SmallBuns has published a fantastic book!
Our very own SmallBuns has published an excellent travel memoir called "Eat F*ck Love" detailing his escapades while on a backpacking trip in Western Europe. It is funny, steamy and titillating. I found the book highly entertaining. Smallbuns being a modest man won't promote his book. However I as one of the first reader strongly recommend it. It helps that the book could be purchased for as little as $4, and the first 30 odd pages are free to read on amazon.
[URL]https://www.amazon.com/Eat-Love-Enlightening-Epiphanies-Backpacker-ebook/dp/B08HYKW452/[/URL]
1 photos
Somewhere in rural central Salone
A long afternoon spent skinny dipping in the Rokel river with a local friend.
The village kids got us a bag full of sweet juicy mangoes.
I sucked on the mangoes while my friend sucked me above and under water.
Salone, sweet sweet Salone!
A journey across west Africa. Time for Sierra Leone
Taking a break from Madagascar due to its current rainy season. Decided to travel west Africa. I started in The Gambia, then on to Senegal. Reports for both countries are in their respective forums. Now for Sierra Leone, then on to Nigeria and Cameroon.
First of all, a common misconception is that Sierra Leone is a French or Spanish-speaking country beacause its name is a relic of former Portuguese and Spanish traders. Actually Sierra Leone is anglophone. English is the official language. And it's worth noting that most locals I met referred to their nation by its nickname, Salone.
The tourist visa is available on arrival in Freetown airport, the capital city. There is also an ATM and a currency-exchange kiosk in the airport (which gave me a better rate for my US Dollars than the official rate online).
The airport is separated from Freetown by a body of water, so there are private and public boats available to carry you across. I chose the public ferry. It's cheap and a great party. On board we had food, drinks, music, dancing, comedic performances, and a lot of camaraderie. The locals in Freetown were lovely people, friendly, helpful, and loved to have fun. I also met some beautiful young ladies on the ferry who I chatted with and collected phone numbers for connecting later. [I]On a side note, public transport in Africa is excellent hunting ground[/I].
After departing the ferry, I took a taxi into Freetown and arrived at Sweet Mother's Guesthouse, located near the southern end of Aberdeen which is a popular peninsula with a strip of beachfront bars, restaurants, hotels, and discos along Lumley Beach Road.
During my ride from the ferry to the guesthouse, I observed the densely (overly?) populated city of Freetown. People and traffic are everywhere. Motorcycle taxis are common. And after checking in to the guesthouse, I connected with a moto-driver who gave me a tour of the city, including the Aberdeen strip. My impressions were that Aberdeen had once been a well-developed, highly-trafficked beachfront destination for locals and tourists. But it has fallen into disrepair. A lot of wooden shacks and shanty construction remain. Nonetheless, the area's natural beauty shined, and it seemed to have great potential if the government decided to invest in the revitalization of Aberdeen as a business / tourist district.
Among the places he showed me were Fourah Bay College, which was full of beautiful ladies. We visited the campus several times in the following weeks, and I always collected a handful of numbers. We also explored downtown, but there were just so many people it was hard to connect. Most of our hunting was in and around Aberdeen, and usually in the late-afternoon, evening, and night.
By the way, Tinder is also popular and effective if online is your preference.
Some of the places in Aberdeen I recommend are: Kingston Bar, Papa Cleff, and The Warehouse. There are many other (nameless) venues within walking distance to these.
On a positive note, Freetown has a lot of ladies who are interested and available. They are incredibly sweet, feminine, and cooperative. The typical appearance is medium height, slim, and dark-skin. Wigs and weaves (fake hair) are common. I also saw some skin bleaching, although not as much as in Ghana.
As for prices, it's important to first reiterate that Sierra Leone changed its currency in 2022. Previously the notes were one thousand, two thousand, five thousand, and ten thousand leones. They have removed the "thousand" from all notes. As a result, the currency is now one, two, five, ten, and (a new note) twenty leones.
Cash gifts I offered to ladies were similar to other African countries: short-term 200 leones. Long-term 300 leones. I also paid for all transportation, food, drinks, and entertainment. I received no complaints.
On the subject of money, Sierra Leone is a cash-based society (like many African countries). Most hotels, restaurants, clubs, and bars do not accept credit or debit cards, and there is no mobile money network like M-PESA in Kenya. In other words, you must carry cash everywhere and every day. The problem specifically with Sierra Leone is that the bills are of such low value that it's necessary to carry pockets full of money just to pay daily expenses. For example, 20 leones (the largest bill in circulation) is only equal to about $1. Yes, one dollar. Well, my hotel for the week was $300. Imagine having to go to the ATM machine, withdraw 300 one-dollar bills. BUT the ATM will only dispense 20 or 40 bills per transaction, depending on the bank. So it's necessary to make upwards of 15 consecutive withdrawals just to get the cash necessary to pay the hotel. This is before withdrawing cash to pay for food, drinks, entertainment, and ladies.
Sierra Leone is the first country where I thought to myself that the currency is worth less than the paper it's printed on. This can be good and bad. While a worthless currency is good in that products and services are cheap, especially if you discover and live within the local economy, it's bad in that you have to deal with dozens of regular ATM withdrawals and carrying large amounts of cash on you every day. Moreover, the locals know you are carrying it, and they know that you are a foreigner. Fortunately, during my time in Freetown, I had no issues with crime or personal safety.
Food in Freetown was not for me. Typical meals were often just rice with a SUPER spicy sauce on top. Way too much hot pepper for me. I usually couldn't taste the food through the spice.
Also, I observed a lack of a beach culture. In fact, the ocean at the southern point of Aberdeen is literally a floating trash dump. During my first days at Sweet Mother's Guesthouse, I enjoyed walking to the beach where several local women grilled and sold fish for lunch. But I never saw anyone swimming in the ocean. On the third day, I decided to carry my beach shorts and to take a swim. Big mistake. I barely set a foot into the water before a barrage of plastic bottles, bags, and other garbage surrounded me. I could not take a step without a sea of floating trash colliding with me. At that moment, I understood why nobody swam in the ocean. I had never experienced anything like that before or since. It's truly disappointing (from a local business perspective) because the Aberdeen peninsula and Freetown as a city are amazingly beautiful naturally, and they should be cleaned-up if for no other reason than as attractions for tourists who want to visit, swim, and [I]spend money[/I].
From Freetown, my plan was to fly directly to Lagos, Nigeria. So I needed to obtain a tourist visa for Nigeria. While in Freetown, I visited the Nigerian High Commission (embassy) in order to secure my visa. That whole experience was an expensive, illogical, frustrating pain-in-the-ass. In fact, I ended up visiting the High Commission six times, paid a total of $360, submitted current bank statements to demonstrate my financial solvency, and even sat face-to-face for a required interview with the ambassador himself. All of this was simply to [I]visit[/I] Nigeria. Little did I know that the horrible process of obtaining a tourist visa was a harbinger of things to come during my time in Nigeria. More on that trip in the Nigeria forum.