West to Limbé

  Limbé, Cameroon
Wednesday, August 27, 2008

We left Douala for a few hours today, and saw a bit of both north-western and rural Cameroon. This morning it was Mr. Hongerloot who had the intestinal difficulties. He didn't feel well enough to leave the hotel, so just the Harpers and I would make the expedition. But we encountered another Cameroonian misunderstanding that became apparent first thing in the morning. I had explained that the camp would end yesterday evening. Today I intended to have a full day to show our visitors, two of whom who had come almost entirely at their own expense, someplace other than Douala, and not in the usual cramped uncomfortable conditions they've had so far. I decided that Limbé, not far to the north, would be a good choice, and let Mr. Mabout know so. Yesterday M. Mabout had asked to see me and asked if other members could also go to Limbé with their children at their own expense. Of course I had no objection to that.
 
He asked what kind of transportation we needed and I asked him to arrange a Chinese mini-bus (holds about 8 people in cramped conditions or 4 or 5 in comfortable conditions), because I didn't want to be cramped for 4 hours on the way up to and back from Limbé. He asked what to do if he couldn't find one of those that would make the trip, and I replied we could get a larger van and perhaps take a few other people with us.
 
This morning he arrived with a taxi-van (just a normal sized van) that is legally capable of carrying 19 people in the usual very cramped African conditions. And when we arrived at the van, we saw that virtually the entire camp was in it: campers, adult staff, kitchen crew and a few extra people as well. There were already 20 people in the van, and we three (supposed to be four) were expected to squeeze in over and above that number. Since riding in our van would be free, my instructions had been misunderstood in the most economically advantageous manner. So much for traveling with some space....
 
The road leading west out of Douala requires crossing the bridge over the Wouri River. It is always congested and today was not exception. Beyond the bridge, the road has some very rough patches with giant holes filled with rain water. It took us a whole hour just to get out of the city.

The road out of Douala

We had one fender bender, when our van ran into a taxi in front of us. After stopping in the middle of the road and bringing our lane to a complete stop, but finding no visible damage, everyone just drove on.
 
At one point the driver stopped to break a larger bill and get some change. This was important to him, because he knew he was going to be hit several times for bribes by police and military officers at various checkpoints and he needed to have exact change, otherwise they would round the amounts up for him. Drivers routinely calculate into the prices they charge their clients, the amounts that will be extorted from them by the forces of law and order....
 
About 15 minutes out of Douala we came to the Mungo River, but not before having to stop at three different checkpoints each of which required a bribe. The driver muttered as he got back in after the third one "are these security checks or toll booths?" They police made no pretense of what they wanted.
 
I noticed there was a new bridge over the Mungo, and I asked about it. The old bridge had been in terrible shape, many of the guard rails and even hand rails were gone, the bridge dated from the German colonial period prior to 1918. Mr. Mabout said the new bridge was complete about a year ago by the Canadians. The old one had been completely destroyed when a fuel tanker hit a barrier at the bridge and exploded, killing quite a number of people and dropping the bridge in the river.
 
Once we crossed the new bridge we were in English-speaking Cameroon; the section that had belonged to Germany and then had gone to England as part of the spoils of WWI. There were many fewer problems with the police. There was a checkpoint shortly after the bridge and when the policeman saw us in the van, he simply waved us on through. That never happens on the French side. A few kilometers later we came to a second checkpoint. Someone in the van said "they will stop us at this checkpoint for sure." But no, again we were simply waved on through. This surprised even the Cameroonians. Only once were we stopped in the English zone, on the way back to Douala. As the driver got back in the van after showing his papers, I asked if it was a security check or a toll booth and he replied it was a real security check.
 
We drove by some large plantations, bananas, palm trees and rubber trees. The banana plantation had a big Del Monte sign on it. We could see the cuts on the rubber tree trunks where the rubber sap is channeled and collected. It was a very beautiful stretch of road. We had to pay an actual toll both going and coming, 500 CFA - about $1.25. At the toll stop, Mr. Mabout bought a liter of "palm wine" in a plastic container. This beverage, which has a light alcohol content, is made from the fermented sap of palm trees, in this area usually the oil palm tree. The sellers wanted a 300 Franc deposit on the container, but Mr. Mabout talked him out of it and said he would return it on the way back down.
 
We drove along below and then up into the foothills of Mt Cameroon, which was right above us but which we couldn't see, covered as it was by clouds. It is an active volcano and occasionally pours out lava. Two or three years ago a part of Limbé was destroyed by a lava flow. I recall having seen the red glow on a clear night even in Douala. We drove through some beautiful areas of thick virgin rainforest, on slopes that were too steep to be of use to people and so hadn't been cleared like the rest of the land. Virgin jungle is a pretty hostile environment up close, but very beautiful from a distance.
 
Finally we arrived in Limbé and drove straight to the endangered animal park. It takes in endangered animals, orphaned or wounded until they can grow strong enough to be returned to the wild. It cost 100 CFA Francs per Cameroonian child (under 12 years of age), 300 CFA Francs per Cameroonian adult (12 and over), and 3000 Francs for foreigners. Ka-Ching! Mr. Mabout reflexively trying to save money, tried to convince the ticket agent that we should really count as Cameroonian residents (half the foreigner price), but I told him not to bother, we'd pay.
 
The park was small, but surprisingly interesting. There were bushbucks, several kinds of monkeys, chimpanzees making a terrible racket but fascinating to watch,

Drills in their enclosure

baboons, drills (similar to baboons but with amazing leathery faces), a large python, several species of crocodile, hundreds of beautiful parrots that had been seized by customs agents before they could be illegally exported, and a number of lowland gorillas.

A drill looking through the electric fence

All these animals are native to Cameroon, mostly the Mt Cameroon area. For some of the campers it was the first time they had seen these animals up close. There was a large sign near the gorilla area that said "Caution, the animals throw rocks." Mr. Mabout and Mr. Bikoé who had been here together before, had already told me to be careful because the gorillas had thrown rocks at them the last time they were here. It was probably a behavior learned from humans who threw the rocks at them first. In any event, no rocks were thrown this time. Watching apes and monkeys is always interesting because of the behaviors and postures they have which are similar their human counterparts. We spent about an hour and a half walking through the park.

The group at the wildlife park

 
We repacked ourselves into the van and drove a few more kilometers north to a place where we could walk on the beach, also a new or at least very infrequent opportunity for the campers.

Contemplating the ocean

Then it was time to start the long trip back to Douala. We stopped very near the toll passage to buy some bread and bananas. It was about 1:00 pm by this time, they wanted to finish the palm wine in order to return the bottle, and they didn't want to drink it on an empty stomach. The ladies had brought along some meatballs which when wrapped in piece of white bread made a lunch sandwich for the Cameroonians. We three visitors munched on Slim Jims and bananas and drank our bottled water. Daniel tried a small sip of the palm wine just to taste it, but I passed. It often has undesirable side effects on people not used to it.
 
We had five security checks on the way back to Douala. If I didn't miscount, that made eight in all on a rather short trip.

back to Douala

 We were back at our hotel a little after 2:00 pm. Bernard still didn't feel up to eating, so just Daniel and Cindy and I took a taxi over to the Meridien Hotel a few blocks away for lunch. They have a pizza oven at their pool-side grill. The Meridien is the best hotel in Douala and a very pleasant place to spend some time. We really enjoyed our leisurely pizza lunch and talked over the experiences of the day and the whole trip. Since we started late, we didn't finish "lunch" until after 4:00 pm - we're eating on French hours here.
 
I had a visit at the hotel with several church members starting a little before 5. We weren't very hungry in the evening so we didn't have dinner until about 8:30 and we ate very lightly. By this time Mr. Hongerloot felt enough better to sample the salad bar - we were happy he was feeling better.
 
Tomorrow will be our departure day. We'll meet some of our old friends from the customs and immigration service at the airport on our way out - it's a small world at the Douala airport. That could be interesting.