Ride for Polio Day 1 - Ikoyi to Cotonou

Wow! What a day! 125 km from Ikoyi to Cotonou and a little under 900 km to go.

We started today's ride on scedule art 4am and reached Badagry (first major milestone after 67km) just after 7am, almost 3 hours ahead of schedule. I cycled in the dark for most of the way to Badagry and then stopped for about 30 minutes for a well deserved morning snack.

We reached the Seme border post a little over two hours later. We cleared the border post without much hassle following which we had a lunch break on the Benin side of the border. This was a very interesting experience. A little shack right next to the road with a freshly slaughtered pig hanging just to the right of the entrance. I was of course not hungry but Friday could not wait to get his hands dirty. At least he enjoyed the food while I was nibbling away at my peach fruit roll and nuts.

From the border to Cotonou was very tough and it felt like I was running the last 5 km of a marathon. Not only did the sun came out in full force, but I was also facing a very strong head wind. This slowed me down and I struggled to maintain a good pace. With about 15 km to go I spotted a number of women selling sugar cane. This was like manna from heaven and I promptly pulled over and bought a few. While I was chewing away at my sugar cane "candy stick" I missed the bike path as we were approaching one of only two toll gates in Benin between the Nigeria and Togo borders. Suddenly we were stopped by an army official who quizzed us in French. "non Francais! non Francais!" was all I could get out only for him to switch over to Anglais. After exchanging a few ideas he let us off the hook. Little did he know that I was only too happy that he stopped us because by now I was pulling strain.

With about 5 km to go (I thought we still had about 20km to go) I was really feeling bad and just had to stop. We found a little street restaurant where this friendly lady allowed us to sit in the shade of her restaurant. She was really kind. Friday walked down the street to go and find me an ice cold coke which was exactly what I needed. While waiting I asked on of the other customers whether he knew where our hotel for the evening is. Much to my surprise (and delight) he told me that we only had about 4km to go. I was stoked and all of a sudden had new energy.

7km later we reached our destination - Novotel Orisha, Cotonou. Lovely 3 star (at USD250 per room per night) beach hotel very close to the harbour. When we got to the room and I looked in the mirror I realised why everybody stared so much at me while I was in the lobby of the hotel. I was filthy. Took a nice long shower, a quick power nap and now I am typing away at this blog.

Friday went for a "quick 2 1/2 hour run" and looks in great shape. He probably needed to run his guts out after having had to drive 125km at an average speed of 20km per hour. I would! Well done to him. He is a real jewel and I am very blessed to have him work for us. He was a great support today and really knows how to be a support vehicle operator!

So we are about to go for a "lekker" big proteien filled dinner before we'll prepare for tomorrow and go to bed. Hope to get some good sleep before we start tomorrow.

Plan for tomorrow is to start at 7am and then take a leisurely cycle down to Grand Popo. This is a relatively unknown but popular beach resort area that I am hoping to explore tomorrow afternoon. We will probably do no more than about 70-80km tomorrow which is great because I felt a little dehydrated and worn out after today's cycle. Feeling good now after drinking my one litre rehydration mix.

Hope to update you again tomorrow evening!

Sleep well and have a great Sunday!