There is a famous saying “The way to the man’s heart is through his stomach” that statement describes me perfectly. Being an avid traveler I am a food lover too and I make it a point that wherever I go I do try out the local cuisine. When it comes to Senegal the cuisine is a true fusion of West African and French.
Continue reading “Flavours of Senegal – A peek into West African cuisine”
House of Slaves or Maison des Esclaves is one of the prime attractions on Gorée Island, 3 km off the coast of the city of Dakar, Senegal. This is basically a small house which is set to be one of the main building used during the period of Atlantic Slave Trade. This according to locals was one of the prime locations from where the majority of African slaves were transported. However there were other such houses dotted around the Island which were also used for legal and illegal slave trades.
Continue reading “The Slave House of Africa”
Goree or Île de Gorée is one of the major tourist attractions of Senegal. Its basically an island located two kilometers from the Dakar Port and one needs to take a short ride on a ferry to reach the island. Though this is relatively a small island but people do live here and there is a thriving local community who of course depend heavily on tourism for their survival. Goree is classified as one of the districts within Dakar city.
A visit to this island was always in my list of must to do when visiting Senegal so from the very beginning I started looking out for opportunities to check it out. The day I reached Dakar I did not have any other activity planned so I just reached my hotel kept my luggage and was out to visit this tiny yet significant island.
Continue reading “The Colours of Goree”
One of the places that I wanted to surely visit when I got the opportunity to visit Senegal was Lake Retba or Lac Rose which literary means “Pink Lake”. I really could not imagine that a lake would be pink and checked on Google search that indeed it was pink. I had a real tight schedule and the only time I got to go around the city was during the lunch breaks. I usually had a real heavy breakfast and skipped the lunch in order to utilize the time for some local sightseeing. Wolof and French are the two languages which are used in Senegal and unfortunately I could not speak any of them. Wolof is the local West African language which was impossible for me to figure out so the next best option was French. Well speaking of French I knew only two words Bon Voyage and Bon Appétit. Luckily I managed to get a cab driver who could understand few words of English and negotiate using the calculator in the mobile phone. He agreed for a round trip for 20,000 CFA which roughly translates to 2000 Indian Rupees. This was a good deal considering that I would travelling exclusively and he would be my unofficial guide.
Continue reading “The Pink Lake of Africa”
The night before our departure I was super excited and had already finished up packing for the next day field trip. We were scheduled to depart at 05.00 AM thus I had set my alarm to 04.00. I went to bed early since I had to wake up early the next morning.
Continue reading “Faces of Ndiael”
