More pounding in the 7 seater

Day: 23
Location: Bamako, Mali
Weather: nice, but who cares anyway
Kilometers: 500
Hours: 15
Health: Adam hurt his foot while taking a leak. Also, we felt like we were going to die if we didn't get out of that car. So fine basically.
Accomodation: Chez Ibrahim Keita
Price, room: 8K CFA courtesy
Price, water: 3.5K FG
Shower: no
Morale: 3
Total spend: 104K FG

AW: Another dreary day of all day driving to reach Bamako. Once the gearshift was fixed, we were on our way until we had a blow out and it took the driver 2 hours to find a spare and change the tire and wheel.

As I'm typing this, we just slammed a goat. As per usual there was a group laying in the road, and the driver avoided one, avoided a second, and obliterated the third.

When we were getting the bags in Bamako, Guillaume leaned against the hood in the dark. We took a picture with flash to see that the car was covered in dried blood. The driver's reaction upon impact: "Qu'est-ce que c'est une chevre?" And then, "Does anyone have a light for my cigarette?"

GB: At this point we just wanted to get to Bamako. If not because we desperately watched the hours pass and the timing of our trip slip, then at least because the fat mama to the left of our 4 seat group was increasingly resisting invasion into her padding. Where was space to be found? The fourth co-seater on our little alignment was initially willing to bend forward for the greater good, so that at any point only 3 sets of shoulders would be aligned and needing space. But as time passed, he increasingly threatened this fragile balance by leaning back into the seat, thus setting off a cold war between Adam and I on one side and him on the other. The fat mama was her own Non-Aligned Movement. While diplomatic relations with the dude were never broken, some dire battles were fought, and among the casualties were my left hip, Adam's mojo, and his jaw (friendly fire from my forehead while I was sleeping and leaning across the guy's back to prevent any unexpected invasion of our territory).

AW: We arrived in Bamako at 5AM, exactly 60 hours after leaving Conakry, which is only 44 hours later than anticipated. I guess we should be happy? Either way, I'm putting morale at 3.

The driver was trying to spin some bullshit about how we had to sleep in the car outside of Bamako, but within range of the lights because of potential problems with the police. There was a general mutiny and we all called him a fool for about the 10th time on the trip, so he gave in and took us to the city without incident.

We went with a guy from the back seat to his apartment. In the back seat he was with two fat mamas - we're still not sure how he survived it. The biggest was his wife, and she was about 400% as big as the average local woman. He split a cab with us and left her to manage the luggage and the massive big screen TV he bought in Conakry. It will be stunning if that thing ends up working after being on top of the car during that trip.

While we were a bit wary of the taxi drivers and whatnot, we were pretty much staggering around looking for somewhere to take a diarrhea, clean my wounded foot, drink some water, and take a shower. But most importantly, before all that, sleep. As we left, the driver was explaining to a fascinated group of taxi drivers that his car was crap and he was going to swap out the diesel engine for a petrol one in the morning. I guess he broke even on the trip. He certainly broke us.