Last weekend I went up north to my friend Kait Brown's site in Bani Burkina Faso. Kait had organized an overnight trip out into the "desert" on camels. We would go out and then camp by a gold mine. As per usual we got off to a really late start so late in fact that we were riding camels in the pitch black. That was NOT FUN at all because your entire life was in the hoofs of these camels that were not happy to be carrying 2 people on their backs. The ride was so hard of my knees sitting up front that I had to get off the camel about 3 km from our camp site. I rode with Mikey, he was behind me on the camel. We were both hanging on for dear life as we swayed side to side 10 feet up in the air. There was a lot of swearing and OMGs shouted back and forth amongst the four camels carrying 6 people.
We did not get into came till after 9pm and we were all hurting. You get a WORK OUT when you ride a camel, not only your thighs but your stomach feels like you just did 3000 sit ups. We were in the middle of no where (or so we thought) with only flashlights. We would go a couple meters away from camp to go change cloths and go to the toilet, no trees or bushes there. It is interesting to be going to the WC with no enclosure looking up at the stars. Stars from horizon to horizon.
I was not feeling well after our 2 hour camel ride and was very somber and not entirely looking froward to the next days ride back to Bani. We ate plan pasta with our hands and made some egg and tuna sandwiches and shared the food with our Burkinabe guides. We were exhausted and just wanted to set up our little tents and go to sleep, the Burkinabe were kind of sad because they wanted to tell jokes and stories. Ohhh well. Despite not feeling 100% I actually slept REALLY WELL and woke up around 4:30am.
In the morning we found out that we were rather near a family compound so all of the kids came out to stare at us. Some of us wanted to leave ASAP before the sun came to it zenith but the Burkinabe insisted that we check out the gold mines. Mining in Burkina is like the mining in the USA 150 years ago, I am talking Deadwood (TV). It is a hard life and there is a lot of illegal use of child labor and it is very dangerous. It is also not very lucrative but then again it could be, it is all really a crap shoot. While we check out the mine the men put the harnesses on the camels. We then insisted that they re-tighten the seats because a couple were lopsided. I insisted on sitting in the back for the ride back to Bani due to my horrible knees.
Mikey and I mounting our camel about 7 km from the town of Bani Burkina Faso.
We finally got on the "road" around 8am and I fell in love with camel riding. It was so pleasant on the back. The sun was really hot but we were moving and it was windy. It was so nice I was even able to close my eyes. Since it was daylight we were able to see where we were going, so it was not as nerve-wraking. Mikey also preferred the front. After an 1 1/2 of riding we made our way to Kait's house.
I uploaded photos to facebook since it is so much easier and faster to do it with my iPhoto on my computer. Therefore, check out photos there. I tried to upload 2 films here. I was successful I think with the one of Mikey, I, and the camel (Rajat) standing. I then spent 2 hours trying to upload the one of us dismounting and it timed out, bummer. We named the four camels after characters from Aladdin.
It was a load of fun and I think I will definitely do it again when I head up north to goroum goroum in November!!
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