World Trip

Bongos on the Beach

June 7, 2005

No plans for the day. We just bummed around all day without even going into St. Raphael. The Isle of Gold is very tempting, but Kimo is not that great of a swimmer, according to him. Nonetheless, we planned out the shortest distance to the island and took some practice swims in the guarded area to prove that we could swing it. The water was a little choppy and we decide to wait until tomorrow morning for the swim. Eventually, we went and climbed the mountain to catch the sunset and sit on top of the world.

At night, we heard drumming from the beach. We walked up and met two French guys with bongos just relaxing on the beach at night. Then spoke almost no English so I just mostly relaxed while Kimo talked with them. I got a crash lesson in bongo playing but am not a percussionist yet. Eventually one of the guys, David, ran up to his car and got his guitar and started playing. We started singing along to Marley's "No Woman No Cry" but soon enough I forgot how the lyrics go. Luckily I realized that these two French guys do not speak any English and just improvised to the tune. It was well taken and they did not know any better.

We eventually made it back to camp with every intention of going to sleep to be ready for the morning swim, but somehow stayed up by our tents talking until almost five in the morning.

Sleeping was difficult at night. As soon as we went to bed, this amazingly strong wind picked up. The whole tent was swaying and it felt like it was not going to hold up. The canvas was smacking my face. Eventually, I fell asleep, but was not sure where I was going to wake up in case the wind succeeded in uprooting my tent.