Leafe ni je- I went on vacation

Casey, Eileen and me overlooking a valley. Guinea has topography!!!

Thankfully, our guide had plenty of poses he wanted us to do for pictures, so we never had to think about how to stand for pictures.

We got to swim in this waterfall and then ate lunch beside it.

Huge rock formation we hiked around

Vulture over the valley

I just got back from 8 days of traveling in Sierra Leone and Guinea Conakry. I traveled with 2 friends from Peace Corps The Gambia- Casey and Eileen.We flew into Freetown, Sierra Leone and took the ferry to meet Chelsea and Mike, my friends who live in Freetown.  They took us to River #2 for a great day at the beach.  The water was a perfect temperature, the beach was beautiful and it was awesome to get to catch up with friends I hadn't seen in such a long time.  Casey, Eileen and I were planning on visiting a national park in Sierra Leone, but after finding out how complicated and perhaps impossible it would be to get there, we decided it'd be more fun to just go to Guinea from Freetown. We loaded up in a station wagon (public transportation) and headed across the border.  We spent one day in Conakry. Between the city being crowded and confusing and everyone speaking French, it didn't register as one of my favorite places to be in the world. We left the city asap. Once we were out of the city, the drive was BEAUTIFUL. Being in an overcrowded compact car for more than 8 hours was actually pleasant because of the scenery. We're used to flat, dry Gambia and Guinea (Sierra Leone too) is nothing like that. There are hills, valleys, and trees everywhere!  After 2 days in transit, we made it to Dookie for hiking.

The hiking was a ton of fun. For a couple of days, we clinbed around on rocks, swam in waterfalls, swam in waterfalls inside caves, saw valleys, mountains and cliffs. Once again, coming from flat, dry Gambia this was all SO impressive. Also, coming from flat, dry Gambia, we were all SO sore afterwards.

On the way back to the city to catch our plane back to The Gambia, we spent a night in a huge village on the way toward the capitol. It was a nice laid back night (with air conditioning!!!) followed by getting to hang out with the resident Peace Corps Volunteer. She showed us around a bit, took us to a restaurant and then used her French to get us in a cab straight to the airport.  Its really awesome to be able to link into the Peace Corps network. You meet some cool people and I'm so thankful for all the help we got from volunteers along the way.

Now I'm back in The Gambia. Even though, it doesn't have mountains or waterfalls, I'm glad to be back!