29th Feb 08

Date: 29th Feb 08
Location: Bamako, Mali
Weather: Hazy blue skies, harmattan dust in the air and 43°c
Status: All back on track and loving it!

Second day of chasing visas and a highly successful outcome! We got to the Ghana embassy early, dressed in shirts and trousers to look our best and were instantly told that they took 48 hours to process and wouldn’t be ready until Tuesday…4 more days sitting still!!

Had a chat with one of the smart-looking top dogs there and put together a story on the spot, describing the urgency of our journey to Ghana to meet my sick mother whose arrived there and is all alone (sorry Mum!) and somehow it worked. He told us to complete the 4 identical forms and wait until 12.30 to collect them, as we were about to leave he said wait for another half hour and they’d be done!!!

Ha ha, how we laughed at the way we’d played the system and won….so we headed of to the ex-pat supermarket and spent the next hour marvelling at the huge range of western products and even a wicked range of French wines, vintages all at amazingly low prices. We bought enough to see us through the next week or two and couldn’t believe it when the bill came to £25 each….we had ground coffee, wine, t-bone steaks and more, tomorrow nights meal will be awesome!

Back to the mission to repack the car again and get our selves ready for the big off tomorrow. We need to get to Ghana as quick as possible now to get Luke home and to meet Owen, oh and also to be in Ghana for their Independence Day on March 6th….my birthday and a chance to have some fun!

Arrived there to find a group of 5 American girls staying….superb! so drank beer and chatted away for a few hours to the sounds of….”oh you guys are so cute”, “we’ve majored in…..”, “I’ve got a boyfriend but he likes it when I do this to his hair!”etc etc.

Morgan, Abbey, Emma, Madeline and ??? were brilliant company and off early in the morning so headed to bed. Quick note to the young ladies – Madeline you are SO cute !

Night

End of day location: Bamako, Mali
Distance covered: 15kms round the city!