Okay...so maybe only that 3rd one is true.
It seems almost unreal that we have a mere 6 months (or so) left of service in Senegal. In realizing how scarce our time has become, we've started an end of service bucket list of all the things we want to accomplish before going home. A lot of this entails seeing parts of the country we haven't seen yet, and for Alyssa one of those places was Lac Rose. If you follow my blog, you might remember the trip I took out to this lake in early 2010. Basically Lac Rose is a giant lake about 45 minutes from Thies that is widely known for it's pinkish hue and the salt mining that goes on there. The lake used to be connected to the ocean many, many years ago so when it was cut off by an extended drought the lake retained all of the salt deposits which are now mined and exported to other countries.
We decided the lake would make a great overnight getaway since it was close and campements (hotels) were relatively cheap. Tamar and I researched various places to stay at the lake, and upon discovering that one of the hotels was named "Chevaux du Lac" (Horses of the Lake) I jokingly suggested this to Alyssa, assuming she would expressly refuse. She did not and instead claimed that riding horses on her birthday would be hilarious. Alyssa Titche interacting with large animals? I immediately booked a room.
On Wednesday morning the ladies rented a sept-place in Thies and picked me up on the side of the road in Pout and off we went. After a bumpy ride and an extended argument with the driver who refused to take us to the hotel without an additional payment, we finally made it to Chevaux du Lac on the less inhabited side of the lake. Since we had booked the cheapest place available we didn't necessarily expect to be impressed, but it was actually quite a nice surprise. Run by a French couple, and fit with what appeared to be only a few bungalows, the campement felt really comfortable and inviting. We stayed in the "grand lodge" which turned out to be a two story bungalow with more than enough beds and a Western style bathroom. Perfect!
After a quick drink to celebrate our arrival and kickoff Alyssa's birthday extravaganza, we were ushered out of our bungalow by the hotel manager. He led us to a tiny corral where our beautiful steeds awaited (and by beautiful, I mean not emaciated like every other horse in this country). We met our trail guide Moussa who was immediately amused by the fact that we all spoke Wolof. He gave us what I like to call "calf chaps" to put on our legs - and which took an embarrassingly long amount of time to figure out for a group of 6 college graduates. Moussa picked out appropriate horses for each of us based on some sort of secret combination of size and experience.
Alyssa, incredibly excited and/or terrified
I've spent lots of time on horses in my life so I was given one of the more unruly of the bunch. She had a major attitude problem, but we bonded anyways. Her name was "Gassy" which I'm spelling incorrectly and is actually a Pulaar word meaning "last born" but I like to think that she was just proud of her flatulence.
The ride turned out to be absolutely amazing. Getting a handle on the horses was a bit difficult at first, especially because Alyssa's horse appeared to be half dead and was always at the back of the pack refusing to make any effort to catch up. We lovingly named Alyssa's horse "short bus."During the first part of the ride we headed through fields of perfectly tended crops and vegetable gardens (they impressed Erin and Emily, our token agricultural volunteers, so they had to be good) with beautiful sand dunes looming in the distance. At some point I was behind Tamar and our guide Moussa and was attempting to listen to the conversation they were having. Moussa told Tamar that he had just been married three months ago, but I somehow heard "just had a baby three months ago." I then asked Moussa, "boy or girl?" and he turned around and looked at me like I was crazy. Tamar burst out laughing and tried to explain that I hadn't heard correctly and he just shook his head at me. That was awkward. Especially when minutes later we arrived at a tiny village where Moussa introduced us all to his wife.
None of us had realized how close Lac Rose is to the ocean, so when we suddenly reached the peak of a sand dune and saw crashing waves in the distance we were astonished. It was an incredible feeling to come over one last sand dune and see a huge a huge stretch of pristine beach, with no one around but us and our horses. I think Moussa was a bit nervous when I told him that he and I should gallop our horses along the beach, but he let me convince him anyways. Riding a horse at breakneck speed along the ocean has got to be one of the coolest feelings in the world. It was incredible (even though I can still barely sit down days later).
We returned to the hotel through sand dunes and beautiful fields, sadly dismounted, and thanked Moussa for a beautiful experience. Our birthday fest was only beginning however, so we washed up before dinner, and then the hotel served us an AMAZING meal of cous-cous, chicken, and spiced carrots. They even remembered that it was Alyssa's birthday from us rambling about it all day, and served us dessert - complete with birthday candles for Alyssa.
We had some after dinner drinks in what was basically a tree house on the premises, and then headed back to our bungalow for a dance party. Really, what else are birthdays for? After a decent night's sleep we got up, had breakfast at the hotel, and spent most of the morning walking around the lake, enjoying the sights. We enticed Erin, our pro-Wolof speaker, to call and haggle for a sept-place to pick us up and we headed back to Thies around noon. It was a fantastic birthday celebration and I'm so thankful to have been there with Alyssa to ring in her 24th year.
Lots of pictures are up, so feel free to check them out in the newest Picasa album. Cheers!
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