Lucky Pierre Brings Me to the Dam
Looking for an adventure, Mformi Reese and I decided to investigate a lake on the Ndop Plain. When heading northward from Bamenda towards Kumbo, you climb over the mountain near Sabga and descend into the Ndop Plain. From the crest of the last hill, just before the bush taxi begins to roll faster than its breaks could stop it, you can see Lake Bamendjin. There are hardly any lakes in my area of the NW, and none that I've actually seen. For a long while I thought this enormous expanse of glistening water was a brain trick…the sun shining off corn or beans. Through a bit of research, I discovered that it is all water and that it is a man made reservoir stopped up by a dam.
It seemed from the map that part of the lake was very near to the ring road, and so we left Bafut very early on a clear Sunday morning and dropped in Bamali hoping to be at the lake in an hour to do some fishing and beer drinking. According to Mr. Rogers, the motorcycle driver at car park, Bamenjin was very far and the road was very bad… but he would gladly take us for 12,000cfa because his village is halfway between Bamali and the lake. We bartered and got him to 7,000 and started on our dirt road moto ride. As he lied about the price of petrol and how many liters he would need, I assumed that the trip could not be nearly as long as he had speculated.
We set off, but about an hour later I was beginning to believe that the "Lucky Pierre" seat on the moto is neither lucky nor having anything to do with French cheese. But the landscape was beautiful and the sky was enormous and blue… and we were soon to be lounging in a boat, sipping warm Cameroonian suds. We rode for an hour before reaching Mr. Rogers' village … he said we were halfway, and that the rest of the road was very bad. My spirits waned a bit, but then we got to see 1995 tribal war torn area of Bali Kumban and I was feeling adventurous again.
As we crossed a bridge a little while later, Mr. Rogers exclaimed that we have, "just entered the West Province!!". Surprise! No idea. We had in no way thought we would be crossing provincial lines… this could only mean that we've traveled…. Really very far in a very strange direction. Just go with it. .I smiled, trying to be hopeful, and we continued. We finally were dumped off the bush road onto a nice, wide dirt road and endedn the town of Bamenjin.. nearly two hours and 15 minutes later and on the other side of the lake. Mr. Rogers excitedly took us up to the reservoir we wanted to see so badly (he must have thought we were nuts)… the dam we wanted to see. He had driven us halfway across the Northwest province, into another province (on a Sunday!) to see the Bamenjin Dam. It's a stinking dam, too. We got to go through security and put on white hard hats and get a tour from a guy that only spoke French. Took a few pictures, had some achu for lunch, and headed back towards the ominous, black rain clouds at Ndop.
I wanted adventure… total surprise is what I got. We were even plotted against. Some boys wanted to rob us on the road… but they didn't realize we were strong as oxs and were taking the bush road like a real Cameroonian villagers. Reese even saw a green snake. Sunburned and feeling like I rode on a yahoobuckaroo trail ride for 4 hours, we're eating grilled fish and drinking beer on the couch and feeling no remorse about not fishing yesterday…
It seemed from the map that part of the lake was very near to the ring road, and so we left Bafut very early on a clear Sunday morning and dropped in Bamali hoping to be at the lake in an hour to do some fishing and beer drinking. According to Mr. Rogers, the motorcycle driver at car park, Bamenjin was very far and the road was very bad… but he would gladly take us for 12,000cfa because his village is halfway between Bamali and the lake. We bartered and got him to 7,000 and started on our dirt road moto ride. As he lied about the price of petrol and how many liters he would need, I assumed that the trip could not be nearly as long as he had speculated.
We set off, but about an hour later I was beginning to believe that the "Lucky Pierre" seat on the moto is neither lucky nor having anything to do with French cheese. But the landscape was beautiful and the sky was enormous and blue… and we were soon to be lounging in a boat, sipping warm Cameroonian suds. We rode for an hour before reaching Mr. Rogers' village … he said we were halfway, and that the rest of the road was very bad. My spirits waned a bit, but then we got to see 1995 tribal war torn area of Bali Kumban and I was feeling adventurous again.
As we crossed a bridge a little while later, Mr. Rogers exclaimed that we have, "just entered the West Province!!". Surprise! No idea. We had in no way thought we would be crossing provincial lines… this could only mean that we've traveled…. Really very far in a very strange direction. Just go with it. .I smiled, trying to be hopeful, and we continued. We finally were dumped off the bush road onto a nice, wide dirt road and endedn the town of Bamenjin.. nearly two hours and 15 minutes later and on the other side of the lake. Mr. Rogers excitedly took us up to the reservoir we wanted to see so badly (he must have thought we were nuts)… the dam we wanted to see. He had driven us halfway across the Northwest province, into another province (on a Sunday!) to see the Bamenjin Dam. It's a stinking dam, too. We got to go through security and put on white hard hats and get a tour from a guy that only spoke French. Took a few pictures, had some achu for lunch, and headed back towards the ominous, black rain clouds at Ndop.
I wanted adventure… total surprise is what I got. We were even plotted against. Some boys wanted to rob us on the road… but they didn't realize we were strong as oxs and were taking the bush road like a real Cameroonian villagers. Reese even saw a green snake. Sunburned and feeling like I rode on a yahoobuckaroo trail ride for 4 hours, we're eating grilled fish and drinking beer on the couch and feeling no remorse about not fishing yesterday…
posted by K at 2:38 PM
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