IN THE JUNGLE, THE MIGHTY JUNGLE...

Ever since we went to the Lope National Park I've wanted to write a post on the jungle. It's so much more than just a forest - it's a living organism and it deserves a great deal of respect. Because if left alone in the jungle, let's face it, we die.

Although it sounds kind of dramatic, it's simply true. During one of our outings in Mikongo, I imagined the following situation: our perfectly camouflaged guides suddenly disappear. We start looking around but they are nowhere to be found. What do we do? Which way to go? No sir!, there is no way we can get back to the camp, the jungle is full of little paths made by animals, we can't tell one from another. Yes, we die.

The trips are made in small groups, four people maximum. There are two guides, one leading the group, the other one behind the tourists. They are our ears and eyes, as we truly are blind and deaf in the jungle. They can see the most invisible things: a frog that looks like a leaf or a gorilla's nest. Every few metres they stop and listen - which path should we take? They can hear gorillas banging on their chests, they can hear an ape moving behind a curtain of green. And they themselves are completely invisible (see picture on the right). Very carefully they led us into the forest, walking slowly and silently, talking in whisper. Impressive.

Even though we saw very few animals (dry season!), the jungle experience compensated for that fully: the plants were simply awesome. Tree of adultery with ants living inside. In the old days women were punished for adultery by being tied to that very tree (see picture on the left). The healing tree, its resin red as blood. Desinfects wounds, helps the healing process. Lianas strangling trees. Grass that cuts your skin. Enormous trees.

Our guides turned out to be gentlemen, too. They informed Jandro that I should walk in front of him in case we spotted animals (like this I would've seen them first). They also asked my boyfriend if he wanted to accompany me behind a tree so that I could pee. And when I decided to do it (on my own, mind you!), they, sitting on a fallen tree trunk, turned round and, very determined, looked up, so that they would see nothing. They wouldn't turn back until they were absolutely sure I was fully dressed (why would I emerge from behind the tree anything but fully dressed I don't know).

We thus walked and walked and tracked gorillas, thinking how far away we were from everything. And even though we looked and felt quite out of place in this forest of which we know and understand so little, we loved the experience and are determined to come back; in the end it's not difficult: I can see the forest out of the living-room window...

Photos: Jandro

THE WHEELS OF THE CAR GO ROUND AND ROUND

In Africa, going on a trip by car is no simple matter. Even so, we decided to do nearly a thousand kilometres in five days. The car is a Toyota Prado, with four-wheel drive and whatnot. My "and whatnot" accidentally characterises rather accurately our knowledge of the car and its insides: we don't even know how to use the four-wheel drive thing yet. We went anyway.

We bought some tools and car appliances which might come in handy: screwdrivers, triangles, a funnel... We borrowed a jack which for some reason Spanish people call gato - "cat". We put some air into the spare wheel. We put some air into the regular wheels. We bought sixty litres of gas to take with us. We set off.

The roads are diffcult most of the time. Either there is no asphalt (in the dry season the amounts of dust are incredible) or it is full of holes and you have to jump from one side of the road to the other. Or both. There isn't very much traffic but there are extremely many grumiere trucks (see picture on the right) which trasport huge tree trunks. Most of them were quite nice to us and we had polite car conversations:

Us: Honk honk? ("Can we pass?")
Truck: Honk honk. ("Yes, go.")
Us: Honk honk! ("Thank you!")
Truck: Honk honk! ("You're welcome!")

Others would drive in the middle of the road so that nobody could overtake.

The trip was quite all right (though very tiring for Jandro, as I don't drive) and it was only the night before our departure that we noticed something strange. An indicator in the car lit up and we found ourselves facing a dreadfully orange "T-BELT" sign. After figuring out what on Earth a T-BELT might be (transmission belt or whatever, we thought), we got a bit nervous. 400 kilometres ahead of us and the car says we should change the transmission belt NOW. Oh my.

We went to the guy responsible for our lodgings and asked if there were any mechanics in the Lope village. "I will call". He called. No luck, user unavailable. "We will go to the mechanic's house." Ok, let's. From a beautiful woman who opened the mechanic's door we found out that he was travelling but he would come back the next day. If we were willing to wait. We weren't. We called another person. The guy agreed to see us but couldn't promise anything.

"The transmission belt looks fine," we found out (we had changed it about a month ago!). "Maybe it's a little loose, I can fix it, just give me some tools." We took out our sad little set of tools which of course proved to be useless. The man offered to take us to his friend who had the tools. All four of us went to the village bar/shop where the tool guy was expected to appear. We waited for half an hour and had some sodas, watching the village life while the village life was watching us. The man came and said he wouldn't give our "mechanic" his tools, as the problem was not the transmission belt but something else and we could talk to him about it if we want to. He was very unfriendly. The "mechanic" tried to persuade him but was unsuccessful.

By that time the situation was as follows: our landlord, who was still tagging along, couldn't fix the problem and had no tools; the "mechanic" could fix the problem but had no tools; we couldn't fix anything and to top it all off had no tools; and the guy who had the tools wouldn't help. Seems hopeless but we didn't have many options. Our guy told us we shouldn't let the other man touch our car because he just wanted our money. Relucantly, we agreed and just drove him home. He told us we should be able to get to Libreville. And he wouldn't accept money from us claming he hadn't done anything. Good guy, in the end.

What scared us most was that the car would break in the middle of nowhere. There is no road assistance in Africa and if you get stuck in a place you might be stuck there for days. Nothing of the kind happened, though, and we safely reached Libreville the next day. The car did start making funny noises after around 100 kilometres and it turned out the air filter had a substantial hole. There was nobody we could call so we just put some masking tape round it. It worked. We're the official car fixers from now on.

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.