The three R's - Rain, Rain and Roads
837 kilometers in 31 hours of which 7 of that was spent sleeping, 3 hours waiting for a client and four meetings totaling 100 minutes. Average traveling speed therefore 42kmph. You can see I was bored enough to work all this out as we braved downpours, trucks that insist on driving in the middle of the road, children in villages with no road sense and the ubiquitous hawkers at every robot, traffic jam and toll gate.
We (been Albert and myself) left Tarkwa at around 1:30 on Wednesday to toddle off to Accra for a meeting with a lad that was coming in on the SAA flight that evening regarding a job near the Burkina Faso border. We decided to take the Wassa road, as given the huge amounts of rain we have had over the past two weeks, it was almost a certainty that parts of the road to Takoradi that is under construction were washed away. There have been four washaways that we know of over the past ten days. A washaway on that road adds two hours to the journey as you need to head off towards Ivory Coast before hanging a left to Accra.
The Wassa road is 120km’s of dirt, before you hit a tar road, hang right to Cape Coast and then join the Accra road. We were hit with a deluge of note 30 minutes into the trip, which turned the road into a morass and ensured that the Pajeros 4x4 was well used. I was driving and was caught out by a tree across the road. The ground is so soft, given all the rain, trees spontaneously fall over. As Murphy has it, they will fall over the road. The funny part of been caught out, was you follow the brown road with green jungle on either side. You get so used to it, the quite honestly it required a decent thought process for me to realise the green and brown merged some 30 meters in front of me. Fortunately we were traveling at around 40kmph.
As the Aussies say “no worries mate” 4LLC selected on the 4WD box (dif lock with low range) and we went off road into the jungle to get around the tree. Slip Slidey and a close call with a newly formed stream and we were through. There was a Peugeot 404 behind me who I assume was stuck on the other side of the tree for the duration.
We arrived at the Accra house at around 7pm (not bad going – but I pushed it a bit – The Pajeros sits quite well at 150kmph: Albert – normally pretty verbose on trips was dead quiet during my speed tests.) and after a cup of coffee, finding out the client we were to see was delayed by an hour, we finally left the house at 8pm for an 8:30 meeting.
Or so we tried. David – the house boy had locked us in! After much shouting we woke him up from his back room and he was most surprised we did not have our own keys.
Meeting over at 10 – after client arrived at 9:15 and off to Nando’s for dinner.
I had a meeting with PWC in the morning and like true auditors they wake up late, I set my alarm for 7. My internal clock said “tough!” and set off its alarm at 5:30. The fact that I was miffed was somewhat allayed by been able to finally speak to Nessers on the phone. I have not managed to get through for the past 4 days.
Off to Obuasi we went, for client meetings as well as using the time to show me the direct route from Accra to Obuasi.
The road is reasonable – which means you just damage the car when you hit the potholes rather then fall in them and need a crane to recover the vehicle. One does go through a lot of small – and not so small – villages which slows the trip down substantially. It also exposes you to the total lack of thought process the drivers use here. We were blessed with a petrol tanker that could not climb hills and after finally been able to overtake it, we were forced to stop for something to eat and a pee break. Said tanker – which works really well going downhill – overtook us and we met up with him going through a small town.
All the Tro tros’ (HiAce Taxi’s) had decided to park on both sides of the road, leaving space for almost one fuel tanker. \He now sits stuck in among the taxi’s. We all sit behind him and no-one moves. As I was turning left at the time, I reversed back to keep the road open and to ensure that oncoming traffic did not have to endure the snarl up. As true as God made little apples, a taxi overtook me from behind and filled my recently vacated space and also ensuring – as he was placed on this earth to do – the snarl up became a full blown grid lock.
The truck driver to his credit enforced the maxim “the larger vehicle has right of way” and started moving forward slowly. As if by magic, Tro Tro drivers appeared from nowhere and started moving their taxi’s, thus unblocking the road.
There is a God and he drives a fucked up total fuel tanker!!
Finally got home after the Obuasi meetings at 7:20 – tired and sweaty – and safe with the knowledge I am going to sleep like a baby tonight.
What else has happened this week? The fact that I have not blogged since last week means my Bored time has turned into loads of work time.
Hummm –
The pig on the spit was cancelled due to work pressures, and also the spit arriving at 6pm. 8 hours to cook a pig and we could have had it for Sunday breakfast. After Carlos and Marco spend a while cleaning the rather large porker that had arrived – even using his razor for a close shave (Carlos) – said piggy was put into a deep freeze to be cooked over a slow fire next time.
We instead requested some chicken and fillet from the mess and I made my famous potato salad. The chickens were big enough to be turkeys and the fillet turned out to be silverside. You have to love a chef that cannot tell the difference.
By the time the fire was ready to burn meat, we were seeing pink elephants and I must admit I had a laughing fit that lasted for around 20 minutes. Tears in the eyes and sore tummy kind of fit. What did I find funny? Buggered if I know. But at least everyone was laughing with me.
Sunday was DEAD quiet and I had left over braai for lunch, spent a lot of time on the couch “watching TV” and was in bed really early.
The week has been eventful with new month stuff, fixing up old month stuff and getting things done.
The day has started eventfully with two shutdowns at our client, a driver been bitten by a snake and rushed off to hospital and a supplier finally admitting that he sent us the wrong information and after a snotty email saying “read the manual”, was most apologetic and contrite.
We are living in interesting times :……..:
We (been Albert and myself) left Tarkwa at around 1:30 on Wednesday to toddle off to Accra for a meeting with a lad that was coming in on the SAA flight that evening regarding a job near the Burkina Faso border. We decided to take the Wassa road, as given the huge amounts of rain we have had over the past two weeks, it was almost a certainty that parts of the road to Takoradi that is under construction were washed away. There have been four washaways that we know of over the past ten days. A washaway on that road adds two hours to the journey as you need to head off towards Ivory Coast before hanging a left to Accra.
The Wassa road is 120km’s of dirt, before you hit a tar road, hang right to Cape Coast and then join the Accra road. We were hit with a deluge of note 30 minutes into the trip, which turned the road into a morass and ensured that the Pajeros 4x4 was well used. I was driving and was caught out by a tree across the road. The ground is so soft, given all the rain, trees spontaneously fall over. As Murphy has it, they will fall over the road. The funny part of been caught out, was you follow the brown road with green jungle on either side. You get so used to it, the quite honestly it required a decent thought process for me to realise the green and brown merged some 30 meters in front of me. Fortunately we were traveling at around 40kmph.
As the Aussies say “no worries mate” 4LLC selected on the 4WD box (dif lock with low range) and we went off road into the jungle to get around the tree. Slip Slidey and a close call with a newly formed stream and we were through. There was a Peugeot 404 behind me who I assume was stuck on the other side of the tree for the duration.
We arrived at the Accra house at around 7pm (not bad going – but I pushed it a bit – The Pajeros sits quite well at 150kmph: Albert – normally pretty verbose on trips was dead quiet during my speed tests.) and after a cup of coffee, finding out the client we were to see was delayed by an hour, we finally left the house at 8pm for an 8:30 meeting.
Or so we tried. David – the house boy had locked us in! After much shouting we woke him up from his back room and he was most surprised we did not have our own keys.
Meeting over at 10 – after client arrived at 9:15 and off to Nando’s for dinner.
I had a meeting with PWC in the morning and like true auditors they wake up late, I set my alarm for 7. My internal clock said “tough!” and set off its alarm at 5:30. The fact that I was miffed was somewhat allayed by been able to finally speak to Nessers on the phone. I have not managed to get through for the past 4 days.
Off to Obuasi we went, for client meetings as well as using the time to show me the direct route from Accra to Obuasi.
The road is reasonable – which means you just damage the car when you hit the potholes rather then fall in them and need a crane to recover the vehicle. One does go through a lot of small – and not so small – villages which slows the trip down substantially. It also exposes you to the total lack of thought process the drivers use here. We were blessed with a petrol tanker that could not climb hills and after finally been able to overtake it, we were forced to stop for something to eat and a pee break. Said tanker – which works really well going downhill – overtook us and we met up with him going through a small town.
All the Tro tros’ (HiAce Taxi’s) had decided to park on both sides of the road, leaving space for almost one fuel tanker. \He now sits stuck in among the taxi’s. We all sit behind him and no-one moves. As I was turning left at the time, I reversed back to keep the road open and to ensure that oncoming traffic did not have to endure the snarl up. As true as God made little apples, a taxi overtook me from behind and filled my recently vacated space and also ensuring – as he was placed on this earth to do – the snarl up became a full blown grid lock.
The truck driver to his credit enforced the maxim “the larger vehicle has right of way” and started moving forward slowly. As if by magic, Tro Tro drivers appeared from nowhere and started moving their taxi’s, thus unblocking the road.
There is a God and he drives a fucked up total fuel tanker!!
Finally got home after the Obuasi meetings at 7:20 – tired and sweaty – and safe with the knowledge I am going to sleep like a baby tonight.
What else has happened this week? The fact that I have not blogged since last week means my Bored time has turned into loads of work time.
Hummm –
The pig on the spit was cancelled due to work pressures, and also the spit arriving at 6pm. 8 hours to cook a pig and we could have had it for Sunday breakfast. After Carlos and Marco spend a while cleaning the rather large porker that had arrived – even using his razor for a close shave (Carlos) – said piggy was put into a deep freeze to be cooked over a slow fire next time.
We instead requested some chicken and fillet from the mess and I made my famous potato salad. The chickens were big enough to be turkeys and the fillet turned out to be silverside. You have to love a chef that cannot tell the difference.
By the time the fire was ready to burn meat, we were seeing pink elephants and I must admit I had a laughing fit that lasted for around 20 minutes. Tears in the eyes and sore tummy kind of fit. What did I find funny? Buggered if I know. But at least everyone was laughing with me.
Sunday was DEAD quiet and I had left over braai for lunch, spent a lot of time on the couch “watching TV” and was in bed really early.
The week has been eventful with new month stuff, fixing up old month stuff and getting things done.
The day has started eventfully with two shutdowns at our client, a driver been bitten by a snake and rushed off to hospital and a supplier finally admitting that he sent us the wrong information and after a snotty email saying “read the manual”, was most apologetic and contrite.
We are living in interesting times :……..:
1 Comments:
wonder why Albert was sitting quietly while you drove? Did you happen to notice if there's 2 holes in the floor boards on the passenger side? ;)
ahum, "may you live in interesting times" you know that's an ancient chinese curse?
Post a Comment
<< Home