Travelling light

Road travel in Cameroon is a real marathon. To get the bus from Yaounde to Bamenda, someone had to go buy the tickets early in the morning. Then at 8am we packed ourselves into taxis to the bus station - a vibrant, smelly, crowded place - where we eventually found our seats at the back of the 70-seater.

Once we got going, at least there was some air through the windows, but I can't say it was a comfortable ride! Lucky to have only 5 on the back row, with narrow seats, a real problem for the 2 tall guys among us. The road was mostly tarmac but very bumpy in places, so we were both shaken and stirred during the 7 hour trip.

Children on the bus were lovely - really well behaved in spite of the long hot journey. In front were two women and 4 small children under 5, all on a bench seat for 3, dressed as if for a wedding and quiet as mice.

Views were tremendous. Passing close-ups of the city, people working, shopping, selling, then giving way to rural life, back-breaking work on small plots of land. Plantains everywhere, few animals to be seen, the landscape changing from forest, shrubs, drier grassy areas.

On the city outskirts the bus was pulled up by police, who checked our visas and identity documents. A couple were taken off the bus and we waited to see what would happen. Some men got off to pee at the roadside. Then the couple got on again, having paid an instant fine perhaps? and the bus set off again. Apparently this is quite common, an extra income source for policemen. Bus and taxi drivers seem to know which are the genuine police road blocks and which are thieves.

During the 360 kilometre trip we stopped once for food and toilet. Food was hastily bought from roadside stalls: roasted plantains, peanuts, barbecued fish pieces, and a strange sort of pudding made of pistachio, melon and fish wrapped in leaves. Vendors held up goods to the bus windows at every halt on the road, or got on the bus if they could.

As we reached the north west we saw carrots and cabbage, signs in English - a man got on the bus to give us a real pedlar's spiel about this fantastic detergent in a bottle, our first experience of pidgin English. He seemed to be saying you put your knickers in the bottle, shake it a few times and pull them out clean!