Jan 27/04
Started the day with another safari. Saw some water buck & some warthogs. Climbed up a high hill for a view over a large area of the park. Seemed like you could almost see into Ghana. Also saw a few elephants on our trip. Got back shortly after 8:30. More elephants in camp than in the bush. At least 2 elephants were eating less than 50 feet from our shack. Luanna didn't go along on the morning ride. She decided to sleep in. It was not a restful night. Last night was cool, & we needed blankets. This night I slept on top of the blankets. Kept waking up all the time. Not the most refreshing sleep. When we got back to camp I lay down & managed to get a bit of sleep while the others ate. Then up for a last look at the elephants. There were 9 at the pond & 5 were in the water. 1 just stood there while the rest played. Sometimes all 4 were completly under the water at one time. At one point I took a picture with all 9 elephants within the area of the picture even if not all were visible. Just when we were ready to leave 6 more elephants arrived on the scene. But because 1 of the others had left we only had 14 elephants visible to us at one time when standing in one place. We left around 11. We saw 2 more elephants about 5-6 km from the gate but we had seen so many we didn't even stop. At the gate we stopped & Paul checked us out of the Park. The same people still worked at the gate as when Paul & Lois were there 4 years earlier. The park was started by children of Canadian missionaries & today their children still work there sometimes. The guide that took us around was the same one that guided them at that time also. At Po we got back onto pavement. We again stopped for a break. Paul filled his truck with gas & some of us bought drinks. A large coke in a bottle cost 375 francs, almost $1.00 Canadian. We had to drink them there & leave the bottles there. Lillian made some phone calls for us to arrange a bus & motel for tomorrow. Hope it all works out. Back on the road we saw some unusual sights for us at least. A truck passed us that had the right side hanging full of live chickens. Close to Ouagau we passed a guy on a moped hauling a live pig. At one point the pig put up a bit of a fuss but was promtly put down. The pig was draped over sideways & tied down with Burkina tarp straps, rubber strips cut from old inner tubes. Definetly a novel way to haul pigs. Arrived back at the guest house in Oaugau about 4. Had a shower to cool off & lay down for a while. Me & Johnathan sat in the rear jump seats of the Pejaroe Mitsubushi and the air conditioning did not really do much back there. At 6 we all collected in the kitchen & some looked at some of Jim's pictures and some played chess. At 630 Carmela took pictures of the 10 people on the work team. She used about 6 cameras so it should be well documented. We arrived at our supper reservation's 15 min late at 7:15, the same restaurant we stopped at on the way up here. Tonight we all seemed to know what we wanted and supper cost 91,000 instead of 81,000 francs. Sounds worse than it is. Carmela, Johnathan & Art took some time while waiting for our food to step next door & send & check e-mail. Back at the guest house Luanna got some ointment from Lillian to put on the insect bites on my arms. Didn't notice gettig them but now they sure itch. Have had the fan running for over an hour blowing hot air out of the door & getting cooler air in at the window. Helps some but it won't be cold tonight. Need to use the plug for a few hours to charge the camera batteries tonight. Pill time & off to sleep, I hope.
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