08 Jan Senegal: Dakar, the gateway to Africa

Today I am going to make a tour of some areas of Senegal, starting with Dakar and its surroundings, so with the permission (and without it) of the rebels of the MFDC, I will leave what I like the most in Senegal, La Casamance, for next time.

The truth is that it's been almost a year since the last time I was there, but Dakar... there's something about it.

In the city you can do a thousand things, go out for dinner at Chez Katia, get petrol in Ozio, make you dance mbalax in Le Patio, lose your head in Texas, find it again in Scala (well, no, here you'll lose it again, for sure).........,

And in the morning, if you didn't drink too many flags (local beer) the night before, you can even visit Goré Island, a World Heritage Site, where the slaves left for America,

Watch a Senegalese wrestling match, shop at the Kermel market or simply, at sunset, go to the corniche to watch the fishermen return in their pirogues.

To get out of Dakar, located at the tip of the Cape Verde Peninsula, there are two options: The first option is to study the tides (be careful, you may get stuck) and leave via Yoff beach. You'll have to get up early, but it's worth it.

By the beach, if you have done the study (I repeat, eye ....), you will soon reach the Lac Rose. This saline lake is where the Paris-Dakar racers used to arrive, and where the old Africa Race rockers are still arriving. Here you can bathe in the Dead Sea or Lake Assal style.

Further north you pass through fishing villages such as this one in Kayar,

and the mini dunes of Lompoul, where you can stay for the night at "la belle etoile", or continue along the Langue de Barbarie to Saint Louis. The other option is to take the road through the bottleneck of Rufisque, "hell", believe me, you have never been in a traffic jam like that...., After a few hours you reach Thies and from there the roads to the rest of the country.

There is a third option, if you have a pilot friend, (with a light aircraft, of course), then you take off from Dakar airport and you are lying on the beach of the Petite Cote in half an hour, after a breathtaking flight over the Bandia National Reserve and over the baobab forests (ah, it's good to be Rey....).

Speaking of Baobabs, I have told you that it is one of my favourite trees..... Legend has it that it was a very vain tree and that's why God punished it by planting it upside down. It must be true, because its branches look like roots. In Senegal they are a symbol, there are thousands of them.

They say that Senegal has the widest baobab tree in the world. I say it will be this one

From its fruit, the monkey bread, (similar to a melon) they get a drink, the Bui, which is not only very good, but also has a lot of vitamin C and is said to be a remedy against diarrhoea and malaria (but come on, better to take the malaria pill). Once we reached Thies, I love the route to Kayes, on the border with Mali. I took these photos in one of the villages along the way, where we were working.

If, on the other hand, you go south, you pass the tourist area of the Saly beaches, which I don't like at all, and in a couple of hours you will find the Saloum Delta National Park, which you will love and I recommend it for a romantic getaway. I, as I went with Justi, it wasn't the same, I'm still not ready to take that big step...

Here is one of the most beautiful cemeteries I have ever seen. I would like to have something like this for myself when I die, although I'm not in a hurry for that time to come.

To get around the Delta you have to go by boat. Before boarding, there is an incredible place (for little money, here you could advertise your restaurant) to have a cold flag and try the Thieboudienne, the typical Senegalese dish based on rice, tomato and fish. Although the best I've had is at Jandri's...and it doesn't appear in the guides.

Inland, to the southeast is the Niokolo Koba National Park, the land of the Bassari, which is also very beautiful, but there are not many animals, I think I have seen more wildlife in some of Madrid's nightclubs.

It is impressive how much stress this photo transmits to me.

Once past the Delta, along the coast, you will find Gambia and further down Senegal and Casamance, which has been in turmoil for a few years due to a rebel movement, so it will not be difficult to find military checkpoints.

In the Casamance, we leave the Wolof area and enter Mandinga territory, the great sorcerers and sorceresses of Senegal. I like these people, who are still grouped in secret societies. Here I am treated like a distant cousin, because strangely enough, my surname, Count, is totally Mandinga and is very widespread in this area, and even more so in Guinea (Conakry). Unfortunately, I only resemble them in my surname and the width of my nose.

So that you can see the great resemblance we have, here I have put the photo of some of these distant cousins of mine...

And here I leave you, in the middle of the road. I will finish telling you about it, or if you prefer, I invite you to come with me to discover this part of the world and see it with your own eyes. Have a happy new year. Mine, God willing, will be a year without much money but full of travels in Africa. We shall see, God willing, Insha'Allah.