4th May. Masuku Hotel, Franceville, Gabon

Another post. Sorry about the lack of photos. The journey so far has been quite full on. Hope to get a bit of time shortly to catch up. Connections here aren't the best as well.

29^th April. Reserve de Lifini, Central ROC

S03 16'18.9” E015 28'28.6

After missing the gorillas in Rwanda 4 years ago this was an opportunity to see some lowland ones. Other overlanders had written how nice it was camping by Lac Bleu making us decide to spend a few nights here and unwind. Unfortunately the situation has changed since that report and and camping is not usually allowed and if so, the only place to stay is next to the ecoguardes lodging. Not quite what we expected. Somehow the pitch and the reality is somewhat different. Tomorrow we hope to see some young gorillas and in the afternoon will drive to the part of the park where the males are normally roaming. The park scenically is beautiful. So African we expect to see giraffe's heads gazing above the foliage. The land all the way from Brazzaville and around the park is almost devoid of trees, just rolling grassland.

30^th April. Reserve de Lifini

Looking back at the crossing of the Congo River, despite the frustration, bribes, heat and reliance on other people due to the language barrier, the positives outweighed the negatives substantially. Mary and her side kick Oscar were invaluable. What took 4 days could easily have taken weeks as has happened to other overlanders. You realize this could take a while when you walk into the offices of the port authority and there is not one computer in the building. Some paperwork has to have 6 carbon copies. People you need to sign papers have gone AWOL. Yet the actual loading of the van onto the barge Kinshasa side took 10 minutes. The word was things are easier on the Brazzaville side, with the low water level we had to scramble over rocks to get ashore then the officious immigration bloke hit us with “Where is your hotel immigration?” in French of course, we tried to explain our situation to no avail. The guide book's phone numbers were out of date and we dreaded the thought of having to return to DRC. Then he ordered a bloke to take us up to immigration headquarters where once again the language barrier was a major problem. Then it suddenly all changed: this lady came up and asked us in English what our problem was, we explained and once that was relayed to the OIC he stamped the passports, arranged for the lady's brother to take us to the nearest hotel. As luck would have it, the Commodore Hotel was a stones throw from the port which I discovered the next morning when I did a look around, and on the water, some 6 barges out into the river, sat the bakkie.

That morning, Joan stayed in the A/C cooled room while I once again went from office to office with the aid of a young bloke seconded to help me, and before lunch the paperwork was all finished. Then another problem arose: getting the vehicle off the barge. Being so far out and the cranes not seeming to be doing any work that was our next obstacle. Then Leon came to the rescue. A 3 stripe policeman who spoke pretty good English, he took it upon himself to try and persuade the head of logistics at the port to use a tug to get the barge closer to shore. Twenty minutes of discussions ended with the bloke agreeing, and by the time we had walked back down to the barge, the tug was already there manouvering into position so as to turn it around and push toward the wharf. Even this took quite a while as the flow of the river is strong, the barges are long and our car happened to be on the wrong end which meant a lot of manouvring before it was able to come close enough. Four blokes hooked the clamps over the wheels and before we knew, it was ashore. A few more 'transport fees' and we were off. Unbeknown to us at the time but the following Mon & Tues were public holidays and we would have been lucky to get it off until later in the week.

Then it was our turn to have a bit of luck. We happened to drive past the Gabon embassy where we needed to get visas, being after 3.30 the chance of them being open were slim. But they were, we thought at least if we would get them in we may have them back by the following Monday. The lady asked us to wait, and 30 minutes later we had our Gabon Visas!

The Hotel Hippocampe is the place where overlanders congregate in Brazzaville, Oliver, the owner, is a Frenchman who has been amazingly helpful to travellers over the years. The also have great Vietnamese buffets on Fri & Sat nights. After slim pickings the previous 5 days it was welcome.

The next day we were able to pick up the Carte Rose insurance for next 5 countries for CPT, get SIM card, book for the gorillas and do some shopping. Yesterday we visited the rapids downstream from Brazzaville, impressive, then headed north. Potholed road in places paid a toll on the bakie with our exhaust pipe coming adrift near the manifold. Might scare the gorillas.

7.30pm The young orphaned gorillas were quite amusing. So like human children with their antics. The visitors were on one side of a 15 metre stream the apes on the other. When they reach 6 yrs of age they are released in another section of the park. That section is where we are tonight. Tomorrow we hope to see Sid, the silverback.

One final aspect of the Kinshasa waterfront that I didn't mention. Amongst the maelstrom of humanity that was 'the Beach', when the ferry came in, we would see rows of people emerging from the boat, holding the shoulder of the person in front of them. The leader seemed to know the ropes. All had a sizeable load on their back covered in hessian. Joan had to ask Mary what it was all about. She said that handicapped people can get on to the ferry for free on either side of the river. They are used as mules to convey freight.

1^st May. Bush Camp west of Okoyo, ROC

S01 29'31.6” E015 02'34.9”

Sid didn't let us down. His home is an island in another part of the park. Until the orphans turn 6 he is on his own. There is a feeding platform where the warders supplement his diet and it is there we can get a good look at this massive creature. In fact a little too close for me as visitors are taken to within a couple of metres of him in a boat. It is common knowledge not to stare at the silverbacks but it is hard not to, he is such an beautiful animal. He showed his disgust of us staring by throwing a couple of oranges at us, one collecting Joan on her shoulder. The visit to the reserve cost $240 for the 2 of us,much cheaper than what you would pay to see the mountain gorillas in Ruwenzori, maybe not as authentic but we were more than happy.

Then it was back on the road heading for the Gabon border some 500kms away. Beautiful rolling country with many villages on either side of the highway. As we approached Oyo which was the most eastern place before heading northwards, we were amused to see, in the middle of nothing, a large air traffic control tower and alongside it a 3 storey high glass covered terminal with a fashionable wavy roof. The place was empty as was this new hotel complex nearby. Then it dawned on us: Oyo was the home town of the president. In the town itself have been and are being built these official buildings all built on the style of US Southern cotton estates with columns and the such. Incongruous. A pity they weren't at least build with an African touch.

3^rd May. Lekoni Hotel, Gabon.

A very testing day yesterday. It started well, clearing customs and police control with no hassles unlike the previous night when the immigration official in his little grass hut demanded $40 for him to stamp our passports. 'No' means no in French & English repeated many times, Joan lost her cool, it came down to $20, she stormed out scaring the wife & kids, then it became nothing except a plea for something, still 'No!' We drove on to our bush camp.

The Chinese are improving the road up until about 30kms from the border. Due to a mistranslation we headed off on the wrong rough track for about 10kms until a truck driver working on the road explained for us to go back. What we had interpreted as a long detour should have been a very short one of 200 metres or so. Then it was over the bridge into deep sand. Sand is no bother but the wheel tracks were so deep from passing trucks that it is very easy to become stuck high and dry. Often there was no alternative track to take. This happened 5 times, each time a group of children and youths would appear, grab the shovel from me, and take over. Perhaps age still does matter here. One group helped us three times and didn't demand anything. We gave them water, some biscuits and $10 or so to share between them. But even then they weren't going to leave us: an older man jumped in the cab with two others riding shotgun and we headed north with them pointing out the best route. They would have gone kilometres past their village but were quite happy to walk back. This happened once again when we were getting close to the Gabon border with a young bloke accompanying us for a long distance until he could show us a track we would have ignored but proved to be firm with no sand patches.

After that respite sand continued right to the border when with one last attempt to entrap us failing, the road became a two lane newly formed asphalt, markings, signposts, the lot as we entered Gabon.

Immigration was at nearby Lekoni. By the time all was completed it was dark, we were hot, dirty and weary. The Lekoni Hotel is not the Ritz but it has A/C, no mosquitoes in the room, cold beer and HOT WATER! For the 2^nd time since leaving Windhoek we relished the fact. All for $30.

3^rd May. Hotel Masuku, Franceville, Gabon.

Another hotel that welcomes the trickle of overlanders that head via West Africa. With Angola and now DRC making it very difficult for those heading down Africa to obtain visas, not many people are coming this way.

A very pleasant short drive from Lekoni to Franceville this morning through mist covered rolling green hills then at times dense tropical jungle. A taste of what is to come.

After sorting out Hotel Masuku, we needed to find a mechanic and welder to repair the exhaust. Hard to find mechanic shops as a lot of the work is done on the side of the road, we found one such bloke who did the work professionally but as can be expected with exhaust systems where the heat welds the nuts on to the bolts, a couple were sheared off which meant more extra work getting them extracted. The break incidentally was in an awkward position meaning the manifold as well had to be taken off. Five hours later we had a vehicle that it was possible to listen to audio books as we went along once more. Their effort was much appreciated.