Niger River Project

Our first day on the river is bizarre. Suddenly there are no people. It’s a crazy thing about Africa, that even when you think you’re in the middle of nowhere, someone pops up - out herding, collecting water or just sitting under a tree. But almost as soon as we push off from the bank and head out of Faranah, we’re on our own. A few fishermen in pirogues pass, but I can’t help the feeling we’re heading into somewhere really wild.

The fist afternoon passes without event. From my steering position at the back of Djoliba, I follow our course on the map and using the GPS. It’s clear from the outset, from the way the river meanders back and forth, left to right, that progress is going to be slow. We’ll need to be patient, get into a ryhthym and, quite literally, go with the flow.

At about five we decide to find somewhere to camp. We’re only about 8km as the crow flies from where we started a few hours before, but with wiggles, we’ve probably done twice that.

We find a bit of bank where the vegetation isn’t so thick where we can bring the canoe in. We have to scramble up a steep muddy bank, but at the top it’s flat and looks good for camping. We set to with the machettes and clear a space. Dan gets his hammock up, while I join the ants and other delightful creatures on the ground in a tent.

The evening is peaceful, and we soon have a good fire going. The wood here is the driest I’ve ever come across. Soon the midges are biting so we cover up and slap on the repellent. We’re going to have to get used to this now.

All sems tranquil and convivial - until disaster strikes. Now in full bush mode, Dan decides to get stuck into splitting some wood for the fire with his machette. I’m watching him, thinking, that looks dangerous, when, wham! in front of my eyes it’s happened: he’s missed the log and embeded the heavy cutting edge of the blade in his finger. Instantly both he and the jungle floor look like something from the HMS Victory’s operating table - blood everywhere. He’s hit an artery.

We get a hanky round his finger and stem some of the bleeding, but it’s serious. We don’t say it but we both know this could mean curtains for our trip through the bush.

We rinse the wound, staunch the bleeding again, then slap on some steri-strips, which seem to do the trick. We’ve both brough hipflasks out for just certain occasions (emergencies or celebrations); as soon as Dan’s patched up, we fall on them with gusto, both shaking and laughing at once. For now, at least, we seem to have got away with it.

Day two passes much as day one did. The river lazes its way along, occasionally broken by patches of hardy vegetation growing straight out of the centre of the stream. These we avoid, lest they conceal crafty strainers under the surface, that can snag a craft and tip it.

Fortunately Dan’s injury doesn’t sem to be too much of a handicap - good news, as there’s no room for slackers on HMS Djoliba! We keep a careful eye on it, but the steri strips seem to be holding - as is my lashing, I’m glad to see. Maybe I’ve found my niche.

At lunch we have our first hippo experience. Dan’s just cooked up some couscous on a nice shady rock next to a confluence between the Niger and one of its many tributaries. Suddenly there’s a loud bellow and a snort from the vegetation directly opposite us - maybe 50 metres away. The bushes shudder and bend. We can’t see anything, but there’s no doubt what it is.

We freeze, spoonfuls of couscous and chilli hovering between bowl and mouth. Suddenly my appetite has been replaced by a block of ice. We look around, wondering the quickest way we can throw our things in the boat and peg it.

But we’ve scared the beast. It’s letting us know we’re there through its truly terrifying bellows, but we can tell from the crashes in the undergrowth that it’s heading upstream, happily away from us. We bolt down the rest of the couscous, chillis and all, and paddle off as fast as we can. This is is how it’s gonna be; this is the wild. It feels good to be initiated.

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