rory + stephs travels: Yamoussoukro, Côte d'Ivoire

The road from Grand Bassam to Abidjan is lined with arts and crafts stores, workshops and cafe's. It's quite the sight and also very hard to fight the temptation not to stop every few meters just to end up buying things we don't really have any space for. Entering Abidjan we were hit with a wall of fumes. The city is covered in a smog cloud. Not surprising if you see the amount of cars, bikes and trucks with a couple of decades worth of mileage on their clocks.
We stopped at a Patisserie for breakfast where I managed to drop my bike in slow motion while attempting to park it. Embarrassing! But as Judy from ADA would say, as long as your hands are still on the handlebars it's not considered a crash. I blame the lack of breakfast and tiredness in any case. When we saw the selection of breads and pastries, we were instantly in heaven. We had the most delicious custard pastry, fresh from the oven and still warm followed by omelette with baguette and coffee.
Refuelled we hit the road again to be met shortly afterwards by the impressive Abidjan sky line. An old testament to how quickly things rise and fall in the world of economics. It is unbelievable to come across a sky line like this when you are surrounded by so much poverty. The history of the country is well worth a read.
The highway leaving Abidjan is like a scene out of any apocalyptic movie like "28 days later" or "Mad Max". Perfectly constructed multiple lane motorways that haven't been maintained probably since the economic crisis of the 80s. Everything is overgrown, nature is claiming it's own back. Signposts are unreadable due to moss build-up, grid and bleached by the sun. Crazy images!

En route to Divo we stopped a few times to admire the clean towns, gardening and farming we came across such as in Tiassale. People clearly take pride here in their surroundings. A few kilometres outside Divo we pulled in to one of the many fruit and vegetable stalls alongside the road. We were curious to try some of the fresh fruit and mix with the locals. No disappointment here. It was so much fun trying to communicate with the women. All the more since it was Rory surrounded by a bunch of them trying to buy 2 mandarines and 2 mangos. When I pulled out the camera and asked if I could take a picture excited mayhem broke loose. It was one of the funniest things.
Upon arriving at Divo, where we were going to stay for the night and meet up with our Galway mate Daragh, Rory went into a shop to buy a SIM card for his phone. This undertaking turned into another ball of entertaining madness. While Rory tried to negotiate prices of SIM cards I made friends with an over enthusiastic political rally supporter. Actually I think he was trying to deafen people with his fanfare. Anyway, the only way to quieten him down was by taking a picture of him which then started another drama as he wanted to have the picture there and then. Long gone are the days of Polaroid... An adventure in itself trying to explain this to him.
We met Daragh an hour later and went for food and a few beers at one of the local restaurants with an open kitchen ;-) I'm sure we saw the tiny little chicken still running around before it landed on our plates. So little food, but oh so tasty! Daragh had been given a suggestion of a hotel for us to stay the night which we gladly followed. Hanging out with Daragh felt a bit like home. Good craic like.

Arriving into Yamoussoukro we had a similar feeling to Abidjan. Six-lane highways leading nowhere, streetlights brightening roads that are hardly used and impressive monuments and oversized, architectural statement buildings you can't get to in most cases. This is Côte d'Ivoire's capital and it's strangely fascinating. From the Parliament buildings, to the Basilica (which is Vatican property), to the former Presidents house with it's sacred crocodiles in a lake to the front and the ostentatious Hotel President (it would have been a moral sin not to stay there), we are blown away with the place. Five days into the trip we took it as an excuse to recharge the batteries and stayed an extra night in Yamoussoukro. No regrets.
We will continue our journey tomorrow and head for Man in the Dix-Huit Montagnes region and closer to the Guinea border. Enjoy the snaps and stay tuned!

Abidjan