Seven Months Seeing the World

First tour in weeks! - Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire - December 5

Today I had the third of the tours I booked through Across Africa, set up on our Cruise Critic Roll Call. It was called Abidjan Round Experience. Originally, we were supposed to go to the Mosque du Plateau, St. Paul's Cathedral, Centre Artisanal de Ville, the Civilization Museum, the zoo, and have lunch. It was decided a few weeks ago that we would not go to the zoo because it was in poor condition. Yesterday it was decided that we would not stop for lunch because the ship's original arrival/departure times had changed and we needed to get back earlier.

We met at 7:00 in the Ocean Bar but it took about an hour and a half until we were cleared by health inspectors and immigration inspectors. We were watching the dock as people were finally able to get off but the buses had not yet arrived. We finally left the ship about 8:50 and ours was one of the first vehicles to arrive. We were told to bring our passports and Covid cards but nobody checked them. There were 16 in our group and instead of two vans, we had a large (about 40 seat) bus for all of us with amazing air conditioning.

As we left the port area, our guide told us that Abidjan port was used to import/export goods for neighboring land-locked countries like Mali and Burkina Faso. We headed through the city of over 6 million, which although not the political capital, is the economic capital and largest city in the country.

Our first destination was to the Banco National Forest which was somewhat of a surprise since it was not on the itinerary but I think maybe it was substituted for the zoo. Honestly, it wasn't very interesting and was very hot and humid. My leg gave me fits all day (I seem to have alternate good and bad days) so I didn't get off when the guide gave us five minutes to get off and look around (nobody needed any more).

We then went to the Museum of Civilizations. I hobbled around for a bit and took some pictures. All of the explanations for the artifacts were in French (the official language) and my high school French was not up to translating more than a word or two.

We mutually agreed to skip the Mosque although we did drive by it on our way to St. Paul's Cathedral. Again, I did not get off the bus but those that went inside said it was beautiful with stained-glass windows of African animals.

The final stop was to the artisans' market. I enjoyed looking around (and buying a few souvenirs for friends) until I caught my leg on a rough piece of wood and scraped off a few inches of skin and bled copiously. A very nice young man from one of the booths rushed over with tissues and brought me a chair to sit in while I sopped up the blood. Since I tend to do this much too frequently, I had a whole supply of various sizes of band-aids with me to put on once the bleeding stopped.

We were back to the ship earlier than the itinerary called for but I don't think anyone was upset. There was time to have lunch on the ship which is what I did.

All aboard was 3:30 but the last HAL tour bus from the Ivorian Cocoa Farm did not roll in until 4:07 (I was out on the deck waiting for sail-away). It did not take long for us to depart after that and we were off the dock by 4:25. I watched for about a half hour as we turned and sailed out of the lagoon and then started working on the blog and today's pictures (there are quite a few!).

I did not go to 7pm trivia because the pictures were uploading at a steady pace.

Tonight was "Orange Night" in celebration of Holland America's heritage. On December 5 in the Netherlands, gifts are exchanged on St. Nicholas' Eve. For the first time I had something orange to wear (a shawl, of course).

After dinner I went to the show which was another performance by CH2 and then up to the Crow's Nest to check out the Orange Party. Lots of drinking, dancing, orange wigs, hats, shirts, dresses, etc. Everyone was having a good time.

Smooth sailing until next time!

Here are some street scenes