Monday, 30 May 2011

Limbe, Limbe, Limbe

Before an intense week of welcoming and training the new Peace Corps Trainees, I took some vacation days to go fishing in Limbe, Southwest region, Cameroon.

First stop was to the barber shop as my buddy wanted to get clean-shaven or as Cameroonians like to say, “Oh, you want to be fresh?” Thank goodness I was there as I stopped them from putting black gel into his hair that I’m positive is only for African hair.

Best idea that we had was to stay in Limbe’s Botanical Gardens. Founded in 1982, the Gardens cover almost 48 hectares and are ideal for nature-lovers of all kind (too bad I'm not one!). Birdwatchers was booked, so we checked into Hotel Miramar for 15.000CFA. It was an okay view as our room overlooked the ocean from a cliff. Not too shabby!

View from Hotel Miramar

After eating at Mars, we headed off to the black sand beach. With a gentle breeze and the sun setting, it was very relaxing to say the least.

The rest of the weekend was spent beaching it up, exploring Limbe’s Wildlife Center (one of the few primate sanctuaries in the world) and fishing at midnight. Cameroon is actually one of the few countries where coastal and lowland gorillas exist, so it was great to see them being saved in the sanctuary instead of being poached. See the video below for some good times!

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