The ferry "Port" ( ha ha ha.) is on the river bank and there is the ever colourful range of food stalls , market traders, a man with two excessively long pythons. Incredibly beautiful women dressed up in sequins , satins , flounces and frills their heads stacked high with bales of immaculately folded cottons in every colour , I would have loved to have a look at some but I was scared of the stampede of women that would descend if I started the ball rolling. The scene resembles a packet of liquorice all sorts thrown on a burnt sienna canvas.
Then we spot the er.... "Ferry" ????
A recycled ferry naturally. It is one of those single deck ferries that you roll on and drive off. Once again our ferry crossings in Italy come to mind, however what is about to take place makes boarding The Piombino ferries feel almost like a military precision exercise. My dear Italian friends you are novices when it comes to boarding ferries.
First past the post a CD registration 4x4 . Then us, then free for-all , ram jam packed on. Not a single free square inch.
Wait , I should explain. The deck for the vehicles is not centred, it is at the side covering approximately 2/3 of the flat boarded area. The remaining 1/3 is a two story covered unit , it has the same paint finish as the Gule Gules'. Deck level is a seating area and on top is the captains zone.
This arrangement means that when we are all loaded on there is automatically a lilt on the vehicle side. I privately reckon I could swim to the other side if we do topple overboard.
There is enough space for two vehicles side by side alongside the passenger block. Between us and that unit is space for a very thin person standing flat against the wall. This space actually becomes crammed full of people. Behind our bus is a Gule Gule with chairs, bales of some kind of food, maybe rice, a metal bed base and of course goats all tied on the roof. It has the feel of the London underground in when the Nottinghill carnival is on, the heat, the good humour, the chatter and once again we catch a glimpse of a small act of sharing. Our guides hand out their cool drinks to some small children and let a lady, dressed literally head to toe in fuchsia, perch like a butterfly on the door step of our bus.
Huge relief to reach the north bank .
Now we go to the stone circles and then lunch.
"Excuse me, a while back didn't you say lunch would be in 30 minutes?"
Gambian minutes are obviously very much longer than our minutes.
We do not get to the Wassu monolithic stone circles for another hour. As we near boiling point both mentally and physically the driver senses our general distress and the real air-con goes on. We are soothed. We will come to learn that our driver has a game plan. The air con goes on cool and fresh. We calm down. Slowly the air con changes to fan- con. He then leaves us to warm up and at the point he feels we are going to riot he either produces food, cold drinks or resorts to real air con , never all three at the same time, he manages very successfully to spin us out as long as possible.
Wassu is incredibly interesting and I have since read up on this world heritage site. However on that day it was just gas mark 8 and impossible to appreciate and take it all in.
As we head back towards the bus and take cover under a shady overhanging tree I am quietly remembering to myself the story of the tigers who walk round and round the tree trunk until they melt into butter. What was that story ?
We melt back onto the bus and ask when is lunch? "Jus now " we are told very soon we will be on the boat .
This time it turns out to be true , within 15 minutes we are boarding our boat for the 4 hour trip upstream. It is now 4 pm, we are running late, the lunch of chicken rice and flies has obviously been waiting for us out in the sun. We calculate without too much importance that we will arrive at Janjanbureh camp at 8 pm.
The boat is hand built from planks of wood. The floor is painted faded pink and fairly uneven. There are extremely lumpy kapok cushions on the side seats and it is open plan for viewing the animals as we go along. There is a viewing level above us.
We eat, drink down a few Julbrews and settle down to a leisurely afternoon as our boat glides over oily still waters. The atmosphere is mellowing, the Tubabs ,as us white people are known , are relaxing . The boat goes in close to the edge of the river bank and we see red monkeys, then a familly of chimpanzees. As time passes we see the baboons as well. We take a siesta and all is good with the world . Our Gambian guides are now our best friends instead of our captors .
Probably a good idea to take advantage of the loo. "up front , second door on the left past the kitchen"
When the door is opened I can tell this is going to be a real challenge. Imagine a normal small loo. Make the walls out of woven bamboo. (fine so far) now put the loo on a plinth up two narrow steps approximately 2 feet above floor level (still could be ok ) now tilt the whole construction forward 45 degrees and remove the loo seat.
I didn't do too well but I was not alone.
At about 6.30 we realise the boat is slowing and moving very gentle near to the river bank.
"HIPPOS"
It was just so exciting, to begin with they looked rather like large tree logs floating on top of the water , they were about 10 feet in from the bank and fairly submerged, the guides know what they are looking for and where they hang out but it is quite rare to get to see them. We hung about a suitable length of time and the boat very gently started to glide on . BUT hey!suddenly there was a significant movement from the biggest log.And THE HIPPO YAWNED ! Fantastic huge jaws , a gapping pink mouth it had performed as if it was to order. Everyone was so happy and fulfilled especially Elaine who is passionate about hippos, they had put on the show especially for her.The day was made , all was forgiven.
Now 6.45 ish 1 hour and 15 minutes we would be at our destination. Dinner , some African music and dancing and bed. It had been a long day but all had come good.
What - did - we -know.
Like lambs to the slaughter we floated towards our next adventure. Actually , let me rephrase that. " next ordeal."
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Then we spot the er.... "Ferry" ????
A recycled ferry naturally. It is one of those single deck ferries that you roll on and drive off. Once again our ferry crossings in Italy come to mind, however what is about to take place makes boarding The Piombino ferries feel almost like a military precision exercise. My dear Italian friends you are novices when it comes to boarding ferries.
First past the post a CD registration 4x4 . Then us, then free for-all , ram jam packed on. Not a single free square inch.
Wait , I should explain. The deck for the vehicles is not centred, it is at the side covering approximately 2/3 of the flat boarded area. The remaining 1/3 is a two story covered unit , it has the same paint finish as the Gule Gules'. Deck level is a seating area and on top is the captains zone.
This arrangement means that when we are all loaded on there is automatically a lilt on the vehicle side. I privately reckon I could swim to the other side if we do topple overboard.
There is enough space for two vehicles side by side alongside the passenger block. Between us and that unit is space for a very thin person standing flat against the wall. This space actually becomes crammed full of people. Behind our bus is a Gule Gule with chairs, bales of some kind of food, maybe rice, a metal bed base and of course goats all tied on the roof. It has the feel of the London underground in when the Nottinghill carnival is on, the heat, the good humour, the chatter and once again we catch a glimpse of a small act of sharing. Our guides hand out their cool drinks to some small children and let a lady, dressed literally head to toe in fuchsia, perch like a butterfly on the door step of our bus.
Huge relief to reach the north bank .
Now we go to the stone circles and then lunch.
"Excuse me, a while back didn't you say lunch would be in 30 minutes?"
Gambian minutes are obviously very much longer than our minutes.
We do not get to the Wassu monolithic stone circles for another hour. As we near boiling point both mentally and physically the driver senses our general distress and the real air-con goes on. We are soothed. We will come to learn that our driver has a game plan. The air con goes on cool and fresh. We calm down. Slowly the air con changes to fan- con. He then leaves us to warm up and at the point he feels we are going to riot he either produces food, cold drinks or resorts to real air con , never all three at the same time, he manages very successfully to spin us out as long as possible.
Wassu is incredibly interesting and I have since read up on this world heritage site. However on that day it was just gas mark 8 and impossible to appreciate and take it all in.
As we head back towards the bus and take cover under a shady overhanging tree I am quietly remembering to myself the story of the tigers who walk round and round the tree trunk until they melt into butter. What was that story ?
We melt back onto the bus and ask when is lunch? "Jus now " we are told very soon we will be on the boat .
This time it turns out to be true , within 15 minutes we are boarding our boat for the 4 hour trip upstream. It is now 4 pm, we are running late, the lunch of chicken rice and flies has obviously been waiting for us out in the sun. We calculate without too much importance that we will arrive at Janjanbureh camp at 8 pm.
The boat is hand built from planks of wood. The floor is painted faded pink and fairly uneven. There are extremely lumpy kapok cushions on the side seats and it is open plan for viewing the animals as we go along. There is a viewing level above us.
We eat, drink down a few Julbrews and settle down to a leisurely afternoon as our boat glides over oily still waters. The atmosphere is mellowing, the Tubabs ,as us white people are known , are relaxing . The boat goes in close to the edge of the river bank and we see red monkeys, then a familly of chimpanzees. As time passes we see the baboons as well. We take a siesta and all is good with the world . Our Gambian guides are now our best friends instead of our captors .
Probably a good idea to take advantage of the loo. "up front , second door on the left past the kitchen"
When the door is opened I can tell this is going to be a real challenge. Imagine a normal small loo. Make the walls out of woven bamboo. (fine so far) now put the loo on a plinth up two narrow steps approximately 2 feet above floor level (still could be ok ) now tilt the whole construction forward 45 degrees and remove the loo seat.
I didn't do too well but I was not alone.
At about 6.30 we realise the boat is slowing and moving very gentle near to the river bank.
"HIPPOS"
It was just so exciting, to begin with they looked rather like large tree logs floating on top of the water , they were about 10 feet in from the bank and fairly submerged, the guides know what they are looking for and where they hang out but it is quite rare to get to see them. We hung about a suitable length of time and the boat very gently started to glide on . BUT hey!suddenly there was a significant movement from the biggest log.And THE HIPPO YAWNED ! Fantastic huge jaws , a gapping pink mouth it had performed as if it was to order. Everyone was so happy and fulfilled especially Elaine who is passionate about hippos, they had put on the show especially for her.The day was made , all was forgiven.
Now 6.45 ish 1 hour and 15 minutes we would be at our destination. Dinner , some African music and dancing and bed. It had been a long day but all had come good.
What - did - we -know.
Like lambs to the slaughter we floated towards our next adventure. Actually , let me rephrase that. " next ordeal."
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Janjanbureh camp
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