The title more or less conveys how exciting the last few days have been. But this blog is a reflection of the delays that often influence a trip such as this and act as a cautionary reminder to any would be African overlanders, that in these parts, there is no such thing as scheduling. Leave your preconceived European notions of efficiency at the door, we’re moving on African time. For those yet to experience this infuriating phenomenon, it’s essentially a vague suggestion of action at some point between now and next month, whenever the stars align and shit finally gets done.

I was, until now, positively zooming along. Ticking off the countries and racking up the miles. I appreciate this is not everybody's cup of tea, but I’m not a huge fan of hanging around. The challenge of big days and the satisfaction of progress appeal more to me than really immersing myself in a particular area or culture. Said progress came to a grinding halt when the notoriously problematic border between Nigeria and Cameroon presented itself to me. In hindsight, I’d have taken the land border to the north, regardless of how bad the road is and how inclined to kidnapping some of the folks along the way may be. For four days I vegetated in Calabar before the ferry finally set off into the Bay of Guinea.

That said, my time stuck in eastern Nigeria was not entirely wasted. Yes, I would’ve liked to have been on the road and if things had moved as expected I be writing this from Gabon right now, or possibly even the Congo. But delays are part of the trip, and I think I managed to make the most of my time stuck in Calabar. I visited the museum which is definitely worth a look in if you’re in the same situation, bought a book, read said book, walked around fairly aimlessly and spent far too long enjoying the air conditioning at the surprisingly well stocked supermarket. As ever though, what really stands was the human interaction I experienced. In particular, with Emmanuel, the security guard at my hotel.

I’ve spoken to a lot of people on this trip, Africans, Europeans, Asians and Americans, but none quite like Emmanuel. Aside from the hours we spent playing chess and checkers on my phone to whittle away the time, we spent hours talking about life, mine and his, and I came to realise he is genuinely one of the most selfless, motivated and intelligent people I’ve met anywhere, period. Emmanuel studied computer science at university and would babble on about subjects that baffled my brain. We’d talk for hours about the changing and unfortunately quite unstable geopolitical condition of west Africa and the state corruption that hamstrings the Nigerian people. Yet despite the selflessness of the guy to wash my bike for me whilst I was in bed (unrequested), take me into town for several hours to sort out my boat to Cameroon and the willingness to endure ridiculous police interrogation when they were adamant he was trying to rob me; despite the wisdom of the guy to have such an impressive knowledge of his field and genuine interest to listen when I rambled on about history (my field), the guy earns practically nothing (about £30 equivalent per month! Yes month) and yet never once asked for money, he simply valued my time and conversation, and was genuinely moved that anyone, let alone a ‘white guy’, would value his time and conversation with equal esteem as he did mine (I did of course give him a little cash as way of thank you but it was completely unrequested).

Long story short Emmanuel would really like to move to the UK in the future to pursue a career in computing. Naturally such an undertaking requires a hell of a lot of saving for and that’s not so easy when you earn what he does. So I’m considering doing some sort of GoFundMe type thing to help raise some money to pay for the work visa application. Power of the internet and all that good stuff. No idea how successful it would be but the idea is there at least.

Anyway, enough of Emmanuel's character CV, back to the matter of travelling across Africa. The boat departed on Monday. Naturally, we could not check through immigration when planned because football was on and everyone (immigration officers included) were too busy watching Nigeria lose to England (that was an interesting room to be in!). We sailed through the night on a passage that can only be described as ‘choppy’. The ‘passenger space’ was more cattle class than luxury and I settled on a piece of floor about 2 feet wide by 4 feet long. Cosy would be a rather optimistic adjective, but realistically, ‘shit’ seems more apt. The aforementioned choppiness did not agree with my stomach, nor the stomachs of about a third of us fourteen passengers. I was lucky enough to be armed with a spare plastic bag and therefore managed to direct my sick into a controlled (if slightly leaky) space. Others were not so lucky and come morning the small room was not the most pleasant smelling environment to be in.

Once clearance was granted, we headed up the river and into dock. Well sort off. We parked next to another boat that was in dock and scrambled over them both to reach dry land. A bit of waiting around to get our passports back and customs to decide none of us were importing drugs we were free to go. The problem however, was that my bike was not. Until the other boat finished unloading (which round here could be about 4 years), my bike wasn’t going anywhere. I’m told (promised) that it’ll come off ‘first thing in the morning’. Which morning, whether that is tomorrow or sometime mid December is yet to be seen.

Eventually, things get done someway or another. Africa is just one continuous test of patience, but given there is absolutely nothing I can do to speed things up in the meantime, I might as well get comfy. I’m grateful to have a bed tonight rather than the floor. I’m grateful to be in another country even if I cannot actually go anywhere yet and I’m grateful to have round the clock electricity now, because in Calabar the only source of power seems to be generators, and at the cheap hotel I was in, that was for about three hours per day.

What tomorrow holds I do not know, maybe I’ll have my bike, clear customs and be on by way. Or maybe I’ll be sat in bed bikeless and bored thinking how much further south I should be. Let’s see. This is Africa, and there are absolutely no certainties.