Two great days (Day 2)

Read / lees in : Nederlands

At the end of a debilitating day, both for me and the Edmobile, I finally reached the regional capital Labé. Because not having street lighting the city looked quite ominous. Fortunately I found a hotel quickly, but unfortunately it was booked solid. After he searched in Google maps for ten minutes the receptionist pointed out another hotel on the map, a couple of blocks down the street. He also offered to call me a taxi. I told him I had my own set of wheels. But he replied that it would be easier to take a cab, because this would allow me to book a room there and then return to get my car. As the logic of that was beyond me I drove over myself. That hotel was full too, just like all other hotels in the city. Apparently it was election time and the next day the president was coming over to lie to the good people of Labé, so the town was packed.

Camping

I tested my luck in Pita, about forty kilometers further heading to the capital Conakry. Both hotels there didn’t have vacancy either. But one of them had a surrounding wall and a garden, in which I was allowed to pitch my tent at room rate. Although the owner wondered what I would do in case it would rain during the night. My plans were to continue to Conakry where I’d get visas for Sierra Leone and Liberia. But the only bridge, that you have to pass to get there, had collapsed a few days earlier under the weight of a lorry. The owner of the hotel advised me to wait until the construction of a new bridge was complete before continuing my journey. Exhausted I crawled into my tent, wondering if I had somehow gotten into a bad episode of the Twilight Zone.

With my tail between my legs

In the morning I decided not to wait for the new bridge being built but to head north, in the direction of Guinea Bissau. I thought it would be best to leave the country as quickly as I could and to scratch Sierra Leone and Liberia off my list as well. I think those countries are even poorer, with possibly probably surely worse roads. Sierra Leone is supposed to have the most beautiful beaches of Africa, but given that it was rainy season I really never believed I would make use of them anyway. The N5 north to Koundara was as good as the road the day before was bad. With special thanks to the Chinese, xiè xie. I moved into the Hotel de Ville where I had a bathroom without running water at my disposal and where the restaurant served only fried eggs. Germany played the only game it won at the World Cup football that night, which made the people around me so happy they jumped around like lunatics. That’s when I was sure about it: ‘Guinea Conakry really is no country for me’.