Today we are on our way to Buea and Mount Cameroon. It is another slow start to the morning. After a late breakfast of eggs and toast, we pack up the campsite and head on our way by 10:20 AM. After driving for a couple of hours, we arrive in Edea, where we stop for lunch and give the cook group a chance to do their shopping.
At first we wander around the town looking for a place to have lunch - but we seem to be able to find are bars serving drinks and many people seem to be getting an early start on their New Year's Eve celebrations!!! In the end, we find some bread and sit down in one of the bars and have a drink to wash down our simple lunch.
We arrive up at Buea at 5 PM and we stay at the Mountain Lodge hotel. Upon our arrival, we are fortunate that the cloud cover around the mountain blows away and we are treated to a view of the mountain in the rays of the setting sun. After setting up camp in their back lawn (which had just been used for a wedding party the night before, so there were bottles all over the place), we prepared our New Year's Eve dinner. The pre-dinner treat was Dorito's, which had been brought all the way from London on the top of the truck. They were an excellent treat, and we had some great home made dips to go with them. While dinner was being prepared, we also sorted out our plans to climb the mountain. Some of us (who, I guess, are a bit lazy or who wanted the time to enjoy the mountain and just did not want to destroy our legs and knees in a one day descent), decided to climb it in 3 days rather than 2 days. As we would have to leave in the morning, plans had to be made tonight.
Dinner was fish kebabs with fried rice. And it was excellent. Once we had cleaned up, we just sort of hung around and had some drinks waiting for midnight and the new year. As we have gotten into a routine of going to bed early and rising early, for some of us, it was tough to stay up so late. But we made it and had a toast to the new year and all that it may bring. We were also fortunate that a fire works display was put on in the town and we were able to enjoy it from the hotel's lawn. It was quite a good one. A great way to usher in the new year.
As Rick had gone to bed early, a bunch of people decided to bring the party to him in his tent. It was quite a crowded tent!!! We then retired to out tent, which had been set up in the middle of the lawn with a great view of Mount Cameroon, which we were looking forward to hiking up in the morning.