Sacred Crocodiles at Sabou

---

We left Ouagga on Christmas Eve, en route for Sabou, about 90 km west of Ouagga and on the way to the Ghanian Border. We thought it was about time we tried to see some big African wildlife and had read of the sacred crocodile lake at Sabou, which sounded quite naff in the guide book: 'you arrive, you're assailed by kids from whom you buy a live chicken at a sacrificial price, it's fed to a croc which lumbers out of the water and photos are taken of you, them and, grinning the widest, the croc'. So, prepared for a real tourist trap we tentatively drove into town - but where were the kids assailing us with their live chickens? I think we must have picked a very quiet day because it was all we could do to find one guide. We duly paid our money, the guide went off to get the sacrificial live chicken (I didn't think the chicken would really be alive, but alas it was) and we followed him to the edge of the lake, cameras in hand. They did a bit of taunting and dangling of dead chicken parts, just to get the crocs interested and lo and behold before we knew it there were about 4 or 5 basking on the edge of the lake. We were busy watching & snapping the mummy croc and her babies - or snapping their snapping jaws which were pretty awesome, when a big old grandfather croc shot out of the water and slyly took the live chicken in one mouthful, when everyone's backs were turned. Busy filming with the camcorder, I let out an almighty scream and turned my journalistic attention to the ghoulish matter of filming the poor chickens last seconds, of which I am not at all proud! We then did the obligatory pics of me and croc and Neil and croc (hope to be loading some piccys tomorrow folks) before we departed. We met, quite by chance, an english woman and her french partner who had bought some land from the chief of the local village and were busy setting up a campsite for travellers on the edge of the lake. It was in its very early stages, otherwise we would have spent the night, but it was fascinating to learn from her all about the special relationship the villagers enjoyed with the crocodiles. We were astonished at how close the local kids were playing to the lake and she explained that the crocodiles had never been known to harm any of the villagers and that was why they, in turn, continued with the live sacrifices. We wished them well with their business venture - it's so ideally placed en route to the Ghanaian border - and made for the border ourselves.

---

Comments

[christine]

crazy
You are the craziest person i know who would be dumb enough to stand over a crocidile. anyways good job