Night Life in Bamako

Hearing that Bamako is the centre of music in West Africa, we figure arriving from Mopti after a 7 hour car ride on a Saturday night - we better experience it!

Dicko comes to pick us up at the hotel around 10pm - well before things really get started we are told. We make a bit of a tour of some of the potential hotspots and decide on Hippo D'or - which has a live act playing - The Jeebby 5 (which it turns out is one of our drives favorites). We pay cover ($3 each, which includes your first drink) and sit down right at the front. About 10 minutes later the band starts playing. Pretty good. Then the lead singer comes out. Things change for the worse in a hurry. Imagine the worst karoke experience you have had - times that by 4. This guy was terrible. The band also just played - they didn't even tap their feet! For those of you who have enjoyed a Sugarshack Stampede party in the last few years would appreciate Orange Whip sooooo much after our experience!!!!

Today was a relaxing day until about 4pm when I called Aeroplan to confirm some information on our flights. Before we left I had called them to check to see about cancelling one of the legs of our trip, they said no problem. Today we have found out that once we have started the trip, we can't cancel any part and if we miss a flight all subsequent flights are cancelled. We were going to miss one leg of our flight to fly directly into Libya, but if we do that it is going to mean much extra expense and potentially not making it home for Christmas - and I can't miss Santa Claus! We are now looking at work arounds - we may make Libya, we may not. We really want to since we have put so much work into getting there and our friends in Libya have put in even more!!

We'll keep you posted....

g&k