Benin for the Bokke

By late October 2023, adventurers Jean Cooper and De Witt Oosthuizen were somewhere in the middle of Nigeria. Their plan was to be in neighbouring Benin in time to watch the Springboks play in the final of the Rugby World Cup. But they ran into roadblock after roadblock..

- JEAN COOPER

The tar road out of Gembu in Nigeria was falling apart, but it felt like our local N1 compared to what we'd been through over the past few days (see issue #197). We were aiming for the town of Bali, 232 km to the north, via the Mambilla Plateau at about 1200 m above sea level. The air was "cool" at 27°C and the views were amazing.

But the dream didn't last forever. A roadblock loomed ahead. Tyres and drums and sticks in the road. A man in uniform with a long rifle signalled for us to stop. Passports. What do we have to give him? Nothing? Did we think we could ride through their country without giving something to the soldiers? We played dumb and friendly, and he let us go.

We stopped to withdraw money. Immediately, we were swarmed by curious people. Welcome to Nigeria! Where are you from? With this bike?! Photos were taken with our Husqvarna Norden 901 Expedition bikes. The ATM wouldn't give us cash, so we continued. Worried, because we had too little Nigerian naira for fuel to get us to the next big town.

Another roadblock. What can you give us? Again and again. Roadblocks were our fate, it seemed.

The road surface became even smoother and we finally managed to reach speeds of up to 90 km/h. We also got cash.

We arrived at a motel in Bali and wanted to check in, but an immigration officer suddenly appeared and asked for our passports, which had been stamped in Gembu. A thousand questions followed.

It was a hot evening and we sweated as we sat down to eat fish, possibly caught in the Taraba River that flows through town. Our visas were only valid for 10 days, but we figured it should be enough time to travel through the country, provided everything went well. We had left Pretoria five weeks earlier.

The Springboks were playing England in the World Cup semi-final and we listened to the match on the radio, via apps on our cellphones, with interruptions because the Internet was slow. The Boks barely scraped through.