June 3 and 4

Friday June 3

On Friday evening I worked until 7 and then quickly changed and met up with some friends to go out for dinner in Aberdeen (which is a different section of Freetown). People who are on the ship long term are able to drive the Mercy Ships vehicles if they have an international license. Our friend Juan from Dominican Republic who works in the surgical instrument sterilization area and is long term offered to drive a bunch of us who had to work late so we didn't have to wait for a poda poda. Traffic in Freetown is quite crazy especially after work hours during the week. It took us almost 2 hours to make it to Aberdeen, we had to take many detours due to accidents and traffic jams. It was quite an experience.

Waiting for our dinner

Sarah, Juan, and I

Finally we made it to the Atlantic restaurant. It seemed like Mercy Ships was trying to take over the restaurant as there were 28 of us! The restaurant was quite nice and was open air, looking out onto the ocean. It was warm but with the breeze from the ocean we were quite comfortable. There seems to be a large Lebanese presence in Sierra Leone and I was able to try a Lebanese cheese appetizer! After dinner we piled back into the Mercy Ships truck and made our way back to the ship through the dark streets. On the way back I sat in the back of the truck which was fun at first, but after a few speed bumps, pot holes, and sudden stops the excitement faded. Juan had to be very careful driving as there is minimal to no lighting on the streets and people tend to walk out in front of you and many cars don't have working lights.

I had to take this picture for you dad. If you look closely the man driving the motorcycle is holding a flashlight in his mouth as a light because his front light is burnt out.

all smiles after arriving safely back at the ship!

River Number 2

Saturday morning my cabin mates and I left the ship and headed out to River Number 2. There were 5 of us so we decided to see if we could hire a taxi for the day. We were going to walk up Bad Boy Lane to the main road and see if we could hail a cab, but as we were leaving the shipping yard a Mercy Ships truck pulled over and Lawrence (the dad of one of the long term families) told us to get in! He drove us through town and made sure that we had a "safe looking" taxi that would survive the trek on the back roads to River number 2. We paid the taxi driver 110,000 Leones to drive us to the beach, stay with us all day, and drive us home (which works out to about 26 American dollars). This would be considered a great day's earning for the taxi driver and he was really happy to take us!

a short clip of the bumpy roads out of town

The drive to River Number 2 was about an hour and a half first climbing winding paved roads up the mountains surrounding Freetown and then onto dirt roads through the small villages of Goderich, Lakka, Hamilton, Sussex and finally arriving at River number 2. This beach is only accessible during the dry season as the roads are very rough and vehicles cannot drive on them when it gets wet.

This is one of the garbage trucks in Freetown

You can see all the locals who have decided to get a free ride

The dirt roads on the way to River number 2. The dirt here is very red

Scenery picture. while crossing a bridge in one of the villages. you can see that people put there houses in very interesting locations. I can imagine that the houses below get flooded when ever it rains

When we made it to the beach we rented an umbrella and some chairs and settled in. This beach is my favorite so far, it was so clean and the sand so nice and white. One of my cabin mates has a guide book to Sierra Leone and we read that before the war, the French tourists would land in Lungi airport and take a helicopter to River Number 2 to spend the day. There is a little market in the village of River Number 2, so after spending some time in the sun we walked around the shops. I bought some fabric and had a shoulder bag made for me while I waited! It was really fun to spend some time with the villagers while they were working away. As the only power source to the village is a generator (which only services the fridge in the little cafe), it was really interesting to watch the men sew with foot powered machines.

The beach is named River number 2 because the river makes its way to the sea here.

you can see the river in behind the huts

The mountains on the shoreline are so beautiful

At the markets. This man really wanted me to buy one of his musical instruments

Sewing a bag for me!

Showing off the finished product

Cabin mates!

The beach is so clean and stretches on for miles. We went for a long walk after our shopping. The only break in the beach is where the river runs into the sea. The water wasn`t too deep so we decided to walk accross. Because the sand is moving so much with the current we sunk in up past our knees! It was almost like quicksand, but we made it accross and had an amazing walk down the beach watching little crabs scurry up and down with the waves! We came accross an abandoned resort on the beachfront. It looked like it had been such a beautiful place to stay before the war. Maybe one day they will be able to restore it for people to enjoy.

In the afternoon, dark clouds started to roll in (you can see them above the mountain in the above picture). Sierra Leone means `roaring mountains`, we were able to experience the roaring mountains first hand as the thunder continued to rumble. We made the long trek back to Freetown and were hoping to stop for dinner at a place called Crown Bakery, but unfortunately it had closed already. Instead we tried our hand at making pizza with the few ingredients we could scrounge up and played Wizard card game and watched a movie! What a great Saturday!

Hope you are all having a good weekend! talk to you soon!