Banana Island :-)

Happy Monday, Everyone!

Actually it’s Tuesday, but I wrote this out on Monday, and I didn’t get any Internet until today, but I’m keeping my original saying.  I hope you all had a great weekend.  I missed a very special event this past Sunday, the christening of my newest cousin, Maeve Elizabeth Butler.  I was very sad to miss out on her special day (and spent the entire day wondering if my mother was as entertaining as she was at the last christening…), but luckily had a pretty fantastic day of my own, seeing as we spent the weekend at Banana Island.

Banana Island is relatively close to Freetown, and pretty easy to get to.  You have to take a boat to get there, so we drove from Freetown to Kent beach, which is a little over an hour drive away, and then we got taken on a boat (which is called a pampah) to the island.  The boat ride takes about 30 minutes, and is a really beautiful ride.  You can look back at the coast, and look ahead toward the island, and everywhere you look is bright blue skies, white sand beaches, vibrant green trees in the jungle, and you feel like you are in the middle of Jurassic Park, which is a feeling I’ve had pretty frequently over here. 

We arrived on Banana Island and were led to our hostel/guesthouse, called Dalton’s Banana Island Guesthouse.  There are only two guesthouses on the island, one is Dalton and one is Banana Island Guesthouse.  The Banana Island costs the equivalent of about 35 US dollars per night, and Dalton cost about $2.50.  (How can you turn down an opportunity to stay overnight at the beach for less than three dollars?)  Kelly had looked the place up on Lonely Planet and Trip Advisor, so we knew that the place was “rustic” and wasn’t going to have too many amenities, but we were looking forward to having a real deserted beach experience, and we certainly got one.  Dalton’s is run by a Greek guy, Gregory, who has been running the place for about five years, and has another five or six local young guys that live and work there.  I’ll put up pictures rather than describe it in too much detail, but it was very awesome and had a big (I don’t know how to describe it exactly) tree house fort to lay on, thatched hut rooms, and was right on the beach.  We were only there for a weekend, but it is actually very freeing to spend some time living without electricity for a few days.  Also, we had the best meals we have eaten so far here in Sierra Leone.  It is actually a paradise for vegetarians, because there is no meat served, and instead we had tons of good pasta (I think since Gregory is Greek he makes sure there is olive oil), as well as fresh humus, fullah, and warm, freshly grilled bread.  For breakfast you get fresh eggs (that come directly from all the chickens running around) as well as potatoes and fried plantains.  Dinner was the best meal, because Gregory goes out every day and catches fish for dinner, so dinner is always the fresh catch of the day.  There were three kinds of fish we had, one of grouper, mackerel, and something else I can’t remember, and they were served with rice, couscous, pasta, olive oil, more hummus, and maybe some other things that I can’t remember but were absolutely delectable.  The best part of all of this is that at the end of the weekend they tally up your bill (because you pay for each meal), but our total, which was for the room, the boat ride to get to the beach, and all of our meals, was about $25.00.  This simply can’t be beat.  

The beaches there were also really beautiful.  The guesthouse is right on the water, and then there is a five minute trail through the woods that leads to another, slightly more beautiful, beach down the way.  The water is perfect – not cold at all, but not too warm, so it is always refreshing, and the water is completely clear.  I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again every time I go to a beach here, but this place is the unsung hero of beaches.  They are absolutely beautiful and nobody knows about them or comes here.  I’ll throw up some pictures when I can.  It’s hard to get the pictures up, so it might be a few weeks of writing and then I’ll go back and add photos and videos.

This week we are in the field again, but the district is the Western Rural district, which is where Freetown is located, so we will just be commuting every day about twenty minutes away to the rural district.  We’re really excited for another week of fieldwork, and to start comparing the different districts around Sierra Leone.  

Also, let me just throw out a preemptive HAPPY THANKSGIVING, in case I don’t get any Internet the rest of the week.  I am incredibly sad to be missing out one of my favorite days of the year (and the official kickoff to Christmas, even though I like to kickoff for Christmas around Labor Day), and I would like to throw out there that in light of everything I’ve done the past few months, and really the whole past year, and really just generally in life, I am very thankful for all of the wonderful things in my life.  I certainly have a lot to be thankful for, so that’s my thanks for the year!

Have a great week, everyone!