Victoria falls is spectacular. Words are not enough. The waterfall thunders into a narrow gorge; it spans nearly 2 km, dropping over a 100m cliff. Victoria Falls is one of the wonders of the world, and has to be seen, felt and heard. The spray from the falls can be seen from miles away. Close up you feel the falls - the spray rises hundreds of metres into the air, it appears to be raining upwards! I wore my waterproof for my close encounter, I needed it! Victoria Falls and the nearby town of Livingstone are also the adventure sports capital [View Full Entry]

---

---

The first photo on the right was Nelson Mandela's cell for 18 of his 27 years of imprisonment on Robben Island. It's tiny. Mandela is a tall man, so he couldn't sleep straight in the cell. The tour of Robben Island is a must see attraction from Cape Town. Along with the Sector 6 Museum. Sector 6 was a multi racial inner city district of Cape Town. It's very existence was living proof of the nonsense of apartheid fascistic social engineering. So, the apartheid authorities bulldozed the whole area, and moved the population out onto the sands of the Cape Flats. [View Full Entry]

---

---

First, I apologize for the length of time since the last blog. As a result this will be a long blog, with 41 photos. In the last couple of weeks I've flown from Cameroun, stayed in J'burg (Josie), Tshwane (Pretoria), the Kruger National Park, the Drakensburg and other places. I also rented a car for 10 days which managed to break down twice. More of that later. And, yes I've enjoyed myself. Getting off the plane in J'burg (Josie) was a shock after months in West Africa. The roads were tarred. The electric doesn't cut out without warning, and all the [View Full Entry]

---

---

I've noticed, that a negative strap line seems to get more visits to my blogs! Give the punters what they want! Whilst I've been here in Cameroon, the student protests have been a major news story. University students have been protesting about increases in student fees and inadequate facilities, including a lack of toilets. On April 27th the military and riot police invaded the campus of Buea University. They shot dead 2 unarmed students. The government has promised an inquiry. There's more coverage of this story at: IRINnew.org and at http://ambazonia.indymedia.org [View Full Entry]

---

---

Chad is hard work. The roads are non existent. The police are uniformed criminals. The transport is slow and uncomfortable. Outside the capital the country lacks basic infrastructure. Chad was a French colony, but they didn't know what to do with it. They spent nothing on it. After independence the country descended into decades of civil war. The situation was made worse by the meddling of the French and Libyans. In 1980 Libyan forces briefly occupied the capital N'Djamena. The French forces drove the Libyans north leaving the country divided in two. The Libyans we [View Full Entry]

---

---

Niger, Il fait chaud! Niger is hot, very very hot. And Niger is big, so very very big - thousands of miles of barren scrub and desert. As a result there were times in Niger where I felt I was on the road to nowhere. For those of you that have been following my blogs regularly there is news about the political situation in Niger. I'm quoting here from IRINnews.org IRIN is a project of the UN office for the co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs. "Niamey, 20 April 2005. The government of Niger has struck a deal with a civic movement that [View Full Entry]

---

---

Benin was for a short period after independence called Dahomey, in honour of the Dahomey empire. Dahomey was famous for its Amazon female warriors, who were far more vicious than the men. The other main attraction I've just visited is the stilt village of Ganvie, built in the middle of a lake, which is Benin's main tourist destination. So to catch up with recent events... WED 6th By the time I'd booked into a Hotel in Cotonou, I was too late to get to the Niger Embassy. I needed to be in Cotonou in order to get a Visa. I lazed [View Full Entry]

---

---

I've just returned to Cotonou, the capital of Benin from Ouidah. Ouidah is the centre of Voodoo. It was also a place from which slaves were sent to the Americas taking the Voodoo religion with them. I'm back in Cotonou in order to sort out a Visa for Niger. I'm watching the situation in Niger, as there has been considerable political unrest in Niger in recent weeks. A General Strike had been called for the 5th of April but it was called off by the political opposition at the last minute. At the end of the last blog I had just [View Full Entry]

---

---

"Issuing useless communiques and condemnations by toothless organizations such as the African Union and the ECOWAS group (of West African countries) won't get democracy restored anywhere on the continent, especially in Togo. It is simply pathetic. It won't work...What happened in Togo is a disgrace and shameful. It would greatly set back the course of democratization in Africa." (Ghana's National Democrat in February 2005). I've just had an enjoyable stay in Togo, but back in February, knowing that I intended to visit Togo, I was worried that things there mig [View Full Entry]

---

---

I've been taking it easy for the past week, spending a lot of time in Accra, with trips to Lake Volta and Kokrobite. Lake Volta is the largest man made lake in the world, the lake was created when the hydroelectric dam was built in the first years of independence, under the government of Dr Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana and independence leader. The lake and the scenery around it are spectacular. The rainy season seems to have started early. That doesn't mean it's been raining all the time, but there has been a lot of heavy rain. Parts [View Full Entry]

---

---