Leaving Freetown and heading north

Remember that geographically Sierra Leone is about the same size as the Navajo Nation but has 7 million people instead of 200,000. Although a good chuck of the 7 million live in Freetown, there are still lot of people living in district towns and the many villages. Unfortunately, the road situation is similar to Navajo so that there are paved roads to the few bigger district capitals and everything else is dirt.

I left Freetown last Monday for Kabala, 189 miles away. This is, incidentally, similar to the distance between Chinle and Flagstaff. The road is paved the whole way and even starts as a 4 lane toll road thanks to the Chinese. But it fairly quickly goes to 2 lanes and after Makeni has frequent treacherous potholes.

Traveling up country is not undertaken casually. I was advised to take a supply of water and extra food.

When the road narrowed for a single lane colonial era bridge, vendors flocked to the vehicles waiting to cross.

Local cashews and peanuts – very tasty!

I thought this bridge was scary. I had no idea what lay ahead.

All along the way there were people selling mangoes on the side of the road. Mangos are just coming into season and it’s sort of like zucchinis. You can hardly give them away. People were also selling bags of home made charcoal. We saw one guy holding up some kind of dead animal – bush meat for sale. It was likely a cane rat.

Horses were rare but cows, goats, sheep, chickens, and ducks had to be avoided on the road. The countryside was flat until we reached further north and stony hills emerged.

As we got further north, we encountered frequent road blocks. Some were police stopping vehicles with a rope across the road to collect a “tax.” I heard different stories about the tax. Some said the money was used for community projects, others were convinced much of the money went into police pockets. Other roadblocks were set up by school age boys to collect a “donation.” Our driver who is originally from the area said there was a story when he was growing up that a boy was given $200 by a tourist he stopped and it changed his life. When our driver tried setting up a home made road block, his mother caught him and gave him a hiding. He tried it again and a police officer caught him and gave him a hiding. He decided to pursue ways to make money that didn’t involve getting a hiding.

After 4 hours of driving, we arrived in Kabala, a lovely area, and went to our hotel. Unfortunately, we discovered that electricity would be limited to 7pm-1am and that water from the tap would also be limited. It turned out that electricity usually went off at at 11pm (the room would immediately become an airless sweaty place) and there would never be any water from any tap. Fortunately, I was prepared with many practical items gifted to me by thoughtful people prior to my departure. The flashlight and solar lantern, the quick dry towels, the permethrin coated sleep sack all came in handy. Once you’ve modified your expectations of the faucet and get a bucket of water, bathing and flushing are easily accomplished. Charging various electronics is harder with the limited hours of electricity but at least I had a backup battery.

More to come on Kabala and the other areas I visited.