Niamey is approximately 500 kms from Galmi. It's not a terribly long drive and usually takes about 6 hours to complete. One of the biggest factors that slows traffic is the use of incredibly large speed bumps in the villages along the way. Most of the time there are multiple speed bumps to deal with. This generally means coming to a stop and slowly crawling over the bump. In a lot of villages the beggars have strategically positioned themselves next to the speed bumps because they know that people have to come to a stop and look at them. Quite a sad sight.
So overall the drive is not that difficult unless you are us, in which case the drive will take approximately 14 hours. It is also important to note that the temperature was very high, probably around 120 degrees.
After the first blow out on our right, rear tire we were told by the kind gentlemen who stopped to replace the tire that we need to drive slower in the heat. Hot pavement, along with hot rubber apparently causes the tires to - explode. We were very grateful to the two men who stopped and did all of the work. It would seem to be a respect for your elders thing. Anytime Orest wanted to do something they would step in and take over.
Did we slow down - well we averaged around 35.5 km per hour on our journey. We did slow down its just that another 3 blow outs tend to spoil your progress somewhat. Especially when you've already used up your lone spare tire.
Close to a town called Dogondoutchi a SIM missionaey was able to help us with the second incident. He managed to buy two used tires. He picked Orest up, along with the the blown tire and blown spare and they went off to town for repairs. Grace stayed behind on a barren, hot piece of land and entertained the kids that came to visit her. She managed to teach them some english and learned some Hausa from them. We sat under a very large tree for shade for about 2 hours before help came.
We got the new, used tire in place and now had a spare. All would be good - right. They lasted until we were 60 kms outside of Niamey. Fortunately, we were close enough to enlist the late night help of C and D to come to our rescue. They showed up with a new tire and got to work making the switch. As they were about to put the new tire on they realized the new tire rim had holes for six studs, not the required five. So quickly, they grabbed the tire, and a blown tire and went off to the nearest town to switch rims. This meant they would have to find, and wake up, the local tire repair guy. So glad for their experience.
Gladly, all was fixed and we managed to reach our destination at midnight.
Life is a blast in Niger. We are so grateful to all the people who graciously assisted us in our time of need. We are grateful that SIM is truley like family and that we have people we can call on anywhere, at anytime, for assistance. Being people that have been largely independent this was a great lesson in the need to rely on our fellow SIMers.
No comments:
Post a Comment