togo

Togo

Sunday 13th January 2008:

With Ghana behind us we drove down the narrow jungle track to the Togolese Immigration hut. Ross jumped out and after about 45minutes of persuasion, we got our SA passports stamped with our entry stamp. Hooray we're in Togo at last. Next we needed to get the carnet stamped, which should happen in the dark hut next door, but the Customs twit had no stamp and was only interested in a New Year's present. We therefore ignored him and drove off hoping to find another Customs point further into Togo. By now it was getting dark and we realised we had crossed into Togo in one of the most remote side entries, probably lucky for us. Duzi2 had to climb up steeply and turn around some pretty hectic tight bends. We got to Adeta, where we managed to get our carnet stamped and then headed on to Kpalime (Pal-i-may). Kpalime is the capital of the cocoa country and of the entire fruit growing area selling delicious, huge queen pineapples, plantains, paw-paws and yams. It was now late and dark so we pulled into a well lit hotel, Grand Hotel du 30 Aout, and asked if we could camp for the night. They agreed for a fee of CFA 5000. We had the entire carpark to ourselves and our own night watchman to guard us. They opened up a room for us to shower in, complete with cockroaches. After a good clean and looking less brown we collapsed into the tent.

Monday 14th January 2008: Grand Hotel du 30 Aout, Kpalime, Togo

GPS Info: N06° 53' 30.2" E00° 38' 22.8"

Miles Today: 86 Total Miles: 10 106

After nice South African muesli for breakfast, thanks to Shoprite, we filtered more water to full up the main water tank and admired some local artwork displayed in the hotel. We bought our first souvenir form West Africa, a beautiful painting of a typical village scene. We set off on the good road to Lome, via Assahoun.

Entering Lome we managed to get totally jammed in the middle of Lome central market, Grand Marche, for at least an hour and a half! It was complete chaos with no space for cars let alone trucks, ice-cream carts, people carrying mattrases on their heads and everything else under the sun. We finally popped out the other side on to Lome's yellowy coloured sandy beaches, which were full of people sitting in groups, either cleaning nets or just gathering together.

We needed to exchanged our Ghana Cedi into CFA, but the banks were not interested in dealing with GhC, apparently this is the case in all banks in Togo. Managed to eventually change it on the street outside and then went looking for Chez Alice and her famous coffee and cake. As we pulled into Chez Alice we saw the familiar yellow Oasis Overland truck already parked there. We were shown to the place we could camp in, on a separate site which looked like where the workers and their families lived. It was CFA 2000 to camp and CFA 3500 to take a room, with a shower cubicle attached. Hard one...we took the room with a mozzie net and a ceiling fan as there was no air movement. Ross was very keen to try her coffee and cake, recommended by Raulf in Mauritania. Guess what, they were out of cake. After telling them we'd been longing for their cake since Mauritania, they instantly managed to produce some cake. Not quite what we were expecting or could identify, but cake none the less, which Ross enjoyed. My how standards have dropped in this trip. Ross filled up the wash bucket from the well and we cleaned up before going to have some schnitzel, chips and salad. The meal was very tasty and huge, (CFA3000 and CFA3800).

With the fan on full and a mozzie coil burning we tried to sleep under the net.

Tuesday 15th January 2008: Chez Alice, Lome, Togo

GPS Info: N06° 10' 04.7" E01° 20' 25.6"

Miles Today: 178 Total Miles: 10 284

Up early as we wanted to cross the border into Benin as early as possible. Neither of us slept very well last night and mozzies managed to get into the net so thank goodness for our sprays, bought at Shoprite and Game. We stopped off to see Lac Togo at a place called Auberge du Lac (N06 13' 01.3" E01 27' 00.3"), costing CFA 2 500p/p to camp or CFA 10 000/room. This place looked idyllic right on the lake shore, but there was a glare and a thick fog so we didn't really have much visibility. There were people on boats punting on the lakefloor as they silently sailed passed.

We drove through Aneho and suddenly found ourselves at Hilakondji, the border of Togo and Benin. The Togolese side of the border crossing was very quick, friendly and efficient. We were through this border in record time of about 10 to 15 minutes.