Friday 18 Jan (mileage 14 piste, 78 road, total 3094)
There’s a cyber across the road from Via Via, so in the morning I check my email and add to the blog. A desk with LAN cable is reserved for anyone with a notebook, so at least I don’t have to queue for a spare machine. The place is full with Senegalese guys checking out English-language dating services and writing “Hello darling” letters to European girls they have met in the ether.
Via Via’s Lion of Sénégal
Via Via is OK as a refuge in a storm but nobody in their right mind would want to spend a holiday in Dakar. Irene’s flight arrives late on the 19 Jan. I decide to check out the Lac Rose area, where the Rally would have finished on the 20 Jan. We shall be there even if the Rally isn’t!
It’s just 15 miles as the crow flies, and I try a direct route missing out the horrific road through Rufisque. Winding my way through horse-drawn carts and the fume-emitting buses and trucks, my progress is painfully slow with an average speed of just 9 mph. The sides of the roads are deep sand as are the smaller side roads, so I have to go wherever the tarmac leads me, which is round and round in circles. There’s no way I can get through and I return to ViaVia and take the Rufisque road.
There are several routes into the lake area and it’s not clear from the map which to take. I set off down a dirt track which soon becomes quite sandy. One-up without luggage I can manage this, but I have little two-up experience and we would be carrying luggage, so this route is out.
Eventually I’m at Lac Rose and there are many hotels, all with swimming pools. Some I reject immediately then I find one which looks OK, but when I ask a French couple what they think of their hotel they are not happy and suggest I look at Chez Salim. This is much more upmarket yet only CFA 20000 for double occupancy, so I make a reservation and head back to the madness that is Dakar. With the lake area only 15 miles away I would have expected a total for the day of maybe 45 miles, but I’ve covered more than 90.
Back at Via Via I am buying water from a shop with my new-found skills in Woloof, “Jockma benna boutelle d’ochh,” when I am approached by a guy who wants to talk to me. It’s a very involved story about his father dying and I don’t know where this is leading other than the end result will involve me somehow being expected to hand over cash. I cut him short, commiserate with him about his loss and say I cannot become involved.
I’m sorry that much of this blog is being taken up with stories of corruption and scams, but that’s life here. There’s one group I do give small amounts to, and that’s the street boys, or ‘talibe’. The word talibe probably comes from the same root as taliban which means student, and these kids are given to the religious leaders to be instructed in the Koran in a madrassa. Any money handed over by the parents is kept by the teachers who send the boys into the streets to beg for their food.
Saturday 19 Jan (135 miles tarmac, 3209 in total)
If Irene and I head north to Saint-Louis we’ll need somewhere close by Dakar to stay the night before Irene flies back, so I head out of Dakar to visit the Petite Côte, the stretch of coastline that leads south from Dakar, looking for a suitable hotel.
As the Lonely Planet guide book writes, Saly-Portugal “is the sort of holiday destination found all over the world: palm-lined beaches, dozens of hotels, nightclubs, bars and souvenir shops.” Not what I had in mind. After some searching I find Saly-Niahnaikhale, which is much quieter with refined guesthouses. I make a reservation and head back into the Dakar maelstrom.
Irene’s flight is a two-hop, the first leg from London Gatwick to Tripoli in Libya, and thence on to Dakar. It is due to arrive at 2100 so I get to the airport ahead of time and find the arrivals information systems out of order, but never mind, I am told the flight is early and is due to land at 2050. By 2130 I am getting concerned, check again and am told the passengers will be through in five minutes. Twenty five minutes later the passengers from a Madrid flight materialise. Eventually at about 2215 the Tripoli flight turns up.
Irene’s not a particularly good flier and her first leg has been traumatic as the guy in an adjoining seat had suffered a grand mal seizure.
I’ve organised a taxi back to Via Via and am waiting there by the time Irene arrives. We then unload Irene’s case with her biking gear and helmet. There’s little room on the bike so we refill the case with things I can do without for the next couple of weeks and leave it with reception. Fine, we’re ready for the off tomorrow to Lac Rose!
Tim
There and Back Again 