14th May - Somewhere South of Koundara

We packed the truck in the morning and made to set off, but Lamé, the Rastafarian looking after the campsite, was nowhere to be seen, after heading out last night for a night on the town. His brother Moussa arrived after a while, and searched high and low for him, and eventually he turned up sound asleep in one of the rooms in the Auberge. We paid, FG 40,000 (just over £5) for 2 nights, and left. Moussa had been so friendly and welcoming that we left him a small present as a thank-you. Incidentally, Lamé is a mean drummer, the best I've seen yet, and he showed me what he could do on our drum; he was delighted when I could pick out some of the basic rhythms he showed me.

The road south to Labé was actually pretty good by Guinean standards. However, it still took us 4 hours to cover the 120km. Near Mali-ville, we saw a lot of people walking up the road towards the town with various wares perched on their heads, as it's the town's big market today. Further away, people were heading towards other towns and villages. People walk many kilometres – maybe 25km or more each way – to take their small basket of goods to the market. One guy even had a plough on his head.

Our main task in Labé was to buy fuel, which we happily accomplished, and then to look for the internet café to post the blogs for the last week or so. The Lonely Planet map was absolutely crap, as usual, so we had to ask many people for directions, around the busy, narrow streets. Alas, the internet café was closed, as is everything else on Sunday apart from the market stalls! Labé was a crowded and dusty town, so we unanimously decided to push onwards, in the hope of reaching Koundara by the end of the day. We were told this was easily possible, but by now we've learned to take Africans' estimates of travel times with a good deal of salt. Labé marked the southernmost point of our trip before turning back north, so I texted Si the GPS coordinates from the satellite phone.

Joy of joys, the road north started out marvellous! Still gravel, but smooth and untarnished, I managed to sustain fourth gear for considerable distances. The road surface was obviously brand new, because after a while it deteriorated again to the usual mix of washboarding, potholes, ditches and the sharp little concrete bridges that took out our tyre so effectively the other day.

We stopped to buy some bread for lunch, and cracked open our tin of salmon pate. We'd hoped to have avocado with it, but one was putrid, and the others are still unripe. The bread here has to be eaten fresh, because it gets hard quite quickly, so we should have bought our loaf in Labé, rather than paying more and getting less fresh bread down the road.

Nicki is getting good at spotting any potholes or ditches I've missed, and calling out a warning, so the number of orbital launches we're hitting is diminishing. Nicki has a knack of being hit by water bottles as they fall down from the cubby holes, even the ones that fall from my side of the truck. I did swerve at one point as a leaf I was about to drive over turned out to be a chameleon. The road wended its way through the mountains, which are covered in cheerful green forest. We saw grass in one area – the first since Spain, I think, apart from some around a hotel sprinkler in Gambia! Given this is the main road joining two of Guinea's major provinces, there is very little traffic on it; we probably see a truck every couple of hours, and every half-hour or so a Peugeot 505 taxi with a heavily laden roofrack, sometimes several times the height of the vehicle, containing goods, sacks, often many people, and on one occasion, goats. How do you tie goats to your roof rack?

I was taken aback to see a sign indicating a car falling into a river in one town, but sure enough, a river there was, with a hand-powered chain ferry crossing it. The river was only about three times the width of the ferry, but obviously deep enough to warrant it. We drove on, up steep metal ramps, and crossed in a couple of minutes, along with some local children, who when we got to the other side, had to take off their trousers and skirts to wade the last bit. I asked how much to pay, and the ferryman said a figure which sounded like FG 60,000 (about £8), which had to be wrong – that's a fortune here! So I offered a FG 5,000 note, but he said no, we had to pay over ten times that amount! I couldn't believe it, and discussed it with him light-heartedly, but he was sticking to his guns. The ferry had pulled just short of the bank, so we couldn't drive off, in theory.

Thus began a lengthy debate, with me saying it was way too expensive, and him saying no, that was the official rate, and everybody had to pay it. Mindful that you pay in Africa either in time or money, we sat around and twiddled our thumbs waiting for the price to come down. The guy was very un-cooperative, and then said he'd charge us FG 5,000 for every ten minutes we waited around! He said he'd lower the price to FG 50,000, or 40,000 plus a shirt! A SHIRT! We told him no, we'd pay 20,000 and no more.

After waiting around, and talking, and arguing, I started the engine, and said I'd pay 25,000. He still wanted 50,000. This was just ridiculous, a small fortune over here. I said I could buy the whole boat for that much. I took a look at the exit ramps, which were floating in about 18 inches of water, and figured I could probably drive ashore as a last resort. As the guy still wasn't co-operating, I told him we'd leave anyway, money or no money, and I started to drive forward, over the wooden chock he'd put down in front of our wheel. I think this made him think a bit more seriously, as he hadn't realised I might actually be able to drive away from where he'd stopped the ferry. He told me if I did, the ferry would slip backwards, and I'd get stuck… more likely, I'd have broken his ramps, which were held up by thin cable.

I said 30,000, no more. He said he was going to charge me 5,000 per 10 minutes waiting time, and I said he'd agreed that, not me! In the end, we were both getting a little cross, but I think he was worried we were going to drive off anyway, so he took our FG 30,000, which was still an absolute rip-off, and pulled the ferry up to the bank so we could disembark. It was a game of bluff at the end; he thought I couldn't drive off the ferry without him moving it; I wasn't sure whether or not I could; but he didn't know that I wasn't sure! I'm glad it didn't come to that, as it would have probably ended up in me breaking his ferry, and I don't think he'd have been too chuffed about that. It could also have ended in me getting stuck in the mud, which wouldn't have been ideal either.

By this time, darkness was approaching, so we've pulled off the road and into a clearing where we're parked for the night. We both had a shower (our portable shower is just great), but I ran out of water whilst still covered in soap, so Nicki had to fill it up again. Dinner was soup, plus plenty of mangoes. Insects abound here, and some are a little daunting, including some large, predatory-looking spiders which move like the wind, and some very determined beetles and moths. There are monkeys in the area, but so far they're keeping clear of us; the wandering cows continue to be surprised by our presence.

Thanks for the continued messages to the satellite phone; they really are appreciated, especially as we haven't had mobile phone or internet access for a week or so.