ITINERARY

Yesterday we got back from our five-day trip into the wild, or, in other words, to Lopé National Park in the centre of Gabon. We decided to drive there, even though it's almost 400 kilometres, because we really felt like travelling a bit on our own, seeing the country, enjoying the freedom that a car inevitably gives you.

The plan was to spend five days travelling: on Saturday we arrived in Lopé village, we spend Sunday wondering around the area, on Monday morning we left for Mikongo (a camp in the jungle) and spend the night there, Tuesday afternoon we came back to Lopé and Wednesday morning we set off for Libreville again.

The itinerary was as follows:
- from Libreville to Ntoum (bumpy asphalted road, full of holes, drive carefully);
- from Ntoum to Bifoun, driving through the Equator and through the villages of Oyane 2, Oyane 1, Oyan, Oyane 4 in this order, I believe; the road is very good and asphalted;
- in Bifoun we turned left and continued towards Ndjolé;
- the bit right outside of Ndjolé was the worst part of the whole trip: the road was not asphalted, and it was made up of holes, dust was everywhere and there was a lot of traffic; we continued until Alembé;
- in Alembé we turned right and on to the dusty dusty road (most of it full of holes as well) which took us to the village of Lopé and the park itself (100 kilometres of very bumpy ride).

We left home at 6:15 am and reached our destination at 4: 45 pm.

Our provisions consisted of:
- clothes: including warm clothes (which proved to be very important, later I'll explain why) and linen and breathable clothes in khaki, beige and black to use in the jungle (long sleaves essential!) and boots of course;
- thin sleeping bags and pillows (you never know what sleeps in your bed with you);
- 60 litres of gas;
- 15 litres of tap water (to wash our teeth, hands and plates - you never know what swims in the tap water outside of Libreville and you certainly don't want to swallow it);
- 30 litres of bottled drinking water;
- foods and fruits;
- lots of plastic bags, napkins, scotch tape and the like;
- torches and binoculars;
- all kinds of medicines, including a lot of mosquito spray;
- tools for the car (which proved to be completely useless in the face of car damage).

What we forgot was a mosquito net and this was a big mistake. Always travel with a mosquito net in Africa!

The trip was great and we had a wonderful time. I'll keep on writing so stay tuned. :) While waiting for new posts you might want to take a look at my new picasa.