Tom has recovered fine from malaria and the visa for Ghana are finally there. So it’s time to say goodbeye to Guillaume and the team from Le Pavillon Vert in Ouagadougou. We’re setting off to the Karfiguéla falls in Burkina Faso. With a landscape that turns greener every kilometer and the dust that gradually disappears, we can’t but appreciate this great region. A first flat doesn’t bother us too much here. The change is more than welcome!
Just patched the very first flat in about 15000 kms. Not bad those Mefo Tyres!
But all of a sudden, things don’t exactly look too well anymore. As a big lorry approaches from the opposite direction in the center of Banfora, some lunatic in an old van happily decides to overtake it, the throttle wide open. Tom doesn’t really know where to move with a 1m deep ditch to the right of him. My heart almost stops as I see the van passing Tom’s bike at what must have been less than a centimeter distance, Tom balancing on the edge of the ditch. With Toms impulsive nature, he turns in a split second and goes after the crazy road hog. In the meantime the passengers have stopped the driver and we could tell from the shouting and the gestures that they too donn’t exactly appreciate what just happened. The driver doesn’t see any other option than to cowardly run straight into the fields. This guy won’t do a lot of driving anymore today! This could have ended a lot worse…
A nice stretch of piste finally gets us to the waterfalls and we decide to spend the night in one of the very basic huts. The shower, well, that seems to be the waterfall itself. And for other sanitary needs, we are gently referred to the ‘great wide open’. But the peaceful sound of the falls and the most impressive scenery is all it takes to make us feel just great as we go to sleep.
Karfiguéla waterfalls, Banfora, Burkina
Until all of a sudden, in the middle of the night, I wake up with a terrible stomach ache. Did I have too much rice the last few days? Or do I have some nasty bug in my blood? I hope it’s not malaria too… The next day I am feeling horrible and my energy level sunk below zero. We can’t but spend another night at the falls. Unfortunately it’s Saturday which means the whole area gets crowded with local tourists with a coolbox, a noisy moped and way too loud music. The peaceful oasis is no longer…
But the next day I am pretty much back on my feet and we decide to spot hippos near Bobo Dioulasso. We get to see quite a few of these huge animals and even at a distance they are pretty impressive. But our guide and steersman doesn’t feel like taking too much of a risk: he’s unable to swim 🙂
Hippo lake near Bobo Dioulasso, Burkina. The setting was most impressive.
Hippo lake near Bobo Dioulasse, Burkina.
After a 200 km ride in the blistering heat, we cross the border between Burkina and Ghana in Hamale, one of the smaller border checkpoints. Compared to the hassle when applying for the visa, the border went really smooth… Well apart from Toms tyre going flat again after a mere 50m on Ghanaian soil that is. The perfect African border crossing has yet to be invented I guess… Some 50 kms of gravel piste takes us to a nice sealed road. Ghana, bring it on!
Just crossed the Ghanaian border