Happy Tourism in the Gambia

A few weeks ago when an American studying abroad in St. Louis (about 5 hours north of Dakar) was couchsurfing with us, I impulsively invited myself on a trip she was taking with some friends from her study abroad program to the Gambia. I guess I really needed a change, and perhaps more than that I needed to spend time with English speaking women. I find myself almost constantly around men here, and, well, that needed to change, if only for a week. My impulsive decision turned out to be a great decision! I had a wonderful trip.

Now how to summarize an eventful week in a different country? What sticks out the most is how much I laughed during the trip. This was due in part to being with girls who like to laugh a lot, but also the Gambia is just goofy. It’s called the Smiling Coast of Africa because it’s shaped like a smile, but I think also because it’s so laid-back and everything is funny! The people there had me laughing until I was crying all the time, whether it was the men we met named Captain Aladdin, Foxy Brown, Bob the Builder, or Alex the Juice man who we had a silly half hour bargaining session with on the beach before he brought us delicious fresh squeezed orange and lime juice. All of the men are not shy and hit on us but not in a creepy way as I perceive men to be here in Senegal, always in a goofy way. I think I fit in well there because everyone seems as if they’re about to start cracking up, which is often how I live my life. Even the animals are goofy. At the beach, I stood up from my towel and a dog immediately took my place and sunbathed on my towel with a goofy expression on his face.

We spent most of our time on the Western coast, starting in the small capital city of Banjul. Then we spent a few nights in Bakau, taking day trips to surrounding towns. On our last day, we spent many hours at Makasutu Culture Forest, an absolutely stunning place, and then spent the night in the closest town, Brikama. A lot of the time, we had activities planned out based on the Lonely Planet Guide book, but more often than not, places we looked for were closed or we never found them at all. Thus our trip ended up being unpredictable, figuring out what to do on the spot.

I will post pictures so please look at those via the link to our picasa album on the right, as they will better show the events of our trip than a description I can fit into a readable blog post.

Here is a small example of the happy, goofy, hospitable Gambian people. At Makasutu Culture Forest, this wonderful musician played his Kora for us while we rested between events. Here he went from playing a piece in Mandinka into this lovely little welcoming song.