Just got back from Conakry; a 25 hour marathon. I decided to take a Toyota taxi van because on the trip up I took a regular taxi and they stuffed 4 of us in the back seat. That 20 hour trip hurt my hips because we were so tightly packed. I asked for the front seat of the van. We waited 5 hours for 17 other passengers to come. (Children under 5 are not people) I did see at least 3 non people in the van. So we were at least 22 people in this little van with about 1000 pounds of luggage on the roof. We finally packed and left Conakry in roar, only to pull into a mechanics place and change a rear differential bearing. We left there after about a hour and the thump- thump- thump had not changed. ( Oh drat, wrong bearing) No problem, we kept going. Events: We hit a pot- hole so hard the rim bent. We stopped, driver walks across the street, borrows a heavy hammer from a tire shop and beats the tire rim back into place. We end up in a heavy rain storm without a defroster and the windshield fogs up. Driver has a towel on the dash for this problem. He concentrates on clearing the inside of the windshield and we almost rear-end a car that has stopped behind a semi because of the rain. Because of our weight, we could not stop and so swung into the other lane at the last second... to meet a semi coming from the other direction. He, providentially was going slow because of the rain. I checked my seat belt again..... No it is still not there; the belt had been cut. During the trip, the driver works the brakes so hard you cannot touch the front tire rims and grease is leaking out the front bearing on my side. At 2 in the morning, he stops suddenly, jumps out, jacks up the van and changes the brake pads. He told me he changes brake pads every week. How does he drive for 25 hours? He pours Nescafe coffee into a energy drink. Man! It is a great day to be alive...
Posted on: Sat, 22 Jun 2013 08:20:20 +0000
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