Day 73: Wassadu – Wildcamp vor Koundara
The baboons were quite loud again at night, the green sea monkeys are trying to take part in breakfast.
We sit down again briefly on the Nigeria website and Wolle prepares what he can currently do – who knows when we’ll get a SIM card in Guinea. Overall, it's all a bit frustrating because the websites don't work well, the internet is slow and the formal hurdles are numerous.
We head back north to Tambacounda to get drinking water – we don't want to put Gambia water through our filters or our stomachs.
And south again, first on the N1 and then on a track to the border with Guinea.
Leaving Senegal is easy. Then around 33 km to the border and the first post of Guinea – which, by the way, is always referred to here as Guinea-Conakry in distinction to Guinea-Bissau.
Entry into Guinea is a bit more tedious. Passports are checked and the visa for Guinea. Question: Where were you from the six days after you re-entered Gambia until today? Then first check Carnet de Passage (yes, available) and continue to immigration. Entry stamp on visa printout and in passport. We continue around 27 km to Sambailo to import the car. First to scan – that seems new, we hadn't read anything further about it. Having the carnet stamped with the scanned slip – the chief has to do it. And he would like a Letter of Invitation for Germany... But the snow pictures from Germany initially cause perplexity. We continue to check the passports again with a thumbprint and photo. And finally a passport check with the instructions to have the “sticker” or the visa pasted into the passport in Conakry.
It's a good thing it's Saturday and not so busy. Otherwise it would take hours again just because of the scanner.
In between we exchanged money, 50,000 CFA into 690,000 Guinea Francs. The money thing is getting crazier and crazier. We are talking about 76 euros.
At the exit of the town, a hotel should also allow camping in the parking lot. It's after 5 p.m. and would be fine – but today there seems to be a big party and so we drive on and look for a wild camp.