Overland travel makes life sort of difficult here in West Africa. Let me give you a detailed account of what passed during our recent vacation.
June 1, 2010
0415 – Leave Natitingou workstation
0620 – Arrive in Tanguieta
0830 – Leave Tanguieta for Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso
1100 – At the Benin/Burkina border
1130 – Leave the Burkina border
1310 – Transfer in Fada (with hour time change- back an hour)
1350 – Leave Fada to Ouagadougou
1540 – Transfer in Koupela
1820 – Arrival in Ouagadougou
June 2, 2010
0850 - Leave Ouagadougou
1200 - Arrive in Ouahagouya
1220 – Leave Ouahagouya
1400 – Arrival at Burkina/Mali border
1425 – Leave Mali border
1510 – Arrival in Koro, Mali
2010 – Arrival in Sevaré
June 3, 2010
1010 – Leave Mopti
1356 – Arrival in Djenne
June 5, 2010
0715 – Waiting for taxi van to fill up in Djenne
0820 – Leave Djenne for Mopti
1203 – Arrival in Mopti
June 6, 2010
0500 – Woke up to a nice layer of rain, thus moved mattresses into the restaurant area
0610 – Restaurant staff come to open for breakfast, thus we moved out
1304 – Got on our boat to *beep*
1517 – Leaving Mopti at 20km an hour
1903 – Stop off in the middle of nowhere to sleep
June 7, 2010
0538 – Leave the middle of nowhere
0540 – Find out that it actually will take 7 more days to get to *beep*
0815 – Land in Dakawohmina (less than 40k from Mopti)
1050 – Get into vehicle to leave to Mopti
1247 – Arrive in Mopti
June 9, 2010
0633 – Arrive at taxi station in Sevaré
0740 – Get into vehicle to head to Koro
1234 – Arrival to Koro
1615 – Leave Koro
1800 – Arrival to Burkina/Mali border
1840 – Leave Burkina border
0100 – Arrival in Ouagadougou
June 10, 2010
0827 – Leave Ouagadougou
1230 – Arrival in Fada
1254 - :Leave Fada
1519 – Arrival to Burkina/Benin border
1630 – Arrival to Benin border (with hour time change)
1706 – Leave Benin border
1803 – Arrival to Tanguieta
1920 – Arrival to Natitingou
Total traveling time: 72 hours and 27 minutes
Needless to say, we had a lot of time sitting in taxi/van stations and in vehicles/boat. Yet, it was surprisingly still fun. Pictures and captions to follow!
4 comments:
As Carly has told me in the past: any time you can visit a place called "Ouagadougou" it's pretty damn cool.
Stay healthy, Mark Loehrke (Carly's dad)
you will def have a really interesting story to tell your kids one day.
Great blog - I'll be arriving to Benin in less than a month as a new PCV and since it seems like you've done a fair amount of traveling I was wondering whether you could recommend a good travel pack. The PC literature suggests a frameless one, but I wanted to know whether there seems to be a preference among volunteers as to a particular type (size, internal hydration system, etc.) Thanks for all the information and insight thus far, look forward to joining you!
-Tom
thszymanski@live.com
As your service and blog presumably draw to end, I wish to thank you for both- it has been a great adventure and I wish you the best in the years to come.
Judy (Carly's mom)
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