We're all going on a Nigerian holiday

I’ve been to two lovely places recently that have made me like Nigeria even more than I did before. A couple of weeks ago we went to Usuma Dam for the afternoon (40 minutes outside Abuja). If my memory serves me correctly, this place isn’t in the Nigerian guidebook, and I have no idea why as it’s one of my favourite places that I’ve been to in Nigeria so far. We spent a lovely afternoon going on a boat across the reservoir, walking around the path that leads all the way around the dam, and swimming in the lovely warm water (whilst ignoring any thoughts about the possibility of contracting bilharzia!).

And I have just come back from spending 5 days in Obudu – this is somewhere I’ve wanted to go since before I even arrived in Nigeria, so when the 1 year mark hit I decided it was time to finally visit. We spent the first night in Obudu town, before heading 60km up the mountain, spending 2 nights in Abebe’s Lodge (phone number for anyone who wants to visit: 08036242192) and then a final night in Obudu town. I love Obudu. I want to live there and commute to Abuja each day. But as it’s at least an 8 hour journey, I’m thinking that probably wouldn’t be too practical. The top of the mountain has to be one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been to. It almost looks like the end of the earth – all you can see for miles and miles is endless expanses of unspoilt mountain views. Some memorable moments:

1. Our first night in a “luxury” room in a hotel in Obudu town. I had wanted to book a hotel before we arrived, but my travelling companion reliably informed me this would not be necessary, there would definitely be a vacancy in the hotel that he wanted us to stay in. Not so. And several other hotels were also fully booked. So we couldn’t actually afford to be fussy by the time we finally found somewhere that had a room available. This hotel had the hardest bed I have ever had the misfortune to encounter. It was literally like sleeping on a tabletop.
2. Going up the mountain on the back of a motorbike. This wasn’t planned, we were meant to be going up by car, but the lift we were going to get never arrived, and then when we went to the park to find a car it was Sunday morning, so it was likely to take hours for the cars to fill. I was told over and over that I didn’t want to go up by bike because it would be “challenging”, but I also didn’t want to spend the whole day sat in the park waiting for the car to fill, so bike it was. And I’m very very glad as I got to see so much more by bike than I would have seen by car. Admittedly there were certain times during the two hours (I had a very sore behind afterwards!) when we were going up the “intestine road” (see photo which explains this name) when I thought we might plummet to our death, but our bike driver was very good. I do however pity him as I doubt he had any ribs left intact after having me clinging on to him for dear life for so long.

3. The views. Everywhere you went they were breathtaking.
4. Visiting “Holy Mountain.” According to our guide this was named Holy Mountain as during the Biafran war people were able to hide there and remain safe, so it was said that God must have protected them (presumably as the mountain is so frickin high that you actually feel like you’re in the sky when you’re stood on it!). I think it probably had more to do with the fact that the soldiers couldn’t actually find them, or reach them, given it was about as far from civilisation as you could hope to go. We went there on a Sunday afternoon and there was a church group on pilgrimage there. There must have been over 50 people on the top of the mountain all praying and chanting, and the cloud cover was really low, so it was all a bit eerie as more and more people emerged from the clouds as we got closer.

4. Being cold. Obudu is COLD. Not just Nigerian cold, but proper can’t-sleep-for-teeth-chattering-cannot-physically-face-a-cold-shower-cold.
5. Abebe’s Lodge. This is the “economical” place to stay. There is the Obudu Mountain Resort, but with the cheapest room being over 22,000 N (£88) and my monthly allowance being 36,000 N, this was slightly out of the VSO price range. So for 5,000 N we got a room at Abebe’s Lodge instead, which had running water, hot water when requested, and was perfectly clean. The staff were lovely, and it was right in the middle of the community, so I actually preferred it to the Mountain Resort (or so I told myself, anyway).
6. Being able to eat fried yam, akara and fried plantain for dinner every night.
7. Doing very little. It was lovely to just play scrabble, read books, and be lazy. I’m not normally very good at doing nothing, but I think I was pretty exhausted as life here has been busy recently, so it was definitely time for some down time and some space from Abuja and life here.
8. Walking along the canopy walk at the Becheve Nature Reserve. I’m a wimp and I hate heights. I blindly walked onto the canopy walk before realising or contemplating that it perhaps might be called a canopy walk for a reason, and was about a third of the way across before I actually looked down and realised I was suspended over the forest. On a rickety Nigerian walk way. But it was worth getting to the end and seeing the views from the viewing platform (providing I still didn’t look down).
9. Our hotel on our last night in Obudu. This is the hotel we had wanted to stay in during our first night, so we came down the mountain a day early in the hope it would have a room available as it was mid-week. And yes they did. We wanted to stay in this hotel for one very specific reason – each room has a bath with hot running water. So after spending 20 minutes investigating several rooms, and finally settling on the one with the biggest bath, I spent a very long time lying in lovely hot water. Granted, this was Nigeria, and so making a plug to fill the bath took some experimenting, but we got there in the end (who would have thought a pot of vaseline, a black plastic bag, and a big bucket could be so useful).