River Senegal in Western Mali

Malian woman

19 january. manantali to kita

After the long day on the road yesterday, we did a short drive down to Kita, aiming to spend the afternoon looking around the town. It didn’t take long.

We started off camping in the courtyard off the Relais Touristique, another run down affair. The swimming pool in the courtyard is empty and seems now to be a play thing for local kids to dare each other how far towards the deep end they can jump off the side. The rooms probably look better in the light of the one bulb on the end of the bare wire that illumintes them than if they were well lit. The French lady who eventually took the room we decided to pass on (and who had clearly stayed here before) spent her first hour in the hotel on her hands and knees scrubbing her room to a standard of cleanliness she could live with.

So we start off in the courtyard and put up the tent. There’s a nightclub beside the hotel and at 5pm it started up, just after the revving of motorbike engines in the street outside heralded the arrival of 150 wedding guests. They poured into the nightclub. Their children, quickly finding us sitting round the back, poured around us. Why bother risking making fools of yourselves trying to dance in front of the girls when you can watch Toubab TV for an hour or so? We end up sitting on the spare wheel on the bonnet when the entire wedding party congregate around the pool for drinks and food. We don’t feel like joining in.

When the disco starts up again at 9pm and promises to carry on until at least 3am, we relent and take a room, haggling down the price to a reasonable level and manage to get some sleep.

Overlander Info:

If you’d like to experience the delights of the Relais Touristique in Kita...

GPS : N 13°02.350 W009°29.238

20 january. kita to bamako

We’re not sorry to leave Kita. As on previous days, we drive past burning fires beside the piste. There seems to be 3 reasons for the fires: 1) the bush being burnt back from the side of the road or railway line, 2) the cotton fields being burnt now that the harvest is in or 3), villagers burning their rubbish beside their houses. In all, along much of the 600 km or so we’ve travelled in the last few days, we’ve driven past alot of burnt back scrubland.

The start of the tarmac announces we are nearing Bamako. We stop for lunch and watch ATT, the Malian President with the snappy monikar (Amadou Tournani Toure), deliver his Army Day national holiday speech to the nation while we eat our brochettes and chips. The red sauce beside the mustard on the side of the bowl we mistake for ketchup. Woaw! Big mistake - it packs a killer punch. I have to wash it down with my 7.5 percent Guinness served in a glass full of ice. We hum along to the National Anthem.

We’ve heard many great things about Bamako, how it’s very laid back and a wonderful place to visit. As we drive through it heading for one of the two bridges that span the Niger river, we pass through slum areas sitting next to big boulevards, high rise hotels and imposing monuments at major junctions. Apparently, when Mali hosted the African Cup of Nations in 2002, some 30 brand new hotels were built in Bamako to house everyone during the tournament. Most sit empty the majority of the time now, except when the World Social Forum is in town as now.

We cross the river and drive along the south bank of the Niger for 12km to reach Le Cactus campsite. We pull in to find that a couple whose website we have been following on the Overland Network, Jamie and Claire, are here. They’re doing the same route as we are, over the same time frame (a year or so or until the money runs out) in a 30 year old Land Rover ambulance. As they have been a few weeks ahead of us for the last few months (if that makes any sense!) we have been reading their site to try and get information about places we might be going to next. As such, we feel like we’re meeting old friends although we’ve never met. It’s a good time to share a whisky and coke or two.

Le Cactus is also a hotel, run by a Canadian couple, Joan and Andre. They’ve been here for 27 years and come from Pointe Claire in Montreal of all places - where Marie-Jo grew up.

Overlander info:

To get to Le Cactus, cross the Roi Fahd bridge to the south bank of the river and turn right. Follow the road for 12km. GPS : N 12°32.175 W008°02.780. 4,000 CFA per night for a car and 2 people.

21 january. le cactus and bamako

Big cleaning day. We empty the whole of the inside of the Landy onto the tarp and use the compressor to blow dust around the inside of the vehicle and eventially most of it out through the doors. By 5pm, we’ve finished. Oof. A quick shower and we head off into Bamako to meet up with Claire and Jamie and hit the town. And what a relaxed town it is too, chilling under its cloud of smog. A few beers later, we’re wandering dark side streets looking for a restaurant to eat in when we come across a crowd of hundreds of people in the middle of a street. Music is blaring out from a sound system. There’s a TV camera with a bright light providing light in the middle of the throng. It’s a dancing competition, two rows of about 10 girls facing each other jostling for position to try and get in front of the camera. The camerman is fixed on a tall, slim, pretty girl in a tight orange T-shirt. No-one else gets much of a look in. It’s clear who’s going to win this one!

We end up in Chez Thierry, a white-filled European kind of place, but which serves great pizza. The music’s cracking too and the band will be performing at Segou in a couple of weeks time as well. I find out a few days later from the internet that we’ve been listening to Basekou Kouyate (he gave me his card), one of Mali’s best known musicians and renowned ngoni player (the ngoni is a plucked lute - a little instrument that makes a great sound). Paul - http://www.rootsworld.com/rw/africa2.html. The album is available on i-tunes.

22 january. le cactus

Yesterday was the inside of the Landy. To-day is the turn of the outside. Dull, but it’s good to get rid of the dust if only for a few days.

To my surprise and joy, I turn on the laptop to write up the website and find there’s a WIFI connection! I’m sitting in a field near Bamako overlooking the Niger and able to chat to my Dad and brother on Skype. The campsite is next to a large complex built in 2002 for the CAN. We guess they must have put in WIFI at some stage. Anyway, who cares. Free WIFI.

I’m sitting there surfing the internet when Mike and Julia, who we travelled with for 5 weeks through Morocco and Mauritania, pull in. The day keeps getting better. We hadn’t expected to see them again until Segou and it’s great to catch up. We retire to the bar.

Le Cactus is renowned for it’s all you can eat Sunday buffet. It might be 9,000 CFA each, but it’s well worth it. Even Mike can’t eat any more. We all sit around like beached whales for the rest of the day, just about rustling up enough energy to play cards in the evening.

Bushfire

They do like a fire round here!

"More dust, dust, glorious dust on it's way"

Cleaning out the dust at Le Cactus, Bamako