This past weekend Landry and I took the train out to Lope
National Park for the weekend. Our
train was scheduled to leave at 7:30 on Friday night, so we left promptly at
9am on Saturday J There was actually a cargo train derailment
during the day on Friday that had to be cleared before any trains could leave
the station. Their system is set up so
that there are several tracks at each station, but only one track between
stations, so there’s no way to pass an accident or stalled train unless it’s at
a station. But I digress.
Lope National Park is one of many national parks in Gabon
and it has both forest and savannah. We
were supposed to arrive in the early morning hours of Saturday, but since our
train didn’t leave the city until 9am we decided to extend our trip for a day
and come back on Monday night instead of Sunday night. This gave us a little extra time to enjoy
all that Lope has to offer.
There’s an incredibly nice hotel in Lope that’s pretty
affordable, but it’s completely isolated from the town. We decided to stay in a motel, also owned by
the hotel, but that sits right in the center of town. This allowed us to take advantage of all of the hotel amenities,
but we could eat local and explore the town a bit. We signed up for four excursions while we were in Lope. We did a forest walk, a boat ride down the
Oogue River, a 4x4 safari, and we climbed Mont Brazza, a mountain that
overlooks the river. Local fare was a
lot of chicken and rice, but it was good, and the locals were incredibly friendly,
trying to give us tips on where to see elephants. Apparently, seeing an elephant in their backyard is like us
waking up to see a deer or squirrel!
The excursions were wonderful. We saw buffalo several times, which look very different from the
buffalo we have in the states. We got
to see TONS of elephants, some monkeys, and the views from the top of Mont
Brazza were amazing. My bag still has
not been located, so I was pretty limited in what I had to wear for these
excursions and I ended up climbing the mountain in my flip flops. I was proud about climbing a mountain
period, but in my flops?! Put an extra
check mark next to climbing a mountain on the bucket list!
Our return home was another adventure. We had taken the express train up to Lope,
but they only run every other day. They
offer first class seating for a minimal upgrade price and the seats are
spacious, plus there’s air conditioning.
The local was running on Monday, so that was our only choice. No option for upgrading seats, no air
conditioning, and I can’t say for sure, but I’m pretty certain the toilets
runneth over because when we stopped the smell at times was almost
unbearable. Water had leaked in between
the two panes of glass in my window and an aquarium of algae was beginning to
grow. We were delayed at two stations
on the way waiting for the train going in the other direction to pass us and we
arrived at 11am instead of the scheduled 8:30.
Despite the travel bumps, this was definitely the
highlight of our vacation. Just the
right combination of adventure and relaxation.
I’m really looking forward to returning to Lope some day and maybe
showing some of our friends around…any takers??
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| The train station in Owendo, the town next to Libreville |
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| Our car on the train |
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| Getting ready to depart Owendo |
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| Finally arrived! |
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| Getting off the train in Lope |
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| The sign for our motel |
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| Motel rooms are a bit simpler in Lope, but the bed was comfy, the room had AC, and we were so busy we barely saw the room but to sleep in it! |
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| The grounds of our motel. |
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| I know this looks like a dirt road running through town, but it's actually National 1, the highway that runs across the whole country. | | | | |
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| Landry holding up the roots of a fallen tree |
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| On our forest walk |
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| Me climbing vines in the forest. Our guide said that in the event an elephant should charge us we would need to find vines like these and climb them quickly to escape. Kinda glad we didn't see any elephants this day! |
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| Wandering through the savannah. |
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| Monkey in the trees during our forest walk. |
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| Buffaloes we spotted while driving to the forest. |
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| View of Mont Brazza and the Oogue River from the pool at the Lope Hotel. All of the rocks you see are completely underwater during the rainy season. |
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| Likely the most relaxing moment of my vacation |
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| On our boat ride down the Oogue River |
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| On the boat |
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| Having a National Treasure moment. There are prehistoric engravings on these rocks, but they're hard to see. Pouring water on them makes them more visible. |
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| Rock engravings. |
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| Climbing back down to the beach and boat after our hike to see the rock writing. |
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| A chimpanzee our guide spotted on the mountainside while returning from our boat ride. |
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| On the bank of the Oogue River. |
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| Had to document our feet in the waters of the Oogue |
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| Date night! |
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| The water tower in Lope |
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| Half way up the climb to the peak of Mont Brazza |
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| Steep climb! |
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| So steep! |
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| Top of the world! |
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| Celebrating our achievement |
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| When we got to the top of the mountain there was a cement block with several pieces of slate engraved with the names of people who have climbed Mont Brazza. |
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| Here's our addition, L+S '13 |
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| Heading back down the mountain |
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| This is one of the restaurants in town. The whole interior was paneled in tree bark...pretty cool. |
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| Another local restaurant. |
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| Breakfast at Maison Mere, omelets, fresh bread, and coffee. Yum! |
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| Elephant behind the restaurant where we ate breakfast |
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| Elephants playing in the savannah during our 4x4 ride |
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| A family of elephants! |
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| Love this shot with the elephants in the background. And look at us reppin' Philly hard! |
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| Monkeys in the trees during our 4x4 ride. There were so many, but they moved too fast to catch! |
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| Monkeys jumping from one tree to another from a distance. |
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| Our sweet ride |
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| VERY tired after a long ride back on the local train. |
