10th May - Niokolo-Koba National Park

Hi all Nicki reporting as we have a man down, but more of that later.

Our dinner was very pleasant, charcuterie for starters (various salamis and pate with bread), then roast beef and chipped potatoes, finishing with watermelon. We retired early making the most of the air conditioning and separate beds. I read a while and then turned out the light.

Two minutes later David was up asking for my head torch before sprinting to the bathroom where he was rather ill, throwing up copiously. Of course my phobia of such things had me plugging my ears with my fingers to drown out the noise! Two hours later we had a repeat performance which, touch wood, has been all so far. At least we were still in a hotel not the truck! However a restless night followed, especially after the air con turned off at something like half one. (David: I had quite strong pulsing stomach cramps until the middle of the night, which was fairly unpleasant, especially for my male pain tolerance.)

Our original plan was to leave at around half eight this morning to cross the border to Guinea, well when the alarm went off David decided he still felt a bit sub-standard. So I got up and had a pleasant cold shower and washed my hair (such a treat these days!) before heading off to have some breakfast with my book. I lounged around the bar area until all the waiters congregated around me, and anyone who knows the African culture will tell you it is pretty loud! Even general conversation is carried out at top volume, so after ten minutes of trying to read quietly I moved outside to the viewing point. A few minutes after this two ladies with screaming babies arrived which I tolerated for a while (I did feel sorry for the women and exchanged smiles for a bit) until my patience wore thin. So I moved on to the viewing area where I was quickly followed by what seemed like the entire Senegalese army. I asked Colvin what was happening and he reported that a few Czech students have come to the park to carry out an animal count. All the guards/ army men were there to assist them and had arrived for their briefing. I can imagine it must be a near impossible procedure to carry out and I was fairly impressed they were attempting to do it, though I was still not impressed with the level of noise and a lack of somewhere peaceful to read my book!

Finally David roused himself and has announced he feels slightly better, though we have decided we will see what happens later before deciding our next course of action. It is pretty hard to know what the best idea would be, because we never know how long the border crossing will take and having researched Guinea I know there are no hotels with air con till you reach the heart of the country. The place we were planning on heading, Mali-Ville, is a small town up in the mountains and is reported to have a cool climate. However we do not know how easy it is to get there, how good the roads are and hence how long it will take, and with David's present condition we do not want to be taking any risks. Over and out for now.