Stuff only: Togo and Benin

As most of you know, we met 20 years ago traveling through Africa. Back then we celebrated Christmas on the beach in Grand Popo, Benin.
As we live in Accra now, relatively nearby, we just had to revisit the place.

All went well, reasonable traffic. The borders took in general just a bit over an hour.

We stopped after the Togo border for a quick lunch at one of the beach places. Lomé has a nice strip of beach, reasonably clean and several spots to have a drink and a snack. We had some chicken and rice with a coke.

The cokes are big!

The next border was similar; not clear were to go, first the car registered in the big book, then customs for a stamp in our passports, the man lowers the string, or raises the barrier and off you go. This once for leaving one country and once for entering the next.
The border is a busy place for trade, people seem to walk back and forward without checks, where others pay a small sum for a day pass, which doesn't seem to be registered. To the untrained eye it all seems chaotic and random.

We arrived in Grand Popo in the afternoon, far before dark, so happy. Some things have changed, others not. All about Grand Popo in a seperate blogpost.

After Christmas we went for a day to Ouida. Nice small town with a relaxed atmosphere. Small streets that are better for walking than driving. So we went for a walk around town.

we even found a knitting shop!!

Someone tipped us about this museum in town. Thanks to Google maps it was not too difficult to find. It was indeed not what you expect in Africa, a mixture between African and modern art.

Building a new road, on the right the museum

Waiting for our lunch.... a long time.

The next day we didn't have anything planned, luckily a man came to us with the offer to take us to a voodoo festival. It was more a politically sponsored party with some elements of voodoo. None of the scary stuff. All about this in yet another blogpost.

The time had come to move from Grand Popo, it had been nice.
We drove past the broom town and all the petrol sellers (in bottles by the liter) knowing we would pass this again the other way in a couple of days.

Cotonou was busy, the streets are wide enough, but all free space is filled up immediately by motos. In contrast with Ghana there are a lot of motorbikes here, public transport is mostly the back of a moto where in Accra you would take a trotro (van built for 12 people holding many more, most with a stupid slogan on the back and many with still the lettering from the previous European owner on it).
We didn't get a vibe from Cotonou, it seems to lack any character that we did find in other towns. Our hotel was nice, trying to be 5 star but failing in many details. What did make me very happy is that we found reasonably priced tasty Dutch cheese in the little supermarket around the corner: we bought the whole stock (2 kg).

We didn't really know why we wanted to go to Cotonou, we just had to. So we went to the artisanat and had success, one stool and some cloths. We decided to check out the hypermarket and were pleasantly surprised. So we have souvenirs from Benin a.o. Showerhead, lightbulbs, hifi wire.
The things that make an expat happy...

Back to Lomé.

Lunch this time at the Togo side of the Benin-Togo border. They even had pasta.

Lomé is also a big town/city with many motos. But we did feel more at home here, somehow it seems to have more charm than Cotonou.
We did find the guesthouse after passing it two times because it has no signs. It was a nice house with our own ensuite and balcony. And use of the small pool.

We explored the town by car, this was not too bad as long as you ignore the motos. However the turn towards the center of town was not a good idea. We basically drove through the market, with no possibility to turn we had to slowly crawl forward ignoring people that are trying to help by giving directions and just keep breathing, thank god for airco in cars.
The photos below are taken the next day when we went on foot.

Big roundabout with nativity scene

Our hotel was just around the corner of the bottle market. Here a lot of bottles were collected to be sorted and resold, either to a factory, or for selling petrol or peanuts in etc.

This shop on the road had the most bizarre item, a anatomically correct female doll on a home trainer.

My name misspelled

We left to spend new years eve in Kpalimé. A nice drive, but I would advise to go there outside of harmatan season, the views of the mountains are just not visible this time of year. Sorry no photos.