we upped our standards and moved over to Cape Point hotel. Balcony overlooking the pool and affording an ocean view, beach access, air con, and the best shower I’ve had in 3 weeks. As this is low season, only one week before high season begins, it is a bit dead. We are two of five guests here (out of 60+ rooms). The pool is ours, the beach is ours. And, unfortunately, the local touts have no one else to focus their attention on, so they are all ours, too. They are aggressive, but not in a dangerous way. Just immensely annoying. They are hard to shake and back off only when you get back in their face. Of course, just when you shake one, another is there at your side. Argh.

Now mother nature was not cooperating with our plans of 3 days of beach and pool time. We hit some cloudy weather the first two days – nothing too bad to ruin a day, though. We got in enough time at the pool, chatting with two English ladies, Sadie and Joyce, who have been coming here for 2 months a year for 20 years. We hit the beach this morning, taking a dip in the ocean and searching for shells on the beach.

Then, about 1:00 this afternoon, about 10 minutes after we rented bikes to do some exploring down the coastline, a torrential rain storm appeared out of nowhere. We picked up the pace as the first sprinkles came down, knowing we were close to our Sunday brunch destination. And we arrived just in time. Within a minute of getting under cover at the Butchers Shop, it poured. And I mean pour. Just buckets coming down. But it wasn’t all bad. The Butchers Shop is a local restaurant owned by a famous Moroccan chef. We were forced to stay there for over 2 hours (forced, I say) sitting just a few feet from a fabulous Sunday brunch buffet. Pastas, couscous, veggie dishes, sausages, eggs, potatoes, lasagna, pancakes made to order (with honey and/or chocolate sauce), and a selection of fresh squeezed juices made for good company while waiting for the rain to subside.

When the weather cleared up we biked back to the hotel, needing to make our 6:00 massage appointments. We stopped at the local craft market along the way, did some hard bargaining for a few souvenirs and gifts. We aim for the stalls run by men. The women here are exceptionally hard negotiators, and we know we can’t get as good of a bargain from them.

We head back to Dakar tomorrow, reversing the long route that brought us here just four days ago. Then, just one day in Dakar and then back on a plane to Cleveland for me.