#97 CAMEROON

I arrived in Cameroon from Equatorial Guinea and was thankfully meeting up with my friend, Dirk, who'd been traveling elsewhere in Africa. While we had not made any specific travel plans for the country, we both love animals and promptly decided to see some chimpanzees!

Also, having recently learned that the country's name comes from the Portuguese word for shrimp (camarões), we aimed to eat as many shrimp as possible while on this trip, as you can tell from the photos below.

From Douala, we took a day trip to Pongo-Songo to visit the so-called "Monkey Island," and the fantastic chimps did not disappoint! The dominant male and leader of the troop, the mighty Citron, proudly displayed his genitalia, all while chomping down on as many bananas as he could get his hands on.

Landing in Douala, Cameroon

Eating shrimp in Cameroon ;)

Setting off to Monkey Island!

Monkey Island, Pongo Songo

The mighty Citron, Monkey Island, Pongo Songo

Citron and his troop, Pongo Songo

Monkey Island, Pongo Songo

After a few days, we'd exhausted our sightseeing options in Douala, so we headed to Limbe, close to the border with Nigeria, for some R&R on the beach. It was just a short drive from Douala, which allowed us to see some of the countryside as we transitioned from the francophone part of the country to the anglophone one.

On arrival at the hotel, we were greeted by several West African crocodiles that looked smaller than others I'd seen before but didn't look particularly cuddly... Unfortunately, the beach had also seen better days and was littered with more trash than grains of sand. Locals told us that a Nigerian ferry had recently capsized and washed up all sorts of stuff: plastics, clothes, suitcases, shoes, etc. Hopefully, the passengers fared better than their baggage...

With our beach plans thwarted, we decided to head into town and find a different adventure. We ended up at the Limbe Wildlife Center, where I saw brightly-colored mandrills for the first time and learned a bit about local animal trafficking and the center's rescue and rehabilitation efforts.

West African crocodiles, Limbe

Limbe beachfront

For dinner that night, we went into town in search of street food and cold beers. Once the sun went down, sleepy Limbe came to life with restaurants and bars spilling into the street. Here, we ate a ton of grilled kebabs and fish, washed down with abundant beer. Unfortunately, before the night was over, I was unlucky enough to get hit by a drunk motorcyclist who knocked me to the ground and broke my sunglasses, but otherwise, I was unharmed. Still, it was a perfectly chaotic end to the trip, and the following day, Dirk and I parted ways as I continued onwards to Nigeria to return to work with UNEP in Port Harcourt.