DAY 132---DAKAR, SENEGAL

 

        Docking here in Dakar 15 minutes late at 11:15.  It's a sunny but hazy day at noon.  74 degrees and 75% humidity with a nice breeze so much nicer day than at past several ports.  It warmed up to 82 in the afternoon.

Historical/Background Info:

        This is another new port for us.  Dakar is the capital and largest city of Senegal in West Africa.  The population of the country is over 17.5 million.  Senegal is classified as a heavily indebted poor country with 75% of its workforce is in the agriculture and other food industries.  The average pay in Senegal is equal to $208 per month.  Dakar proper has a population of one million but the metropolitan area has a population of 4 million.  The Portuguese reached the Bay of Dakar in the mid 1400’s initially as slave raiders. Slave trade here was abolished permanently in 1815.  Senegal has been ruled throughout history by the Portuguese, French, Dutch, and Great Britain.  But it became independent in 1960 as the Republic of Senegal.  The economy is driven by mining, cement, fertilizer, chemicals, food processing, textiles, refining of imported oil, and tourism. Islam is there predominate religion.  Illiteracy is high especially among women.  It is a French speaking country but English is widely used too with tourists.

LAST EVENING

        Marcia made this "Commodore" jacket.  Much nicer that the one Regent presented to her for sailing over 2000 nights on Regent.  It is Seven Seas Society night so dress is formal optional.

 

                       Mykonos salad was very good.  My sea bass was not as kind of burnt.

                                                     White chocolate croissant pudding.

TODAY

Bad News--Captain Abhi made a PA this morning saying there is a rise in crew respiratory/covid cases so to break the chain the crew are wearing masks again until further notice.  Some passengers are also infected.  They are not saying how many cases there are.  The new President of Regent Seven Seas will be coming on board at Tenerife in the Canary Islands so I know they want to nip this illness in the bud before she arrives.

                                   Here comes the pilot with Goree Island in the background.

                   Here you can see the pilot jumping on the ship's rope ladder to come aboard.

        Anchored just outside of the port is this liquified petroleum gas ship.  LPG is a flammable mixture of hydrocarbon gases which could be propane, proplene, butylene, isobutane, or n-butane.  Not sure if importing or exporting it.

        This Goree Island which is a small island just 3000 feet in length and 1150 feet wide with a current population of around 1700.  There is a fortress here and was one of the places used to export slaves from Africa during the 1700's.  One of the ship's tours (in fact we were booked on it but canceled it) to the island today.

                             Colorful local boat carrying some cargo entering the port with us.

                                              Passing the breakwater and entering the port.

                                                    The birds have found a place to roost.

        View from our suite balcony today.  Boat on left is unloading sacks of flour.  The other one unloading rice.

       I took the officials over an hour to clear the ship so tours could depart.  Most of today's tours will not be returning to the ship until 6:30 or after now.  There is a Mexican food buffet in La Veranda this evening so they will not have to change clothes before dining as it will be casual dress up there.

             I had this roasted chicken breast for lunch in CR.  Not much mashed potatoes!

        As we had not been to Dakar previously, we caught the 1pm shuttle to Independence Square downtown.  As you can see the small shuttle bus was packed full.  Also on the bus were Nino (Food & Beverage Director), Nicki (General Manager), and Olek (Executive Chef).  We dropped them at a supermarket to do some grocery shopping for the ship.

        All along the street for a couple blocks was small shops with everything you might need plus much more.

       

                                                                        Laundry day

                                                      Woman carrying basket on her head.

                                       Many of the women were wearing colorful dress.

        This is the market where we dropped Nino, Nicki, and the chef.  I hope he buys some potato chips as the ship is out of them.

More colorfully dressed women.  About half of the men wore this full length garment.

                                           Arriving and driving around Independence Square.

                                                                           Square

                                                  Man with different, colorful garment.

                                      Lumber on the dock.  Not sure if importing or exporting.

My Impression of Dakar

        Another very poor West African country for sure.  As I mentioned we both took the shuttle for the very short ride to the center of town.  We did not get off but came right back to the ship about 15 minutes later.  As it was a short ride into town I did not see much.  What I did see was people dressed in nice, clean, and colorful clothes.  The streets I saw were clean.  I'm certain it would be totally different out of the city where the people were living in poverty.  How can they live when the average wage is just over $2400 per year.  We were warned that this place is not the safest.

        Spending a lot of the afternoon paying credit card bills.  Thanks to online credit cards and banking I can do it all from the ship.  One thing about being away for 5 months is we are not home spending money of food, eating out, or buying things so my credit cards just have autopays of utilities.

        We considered having our cocktail hour in the suite this evening but decided the bar would probably not be crowded as many just returning from tours.  About decided to go up and have the Mexican buffet in La Veranda but liver and onions are on the Compass Rose menu and could not pass that up.

        Definitely going to the show tonight as it is featuring the production cast in a show they put together called "Don't Stop Believing".  

        We are not sailing until 8pm and will be at sea tomorrow enroute to the island of Cape Verde.  It is 550 statute miles away.