Togo

30.1.2010 – Day 42 – Lome, Togo


Wow – again – what a day! I set off at dawn with no cash or fuel! I’d used all my Ghanian money on fuel, as I’d had to drive further than anticipated. Through mental traffic, I headed for Accra, looking for an ATM and fuel. Luckily my fuel reserves lasted out and I found the ATM (that worked) and a garage (with petrol).

At the Ghana/Togo border, when I was getting my passport stamped, the radio had a DJ shouting off at the UK, saying that Ghana isn’t a Banana Republic, as I was being asked for a small bribe at the time! These borders are something else. Quite difficult to describe really. It appears like total chaos on the surface, with people, officials, offices and trucks everywhere. I had my usual money-changing helper to ease me through. The officials are a mixture of over-diligent and pernikity, and the obviously bent. It should have been 10,000f for the Togo visa but I got asked for money 4 times in Ghana: once a cadeau (gift), once for a gate (!?) On the Toho side I paid 10,000f for the visa, 1,000f for something else and I avoided the guy asking 10,000f for yellow piece of paper. What a load of nonsense!

I’ve arrived in Togo and am staying in an overlander’s hideout, just out of the capital, Lome. I’ve got to get myself sorted out here so I’ll be here a minimum of a few days. I need to try to get a Nigerian visa – could be difficult; get the bike serviced at the West Africa KTM dealer and rest. My impressions of Lome aren’t great so far. The main road goes along the coast which looks stunning. There are traditional fishing boats pulled up on the white sand. There is a burnt out and derelict Brighton-style pier with tired looking buildings inland. I passed factories pumping out huge plumes of fumes from their chimneys and the air has the mixed aroma of shit, fish and dead animals! PS to my great amusement today I sweated profusely wearing my big biking jacket while at customs at the border. The sweat dripped off me in impressive amounts, along with all the muck from the roads that had coated my body. What looked like mud dropped all over the documents, all over the official’s desk and even over his shoes!

I was feeling a little despondent, tired, fatigued, dirty and sweaty by the time I arrived in Lome. But how fast things change. I’m tired and thought that the visa problems might stop me in my tracks pretty soon. But I met a German couple this afternoon who are doing a similar trip to me in a camper. They had some very useful info and there is even talk of going in convoy through the worst parts of Central Africa. As I walked the dusty streets this evening looking for internet, I suddenly had a spring in my step – optimism returns – and a day off tomorrow – even better, it’ll be Sunday so I won’t be able to do a thing!

31.1.10 – Day 43 – Lome

Today is my first day doing absolutely nothing. I’m staying in a place called Chez Alice. Alice is an elderly German lady who runs this place. There is a bar with restaurant under a large thatched communal area, a collection of basic bungalows and an area for overlanders to make camp. Tourism in Togo is on its knees – many years of political and security instability has kept the tourists away. It’s a shame as the interior of the country is supposed to be stunning. Beautiful hill country and the beaches are as perfect as anywhere I’d seen. You can’t go on the beaches of course – well, certainly not by yourself, not at night and not with any valuables.

Chez Alice has the odd overlander that still comes through this way and a mix of ‘locals’ who have made Chez Alice their home from home. They are a bunch of Germans (Togo used to be a German colony until WW2) who sit around the same table all day every day. I’d like to know their stories of how they ended up here. There is the guy with Forrest Gump beard and hair. One guy was up this morning tucking into his first can of Bitburger Beer at 7.20am! There are the 2 guys with Togo girlfriends who both have the African moustache. A sad looking bunch really, although they probably think the same of me – sat here by myself writing my journal.

It’s becoming increasingly difficult taking photos and video. The police are hyper sensitive about images being taken of anything remotely important – big roads, bridges, official buildings, telephone masts, ports or themselves! The people also aren’t keen on their photo being taken, which isn’t surprising I guess. The other issue is security for the camera. You can’t just flash if around, particularly in cities as mugging or theft is a real possibility. At least Chez Alice is a haven to relax in for the day.

1.2.2010 – Day 44 – Lome

Well, I’ve got to slow down now for a while, to collect all the visas I need. It’s good to stay in one place, as it gives me a chance to meet other overlanders and find out what is going on with security and politics – particularly visa info. The first job today was to get a taxi to the immigration centre for Togo, to upgrade my 7 day visa to a 2 week one. I also went to the Angola Embassy to find out it isn’t possible to get a visa for Angola here. The Benin Embassy was much more helpful and getting the Benin visa here should be quick. I later visited Toni Togo KTM, the regional KTM motorbike dealer. They have their own Paris-Dakar team and I found out that the team mechanic can do a service on my bike. Result!

The centre of Lome is not much more than a few dusty streets – plenty of traffic and a big market. It really doesn’t feel like a capital at all – strange. Tarmac, sand and rublle streets are filled with activity. People, sellers, motorbikes and cars all jostle for space in the oppressive humid heat. Plenty of shouting and laughing with cars and moto joining in with their horns. Many of the sellers are women with any number of things on their heads. The balance is extraordinary – I couldn’t help but smile, it is so sensible: why bother carrying anything by hand when you can carry it on your head? Boxes of doughnuts, bowls of flip flops, bowls of grain, piles of clothes, woven dishes or dried fish etc etc. The colour and intensity is something else.

Occasionally there will be a music shop with pirated CDs being blasted out at top volume with incredible levels of distortion. How anyone knows what song is being played or how any one could work in that racket is beyond me. The taxi rank is on the coast road where people swap from shared car taxis for getting in and out of town and motorbike taxis to get you to your final destination. The shared taxis are knackered old European imports with several 100,000 kms on the clock and interiors to match! Four people squeeze in the back and 2 in the passenger seat.

Across the road from the taxi rank is the palm-lined beach. A beautiful and very wide sandy beach with tens of men pulling fishing boars and nets in from the surf.

2.2.10 – Day 45 – Lome

Today was another admin day. The bike got taken in for a service at 8am, I went to collect my passport from Togo immigration and dropped it off at the Benin Embassy for a Benin visa. I won’t go into the web of decisions and difficulties with the visas, just let me say it’s a complete bureaucratic nightmare. The colonial powers of Africa didn’t leave much, but they did instill the important of mindless endless paperwork.

3.2.10 – Day 46 – Lome

I couldn’t pick up my Benin visa until 4pm today, so, to avoid going bonkers waiting in Chez Alice, I headed 20km down the road to Lake Togo. On the far bank of the lake is the town that is very imaginatively named Togoville! I hired a local punt/boat to get there. It’s a small wooden boat with a guy in the back playing the role of gondolier/punter with a smoothed down plan frond to push the boat the 35 minutes to the other side. Togoville is famous for 2 things: 1. the Pope has been here, 2. it is a voodoo centre. Many of the slaves who got taken to Haiti came from here. The mixture of Togo animist voodoo and Christianity gave Haiti its infamous religion. Luckily for me it was market day today. Much of the market is geared towards exchange. No money is exchanged at all, just goods.

The town is scattered with shrines and others statues. One reminds me a little of Buddist/Hindu shrines. One of them had a big willy and another effigy had the voodoo spikes shoved through it – spooky! The local name here for voodoo is just “fetish”. A section of the market is set aside for fetish – no – not Anne Summers rubber wear, but the ingredients for the potions used by the prescribing doctor. After getting sunburned on the way back, I headed into town to pick up my Benin visa. I tried to go to the Nigerian Consulate, but it was closed.

What I’m enjoying here is the handshake. You shake as normal, then keeping palms of hands pushing – pull away and when you get to finger tips you ‘click’ eachother’s fingers - how cool!

4.2.2010 – Day 47 – Lome

All in all a frustrating day. I went to get a Nigerian visa at the High Commission. I arrived at 9am and was told (predictably) that I couldn’t get a Nigerian visa. I was asked to wait to speak to the High Commissioner. I sat for 11/2 hours before I was blessed with his presence. He asked me what I wanted. I said a 30 day tourist visa. He said “impossible”. He looked at my letter of invitation and said “you can’t go to Jos” (the city on the invite letter). I said “that’s ok, I’ll meet my friend in Abuja”. In the end he said if I came back with a second letter of invitation he would consider giving me a few days. Unfortunately the power was out most of the day so there was no phone connection, email or mobile connection to the UK. After a frustrating few hours I got through to Tracy at home and she got the ball rolling – trying to get the letter!
5.2.2010 – Day 48 – Lome
Oche – a Nigerian friend in Edinburgh - has kindly written a new letter of invitation for me! I went to an internet café, found the email and managed to print it out! I felt the day was going to be a lucky one. I arrived at the Nigerian Embassy after collecting my passport from the DRC Embassy (I forgot to mention yesterday that after being refused a Nigerian visa I went to the DRC Embassy to try for a DRC visa – no problem – just a 24 hour wait. If an Embassy’s location is a reflection of its status in the world and wealth, DRC is obviously not doing too well – the street outside was literally just rubble and rubbish, in the middle of a residential area. I could only just manage to get my all-terrain motorbike there!).

All was going well, I filled out the visa application form for Nigeria x 2, gave 53,000f, 2 photos, 2 copies of passport, 2 copies of carnet etc etc. The lady behind the desk stapled it all together then paused…..”you can only collect visas on Tuesdays, it’s now Friday. It’s best if you come back on Monday with all the forms”. She handed all the paperwork back to me over the counter! So near, yet so far!

6.2.2010 – Day 49 – Kpalime

The long wait at Lome has landed me at the weekend, with all the Embassies closed for the weekend. I’ve decided to try escape to the cool of the hills. The heat and humidity of Lome is oppressive at this time of year. I rode 120km North West to the hilly town of Kpalime. It’s touted as being “Togo’s most attractive town” – from what I’ve seen of Kpalime, this doesn’t bode well for the other Togonise towns! Kpalime is at about 600m so IS bearable hot, rather than a furnace. It’s hilly, green and plenty of tropical fruit is grown in the area. But Kpalime is the usual mix of markets and dusty roads. There is a kind of charm here, but it’s no St Andrews, Stow-on-the-Wold or Cheltenham!

On the way here I slowed up behind a small que of traffic. Creeping up the inside line I could see a large crowd of people with a rope across the road: there was plenty of shouting going on. This was no official road block. I wasn’t sure whether the people were trying to extort money or if this was a political protest. The election is happening here in a couple of weeks, and if Togo’s last election is anything to go by, you wouldn’t want to be here when the results are announced. Last time large numbers of people were killed. Being white in Africa can either be a good or a bad thing. Luckily for me at this road block it was a good thing. As I got to the rope I was signalled to cross the barricade and continue – phew! At Kpalime I found a guesthouse – with a pool – hurrahhh!!! After a swim I was properly cool for the first time in weeks. I’ve explored the area, seen impressive waterfalls and loads of beautiful butterflies.

Latest communication from Andrew is that today, Tuesday, he was praying he would be picking up his Nigeria visa at 3pm. I haven’t heard from him (mobile contact is erratic) and know that his plan, if he got the visa, was to hot foot it straight to Benin – the next country. Time would be tight to achieve this by dark, so here’s hoping that the lack of text to confirm he’s got the visa is an indication that he’s on his way to Benin. I’ll keep you posted! Ed.


PS – internet contact from now on until Namibia might be poor – I may have to update without his diary entries (which he photographs and sends to me) but I’ll keep you posted of progress.  Sadly, it also means we might not get much in the way of photos.  We will just have to wait and see...