Look at that sexy mining man!! (I made fun of him for this serious look, but apparently he was just trying to get one shot of himself at the mine. The gal he was traveling with really didn't like taking pictures of people, and I had threatened him within an inch of his life if he didn't come back with lots of pictures.)
On a hill overlooking the mine. They are mining for iron ore here at this operation.
Taken out of the window as he was heading from the mine site to the resort for a weekend of play for the mine workers. This is a little market.
The mine workers (seen out the front window here) had apparently already started drinking on the way to the resort and had to stop for a pee break. The people driving past were honking like crazy according to Brian. His travel partner, Sarah, was mortified. From what I can tell, Brian was just extremely entertained the entire time. ;-)
This was the beach at the resort. The terrain looks very different to me than any other beach I've ever been to. It's pretty rocky in places, and there's a sandbar a little off shore.
This was at the resort. This was a little river that came through the resort and flowed into the ocean. This will play an integral role in an upcoming story. The little hut you see there is one of the guest accommodation huts.
Some of the nightly entertainment.
So when Brian was going over his itinerary with me, he told me they were going on a "booze cruise" over the weekend. Brian showed up on the beach when it was time to go, looking for the "cruise". It took him about 20 minutes to figure out that this rickety canoe you're seeing here was in fact the "booze cruise". There was no booze, as you might have guessed. He's still yet to figure out if someone was joking about that, or if whoever scheduled the trip thought that this was supposed to be something different.
The boat had a two man crew. A driver, and a bucket man. You've got it right, folks. A man specifically designated to bail out the water leaking in the sides of the boat. Brian said it was like a cartoon with the water spurting in at different spots. Here you're seeing the inside of the boat, with the weird gum substance coating the inside of the boat and water streaming down the side.
So these rivers. On the way back from the boat trip to Banana Island (where Brian got lost in the jungle, BTW) a cluster of circumstances led to the boat tipping over in the ocean about 100 yards from shore. As the waterlogged boaters swam in, they noticed that they were swimming through an area where two rivers emptied into the ocean. Rivers that had flowed through little villages. Where villagers washed. And did other things. Now Brian is swimming through it. So you can imagine how he smelled when he got out of the water. Yeah, folks, he brought that smell home with him. G. R. O. S. S.
After leaving the resort, the team returned to Freetown, Sierra Leone, and Brian got some great shots of women throughout the city carrying their kiddos around. This is how they carry their children who aren't swift walkers yet. I can't figure out if her other shoulder is holding him up, or if all that weight is on her boobs...?!?! I am in awe of these women either way!
Also seen throughout Freetown were women carrying tons of stuff on their heads with no hands!! Brian said that this one was one of the shorter stacks he saw. The tallest he saw was 7 stacks of baskets high, with no hands!
I'm super jealous that he got to go on this amazing adventure without me, but how cool is it that he got to do this!!?
