L'Atterrissage

Day: 00
Location: Yoff, Senegal
Weather: balmy
Health: Guillaume ate too much in the airport (but it was pizza and fries so all healthy)
Accomodation: Hotel Cap Ouest
Price; room: $42
Price, petrol: $0.95 / lt
Morale: 8*
Song of the day: "Ride or die" by The Game
Daily spend: €106

AW: Stopped to price a GPS prior to taking the Air France bus, but at €160 it was a bit pricey. Should be in every phone within a couple years, but for now we will do without.

During our 4 hour layover in Milan, we took an ill advised trip into what looked like an industrial suburb. We saw a traffic accident, followed by a lengthy polizia investigation, drank a nice cappucino, and went back to the airport in the rain. We are both convinced there is nothing to see in Milananyway, so no worries there.

Now typing on the plane: We met a Colorado native who spent time in Senegal and Mali and we may get back in touch with some of her local friends for advice. Depending on the expense and cross border headaches, we may need to be more creative with when and how we use a car. There is also the Bamako Dakar train and boats to Tombouctu to think about.

We will stay in Yoff tonight, near the airport. The hotel is very expensive, but nice enough and the best we can do arriving at 1am. The crush at the airport was really incredible, and several loitering entrepreneurs made big plays, but we used the ATM and left without (major) incident.

We were typing these from my blackberry, but the data doesn't appear to flow in dakar, so they may be less frequent.

GB: Our morale now hangs on the idea that we are moving up the learning curve on how to not set records for tourist scamming. We have so far been ripped off to the amount of $8. Manageable.

Re: car - I definitely want us to "ride or die" (see song of the day) but we would be more flexible on foot, and a quick car ride of 4-5 days through Mali actually looks molto fun...

The fact that we have now set foot on the continent that saw the birth of man (and associated parasite species) raises our spirits to almost unbearable levels of happiness. I am being barely excessive here.