First day in Sierra Leone

The participants of the Sierra 2014 expedition have already reached Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone. Despite the difficulties in accessing the Internet, they managed to send a few sentences summarising their first impressions after returning to West Africa. Everyone interested in following the activities of the Wreck Expedition team is welcome to read them!

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“After landing at the airport in Freetown (which, as it turned out, is nowhere near the city) the team loaded all the gear into a small bus and we set off for the capital of Sierra Leone. In Freetown we intended to gather the supplies we would need during our stay on Banana Island.

Unfortunately, when we arrived at the harbour where we planned to catch a ferry to the city, it turned out that there were no more free seats. First problems and time for the first major decision: do we stay overnight in the harbour, or take a longer, roundabout way to the city? The harbour area did not look safe, and the presence of white tourists looking around for supplies had already attracted the attention of locals.

The 5-hour journey in a very uncomfortable minibus was punctuated by stops at 9(!) police checkpoints, where officers were intrigued by our presence on the road after dusk.

We finally made it to Freetown and arrived at our accommodation at 4.30am, where we were finally able to go to bed. Our friends from the USA had been on the road for 48 hours in total!

We spent the next day making the supplies we would need for the rest of our stay.”

Source: Organiser