CAMEROON

When it Rains it Pours

The drive from Maiduguri in Nigeria to Banki, a dusty border village, took us about two hours. As per usual the road condition became worse and worse the closer to the border we got. We took advantage of the cheaper diesel in Nigeria and filed both tanks prior to departure.

There had been a fair amount of rain in Banki during recent days and the normal route to Nigerian immigration and customs was closed off. A friendly local on a motor bike led us through a series of winding dirt roads through the village until we eventually arrived at a boom saying ‘Welcome to Cameroon’.

The Nigerian officials were very friendly and proficient and within no time we were through and on our way to the Cameroon immigration offices. Whilst our papers were being processed I was approached by an insurance broker who enquired whether I had the correct car insurance. I insisted I had and showed him the insurance purchased in Nouakchott, Mauritania, for the Central African counties. He stated this was not valid for Cameroon and when stopped by the police they would not recognise it. I pointed out to him the list of countries covered on the form, but he still insisted that I needed a different insurance and a Carte Rouge (which is a small piece of paper which is attached to the insurance). I weighed up the pros and cons and decided that I should buy the Carte Rouge to make my transit through Cameroon smoother. It is true that right hand drive cars are illegal in Cameroon and I didn’t want to exasperate a potentially tense situation, if it arose. When I asked to purchase the Carte Rouge, he said he couldn’t sell it without selling new insurance as well. I suspected that what he was telling me may not be entirely accurate so I decided to stick with what I had.

Actually, right hand drive vehicles have been banned but if you state clearly that you are a tourist in transit you should be fine. If that doesn’t work then you can explain that the government’s immigration and customs have given you permission, clearly knowing you are from the UK, and if they have a problem with the government rules then they should take it up directly with them.

Once finished at immigration we went down the road towards the Customs Office. Again, the rain had closed some roads off so we asked a local to show us the way. He led us through a series of streets and then to a river which he said we needed to cross because that was the only way to the Customs Office. The river was about10 metres wide with flat sandy banks. Clearly other vehicles had gone through so we put the foot down and plunged through. Once on the other side we soon found the Customs, but were told that the person that processes and stamps the Carnet de Passage was not in as it was a Sunday. This reminded me of Will and Hanna’s (Mind The Elephants) experience so with some gentle persuasion and a phone call I managed to get the official to come to work. Obviously the office could not be officially closed as the border itself is not closed on a Sunday. After about an hour’s wait the official arrived and he was very proficient in processing the necessary paperwork, presumably because he wanted to get back to his Sunday nap !!

We had heard that there would be many police and other check points around the border, so expected the 200km journey to Maroua via Mora to be long and tedious. The road for the first 40km to Mora was in poor condition, but to our surprise we were not stopped once. Actually many of the check points were unmanned, whilst a few of them were but they couldn’t be bothered to move from their comfy seats. Travelling on Sundays definitely does have some advantages. The road from Mora to Maroua was much better, and as we approached Maroua one policeman did attempt to stop us but he was too late as a young assistant had already lifted the boom and we sped through.

Maroua is Cameroon’s northernmost major town and a good place to stop before going across neighbouring borders. We decided to stay at Hotel Porte Mayo which is run by a German called Norbert. One of our main reasons for choosing to stay in such places when entering a country is to gather reliable information. We have often found that information provided from locals can be wildly exaggerated or just plain inaccurate. You can save a lot of hassle, and have a much better in-country experience, by getting to the facts in a timely manner. I spoke to Norbert about the Carte Rouge issue and he advised that, whilst not necessary, it could make travel through Cameroon simpler. For me, the simpler the better, and Norbert kindly offered to have his assistant go to Axa Insurance and have one attached to my existing insurance. The cost was only 1000CFA, and I did not need to buy a completely new insurance.

When the assistant returned with the Carte Rouge attached, it was pointed out to me that my car insurance was actually only valid in two days time. It was fortunate that we had not been stopped on the way from the border as insurance irregularities in Cameroon are taken seriously. On the plus side, our journey was pretty much on schedule as I had ‘best guessed’ our arrival date in Cameroon some three months ago in Mauritania.

The landscape in Northern Cameroon is similar to that in Northern Nigeria. It is a Sahel environment and has minimal rainfall. Generally the area is quite flat, although the Mandara Mountain that straddles the border breaks the mould. We enquired about visiting the remote scenic villages around the mountain range but, when we were told that many of the dry river beds that needed to be crossed were now in flood, we decided to skip it.

The following day we jumped on taxi bikes and headed to the central market, which is described in positive terms in the Lonely Planet. The market really was not worth visiting and within 5 minutes of arriving a storm hit and the market traders scrambled to close their stores. We took shelter for almost three hours until it abated and headed back to Hotel Porte Mayo through severely flooded streets. Later that afternoon, I updated my Blog and called family and friends back in England.

As we had another day to kill before my car insurance became valid so I had some spare time to plan our route towards the south, via Garoua and N’Gaoundere. Having heard some horror stories about the road that connects the north of Cameroon to the South, I made some enquiries. The road in question is the 270km route between N’Gaoundere and Garoua-Boulai which lies on the border of Central African Republic. There are in fact two routes, a western route (via Banyo) and an eastern route (via Garoua-Boulai). Although most over-landers seem to take the eastern route, I was slightly cautious because of our experience taking the ‘popular route’ in Nigeria from Mokwa to Bida....which was a big mistake. I met a local businessman at the hotel who insisted that the western route, as it had been recently graded, was the best one as the eastern route was in very poor condition. This sounded like good advice, but as it conflicted to what Norbert was telling me it needed to be double checked. The gateway to both routes is N’Gaoundere so I figured that when I arrived I would go to the local tour bus operators and ask them. One thing for sure, the local bus drivers always know where the best roads are.

The following day we left at day break and headed southwards. The road was in good condition and we reached our destination of N’Gaoundere in seven hours. The drive down was pretty unremarkable, and we had a fair amount of rain on the way. When we arrived, we drove to the Touristique Tours office and were relieved to find the manager spoke excellent English. He called a couple of his drivers and translated for me. The feedback was in complete contrast to what the local businessman in Hotel Porte Mayo had confidently advised me. The drivers estimated that the eastern journey would take about 7 hours, and to not even attempt the western route as the conditions were appalling. Within this sea of conflicting information, I decided that the bus drivers were the most reliable source and opted to take the eastern route. To add further mystery to this, Rene, a German biker friend, had travelled the eastern route two months previously and reported he had had a terrible journey and one should allow at least 10 hours to complete it. The following morning, not sure what really to expect, we left at day break for the eastern route. It had rained heavily over night and was still raining when we left. We hoped it would not turn into a major down pour, as travelling on laterite roads in such conditions could be dangerous. Once you leave town you are instantly in the bush and driving on laterite. The first 10 km were fine and just as we were wondering what all the fuss was about the road suddenly deteriorated into a real mess. Potholes covered the road like Swiss cheese and they were large. Thankfully, despite the area having had a fair amount of rain, the road was not too muddy. Our progress was slowed to an average of 25km and hour and it looked like it would indeed take us over 10 hours to get to Garoua-Boulai. Because of the rough road conditions, and the fact that we needed to protect Proper Job as much as possible ahead of the journey through hundreds of kilometres of rough roads on the way to South Africa, we rotated driving on two hour shifts. The next 50 km were very rough and needed total concentration. Thankfully there was hardly any traffic and the road wound its way through lush green bush. There were some signs of significant road workings along the way and after two hours it was time to switch drivers. I was quite tired after my gruelling two hour shift and sitting in the passenger seat contemplated what lay ahead. I silently hoped we would not snap something on Proper Job as I didn’t fancy the thought of getting it repaired in a small border village. We couldn’t believe our eyes when after only a few more kilometres, some 75 km from N’Gaoundere, we suddenly came upon a new graded road. The road was so good we could confidently travel at around 80 km per hour. The question was could this last. To our even greater surprise, 20km later, we next hit a very new tarred road which lasted for another 70km. By the time it was my turn to drive again the tarmac had ended but it was still very good graded road. We had now covered 160km of the 270km eastern route. We wondered how this road, which we assumed went all the way to Garoua-Boulai, could have been built within the time that Rene had gone through here and had reported such bad conditions. Surely the Chinese can’t build roads that fast. We raced on and now planned to get as far as Bertoua, which lies along the road to Yaoundé, the capital city of Cameroon. Our jubilant mood however was cut short 50km later when the road deteriorated again and we were forced to revert to an average of 25km per hour. After driving for 6 hours we decided to look for somewhere to pull over and make a sandwich and a cup of coffee. Finding convenient places to pull over on roads that are bound by dense bush is not that easy, but eventually we found a mud track that led to a pleasant clearing in the bush. After half an hour we were refreshed and resumed our slow drive along the rough road. We were surprised when 30 minutes later we drove into Garoua-Boulai. We had made more progress than we had though and it had taken us six and a half hours to complete the eastern route. The new road that is being built when finished will be one of the best roads in Cameron and will crucially link the south of the country to the north.

The road to Bertoua was excellent tarmac and we covered the 300km in two and a half hours. The further south you drive the taller the trees become and the thicker the rain forest gets. The road to Bertoua winds its way through a scenic hilly rain forest landscape and one is struck by the immenseness of it.

In Bertoua we stayed at the Talma Hotel, which had been recommended to us by a Cameroonian fraud auditor we had met the previous evening. It turned out to be excellent value and also had a great restaurant within walking distance. That evening, I decided that we should not prolong our stay in Cameroon. Because of the daily rains we could not visit the nicest parts of Cameroon and didn’t fancy hanging around the coast in the rain.

So as to avoid crossing a border on a Sunday, we planned to drive in the morning to Ambam which lies 600km away and is fairly close to the Gabon border. Overnight it rained again and when we left Bertoua at 6.30am it was still raining. We had been told that there was a 40km stretch of poor road just after you leave Bertoua and we soon hit it. Because of the recent rains there was a lot of water on the dirt road and the first obstacle we came across was a flooded section where a river had burst across the road. I enquired with some locals if it was fine to cross and when they affirmed it was we put Proper Job into low transmission and made our way through the river. The river was deeper than I thought and when we emerged from the other side Proper Job was covered in red mud. I hoped that there were not more rivers like this to cross. The road was very poor and slippery but we did not come across any more seriously flooded sections and once we were through the 40km stretch the road was very good to Yaoundé The road wound its way through rolling hills and thick green rainforest and it was very relaxing. When we got to Yaoundé we found a power wash and gave Proper Job a though clean, especially making sure we cleaned all the mud from the brakes. That finished we pushed on towards Ambam, but as time was getting on it was clear we would not make it. Instead we opted to stay in Ebolowa, which is approximately 150 km from the Gabon border.

Again we hardly saw any police barriers along the way and the few times we were pulled over, they were just curious about where we were going and wished us well on our journey. When we arrived at Ebolowa we opted to camp at Hotel Relais. When we pulled in we met up with a Swiss couple who were making their way towards South Africa, We camped on an old tennis court where there were a few Chinese men making some sort of blockwork. The tennis court was right next to the jungle so there were a lot of mosquitoes around and the bush night life was loud. The Swiss couple had bumped into a few of the same people we had along the way and we spent a couple of hours going through routes and places to stay. Cameroon has wonderful patisseries so we popped into town to get some for breakfast the following day as we would be leaving early for the border.

Overnight there was no rain and making as little noise as possible so as not to awaken our Swiss friends, we pulled out of the tennis court at 7am and headed towards the border. Our plan was to get a substantial way towards Libreville in Gabon so we hoped that the border crossing would go smoothly.

As we approached the Cameroon border we easily found the immigration and customs and our paperwork was processed quickly and efficiently. We made such good progress that we took the opportunity to have breakfast and a cup of coffee in the immigration car park.

We found the Cameroonians to be friendly and, unlike others we had heard about, we did not have any problems with the police at road blocks. On the odd occasion we were stopped we were only ever asked to show our driving license and not one official mentioned the fact that Proper Job was a right hand drive. I would have liked to have seen more of Cameroon as it is a fine looking country. However, for us, the constant rain kept us moving southwards towards the dry seasons.