Hippos at Lac Tengrela

That morning we were told that one of the bikes had a puncture from the previous day's journey. The guys at the campement were very kind to take the bike into the town (before 7am when we were told about it) but then asked us for the ignition key. In a daze in the early morning we refused at first - believing that the bikes had been stolen!Everything was fine, and the bike was returned after an hour, so we could continue on our way. I am still confused as how they got the bike INTO Banfora, a long walk of 4km, very early in the morning...

Puncture fixed, we drove into town to fill the bikes up again. We were sure we didn't use all the fuel, but it cost pennies and was better to have more fuel in the middle of nowhere than less. We got a basic lunch of bread, tomatos, onions and cucumber, and headed to get a quick breakfast at an omlette stand. I drove the short distance from the garage, but when I parked up and tried to get it back into neutral gear, the flimsy gearshift snapped off. Excellent.

I pushed the bike down the road to one of the many mechanics and explained what had happened in broken French, using a lot of sign language. At first they thought we wanted a whole new gear shift, but we said we only wanted it welded together so that it would actually be possible to change gear. After a short wait it came back in one piece, and once fitted, it turned out that it changed gear even better than before! We'd actually improved the bike! We headed back for that elusive breakfast after paying 450 CFA (about 60 pence) to the mechanics, and then hit the road - we had a lot to cover in one day!

Leaving town (chaotic in itself) we drove 5km out on the Sindou road and turned off to the hippo lake at Lac Tengrela. Us boys had seen a handful of hippos at distance in The Gambia, but had heard that this was a really good spot to see them close (an English guy at our campement actually showed us an awesome picture of some fighting in the water - major camera lens envy though!).

We got into a pirogue at the lake (quite unstable, but still better than the one across the moat in Senossa!) and set out for the opposite side to the village. The water was really clear and the lake itself didn't look that deep, as we could see plants that were living at the bottom. That was good to see because the boat seemed pretty unstable, and if we fell in we could probably stand up, but on the other (more serious) hand, the hippos could equally get a good run at us! The sun was very strong over the lake as Dree spotted the first hippo. As Kez has said, we were hoping the guy paddling the flimsy boat would see them first!

There was a huge group of hippos about 100m away from us, but all you could see were a few pairs of eyes just above the water. Then a few more appeared. Unfortunately they split into two groups about 20m apart, and every time one came up for air in a spray of water, or two began a fight with huge jaws open, I seemed to be looking the other way! Think I got a few good pictures, but I needed that zoom lens desperately!

Amazing sights though; it was pretty awesome to be so close to these massive creatures. Our guide kept paddling even closer and, at times, was banging the oar on the bottom of the boat; this made most of them come to the surface, but by this time we were only about 50m away! Possibly close enough for an attack - hippos are notoriously dangerous animals, and Africa's biggest killer! We turned back, had a drink at the lakeside, watched a kid terrorise a small kitten and a monkey run itself ragged round a tree, before getting back on the bikes and starting the rest of the journey to Sindou.