DEEP CRATER HOLES AND WATERFALLS

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Have to cross a bridge to get to Cameroon and soon as we entered we were in for a long arduous drive as potholes are everywhere on the dirt track, the only consolation is it is through dense forest, lots of tree and we saw some wildlife as well, monkeys and hornbills among others. A few small villages we passed through kids yelling out White, white, white or white people at the truck and waves at us enthusiastically. We stopped at a small town to buy food for lunch hardly anything, Our group is cooking tonite but we have to do truck lunch meaning whatever we have in the truck, tins and what not we made sheperds pie or a variation of it, Jo was not well so Dave and I did the cooking, apparently turned out pretty good, Di gave us tips on what to do as I have no idea how to cook the dish as i am obviously not British.
Next morning off again on bad roads made it to Mamfe at last and we were looking to change money but the Money Gram is only accepting Euros, went shopping for lunch with Audrey, Bry and Zoe, then set up lunch on the side of the sreet with the locals looking at us the whole time. Raffa who is not feeling well again bought some cirpo for his diarrhea. He fell off the bike earlier but only minor scratches. Camped again on the side of the road.

We are hoping to get to Limbe today so we drove as fast as we could hard to do when potholes are really crater size, we had fun taking photos! We past the towns of Kumba, Muyuka and Buea and finally we arrived early evening to the campsite in Limbe. they have a swimming pool yay! We will stay here for about 5 days as we wait for the mountain climbers to come back, i opted not to climb Mt. Cameroon and instead enjoy the beaches here. It is so nice to stay in one place for awhile. The nextd day was chill out day internet and pool and eating at the hot spot restaurant above on a hill from where we are staying at(Miramare campsite). We had fabulous dinner with Raffa our adopted Brazilian overlander who is leaving us to go back home. he has had enough of Africa especially after acquiring malaria for the 2nd time, too bad he was such a good company , we got on really well, at least I have a place to stay when I visit him in Sao Paulo in the future. We had a gorgeous barracuda steak, it was probably the tastiest fish I had so far here in West Africa. For some reason we ran short on the bill and had taken us a long time to figure out and ended up adding more money, such is the problem when you have too many people in a group eating at one time, but we had a good time though. Went back to campsite chilled out a bit said my goodbyes to the Mt.Cameroon trekkers as they leave early the next morning.

Lazy day again, went to the pool and walked to town and try to find a tailor that might fashion a gimp suit for Marky out of mozzie nets but failed as I got distracted at the sight of big delicious looking crabs I bought 5 pieces for only 2000 dibdobs, about 6 dollars only!! We saw all types of fishies, the barracudas are huge and they are scaling them, one scale is the size of a coin! Lost Marky in the process, the girls decided to walk to the market and I went back to camp dropp off the crabs and internetted with Brian at a faster internet place and uploaded photos for the blog. Got back and chilled out some more at the beach and cooked the crabs for dinner, Kierstin cooked a couscous meal which was superb. Had a chat after dinner with young men on the local football team called Victoria United, them(Severin, and Patrick) along with their coach Jo had beeen living just next door from us it is where they train and they came by to chat. They entertained us with facts about African soccer and life in Cameroon. We promised them to see them play on Sunday for the local league match. Whilst talking a crab from nowhere suddenly appeared from under the truck and tucked itself in the wheels, Patrick managed to put it in a tub and we threw it out back in the sea. Went to bed after, Brian's feet stinks so bad i have to ask him to baby wipe it as it is horrid.

Next morning Marky wasnt feeling well and was thinking of having himself tested in the lab in town but changed his mind when he felt better later so we just did out work out and hang around in the pool with the soccer players. then off to internet. Then last minute went to the lab and with Brian had their bolldwork done, because Di and Tony both tested positive for malaria, now 6 people have it.

Early morning rise got ready to go to the lab with Zoe and Joe and Tash for bolld work, I asked the Tech if I could see the slides from yesterday but was already thrown out so she said I can look at the slides later when we pick up the test results . Spent most of the time lounging in the pool then had lunch at the camp site restaurant, good food but slow service. I found out I was negative for both Malaria and Typhoid, Tash and Jo positive and Zoe has Amoebiasis! The Senior Tech chatted with me and explained some thing about how they read slides for malaria and showed me a sample in the slide, their microscope here is crap and I struggle to find it.

Back to camp went out at Milly's for a superb dinner, i had the Octopus with Audrey. The trekkers from Mt. Cameroon are back and they all look dirty and tired especially Audrey who came down with both malaria and Typhoid. After dinner I went back to the camp to find Thomas, our new passenger joining us setting his tent up. We travelled together in Central Asia with Drago and was happy to see me, he had no clue I will be here, all he know is I am in Africa somewhere with a truck. Good times were remembered as we looked back on our trip and I introduced him to the rest of the group. Past 1am off to bed, Brian not back yet, fell asleep and Brian arrived around 3 am.

Watched a local football match, the é young players we met, Patrick and Severin are playing for a local club called Victoria United, they had been hanging out with us for the past few days, we went to see their match in the afternoon, the atmosphere is quite lively, the match was good fun and in the end they drew 1 all.
The boys weren't happy, since they drew it meant the other team is 4 points ahead of them. I stayed up to see football matches, Cameroon played and won tonight. THen have to wait q long time to see the Superbowl on cable, Dave and Simon stayed up with me but only up to the end of the 2nd quarter as we were all tired and falling asleep.

I woke up to the news that the Pats lost to the Giants as Brian announced the BBC news ticker. I ruined my day early in the morning. Got myself sorted out qnd reqdy to depart, we leave for Doula today. It was only about an hour and a half drive, we got to Doula it was sticky hot and not much air, we ended up staying in a decent campsite with a nice restaurant overlooking the water, we are spending only one night here as it is too expensive, nothing to see much here anyway, we celebrated Amanda's birthday, watched a few soccer matches in the boys room where there is AC then off to bed, quite hot and sticky.

Thomas showed us some exercises on the monkey bars and pull ups he used to do when he was younger, then we left camp ans shopped for food at Leader Price market, and also said goodbye to Amanda and Annabel. A few hours of driving got us to congested Yaounde, we are staying at the Presbetyrian Mission place.Helped the cook group to cook, then off to bed after the meal.

Di and Audrey and Brian went to town to get forms for Gabon visa and to the police station to certify our passport photocopies so if we get asked by police we can show it to them, police here are unbelievably corrupt, they prey on tourists without their passports with them and fine them heavily. Went for a run and chilled out, when Di came back we filled up the forms and changed money A dollar to 450 dibdobs, quite a good deal, our visas for all 3 countries we are applying for here in Yaounde is a whopping 300 US dollars.
After me and Mark had a good lunch at the camp restaurant I went with Wolfgang to do market shopping for tonight. Cooked with meat for the first time in awhile. A range rover truck pulled in to the campsite, bunch of Norwegian boys driving on their way back to Norway from Cape Town. The next morning went for a run with Brian and showered and did my laundry whilst showering very quickly, you have to pay the water here by the bucket and so I could not be bothered, filled up visa forms for the 2 Congos and hopefullt everything will be lodged by tomorrow then we drive for the weekend to Kribi near the beach for some beach time, again! We come back on Sunday, some people on the group will do their own thing and will rejoin us when we come back Sunday. Tonight we will try to watch the Cameroon VS Ghana soccer match on big screen TV in town and soak up some local atmosphere. Found out also that Marky Mark got his visa thing for OZ approved and waiting to be processed, hopefully this does not mean he will have to leave us for awhile and meet up with the truck at a later time, I will lose a work out buddy.. Sitting on this internet cafe in Yaounde with Audrey and Brian, will chill out and then head back to camp.

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Photos

BAD ROADS
DI SHOWING US THE DEEP CRATERS

BAD ROADS
PHOTO COURTESY OF BRIAN

BAD ROADS
PHOTO COURTESY OF BRIAN

BUSH CAMP AFTER BORDER CROSSING
PHOTO COURTESY OF ANNABEL

DIRT ROADS AND DENSE RAINFOREST
PHOTO COURTESY OF BRIAN