Bushcamp to Bagante, Cameroun, February 27, 2019

What a night!  It poured and poured!  The wind blew and i spent the night trying to keep my sleeping bag on my skinny thermarest to keep it dry.  In the morning I wrung water out of my sleeping bag  but I didn't get it the worst.  Will was completely flooded and ended up in the cab and Clarissa's tent collapsed so she slept in the truck.  I was in a foul mood is all l can say and with the prospect of another Bushcamp night, I wasn't looking forward to the day.  It's really hard to describe African rains. They are nothing like we have at home.  Imagine dumping a pail of water from the sky.  That's what it's like and then combine that with wind.  It's ugly and inches and inches of water falls but magically, little is left lying around.  We are apparently entering rainy season so I am not looking forward to wet nights!

At breakfast a very bossy local woman was hanging around demanding food  Will made the mistake of leaving his coffee on the ground by his chair and she grabbed it and drank it.  We eventually gave her some leftover rice.  She and her companion have facial tattoos and scars that distinguish their tribe-

We are making our way to Yaounde, where we were supposed to be February 23.  The roads are bad so it's slow going.  We made 218 km today-

Cameroun is very green and there's a lot of hand-tilled land so many more vegetables are available at markets.  The people are not friendly;  they stare and do not wave or say 'hello' and 'welcome' like everyone did in Nigeria-

We went to Foumban to see the Sultan's Palace which is home to the 19th sultan of the Baman Dynasty.  Sultan Njoya built it in the 20th century. He invented a corn grinding machine, a script for the Bamum language-

a religion that fused Christian and Muslim beliefs and had 681 wives.  There were some interesting masks-

Costumes-

And statues-

I like this bad-

A weird new building - a spider on top of a snake-

is being built and the artefacts will be moved there.  The visit was an expensive waste of time but thanks once again to Lying Planet, it was a 'must see'!

I found the nearby market much more interesting-

Dried fish-

Piles and piles of North American used clothing-

Chickens-

Eggs-

Tomatoes-

Bananas-

We continued south.  Furniture for sale-

Organized chaos-

It was getting dark and I had my fingers crossed that we'd find a hotel and we did!  So nice.  Next door was a multitasking restaurant-

With a funny menú-

The woman came over to the truck and offered to feed us.  Even though it took a few hours to prepare (we didn't eat until 9:30), it was some of the best chicken I've had.  I drank a litre of Coke Zero since we arrived - (it's hard to find) so I'm pretty sure I'll be awake most of the night.  Oh well, I'll enjoy my room and get everything charged!  Ryan is hoping to catch a 2:30 flight in Yaounde tomorrow but there is no way he/we will make that.  He and Leanne have become very close-

Looking forward to hopefully reaching Yaounde tomorrow!