Trip to Banfora

10. November 2007 by admin.

Apologies for the late post, since my return I’ve been swamped with work, suffering from allergies and stressed from OSAP. So for my loyal readers who have stuck with me for a month and a half, here are the highlights of my trip to the Southwest.

Last Thursday, the “gang” consisting of my old housemate Cindy, Michelle and Jonathan (whom I came here with) from Fada N’Gourma and Alex from Koudougou picked me up from my new house bright and early at 6am. They organized for a driver and a 4×4 for our entire trip at a reasonable price when split between 5. On route to Banfora, our jeep was waved to the side of the road by whom seemed to be highway control. Oh no, I thought to myself, get ready for passport inspection. Alas, I was happily suprised, the Tour de Burkina was on and hundreds of cyclists whizzed by us!

We continued directly to the waterfalls near Banfora. After some bumpy rough roads, we arrived to what appeared like Jurassic Park. Immense trees, giant dragonflys buzzing around everywhere. The path to the watefalls…

Further up the path, a warning sign: Prudence is strongly recommended at the edge of the cascades and the cliffs.

The hike from the path becoming more steep, eventually leading to a short vertical climb.

The view from above the first major cascades of the river.

Then my batteries died. The further up we went, the smaller the cascades, very picturesque! We relaxed in the shallow water and received back massages from the little falls. Even though we weren’t in Bobo-Dioulasso, we joked that we got bobo’s from Bobo because almost all of us slipped, bumped or fell. The rocks were jagged, slippery and there were cracks, where my foot fell into and fortunately I didn’t twist my ankle. Some of the falls were so powerful our bottoms almost got washed away!

After frolicking in the water, we visited the domes. Lucky us, it was sunset which made for a perfect day.

Our driver for the week, Bouba

Michelle, looking heroic

Alex and Jonathan dome-skipping.

Cindy, comtemplating the way back down.

End of day 1.

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