Peace Corps pays Benin volunteers more or less 220 dollars a month, this is practically nothing to the average American, but in contrast to the average Beninese salary we are making big money. We get paid every three months, and if you’re anything like me who loves to travel, blow money and have a good time, you will find yourself broke very soon and anxiously awaiting next pay check. When we were in Ghana and Togo I went all out and made sure I had a great time but as a consequence after our trip, I was broke and running on fumes.




Back in my town, a couple of days when a good friend; Sarah, calls me telling me that her parents are in Benin visiting her for a couple of days, and they want to go on safari at the national park Pendjari which is about 2 hours from my town, people from across the world come to go on safari, and I have not had the chance to go because its too expensive and I am always broke or we have also tried to go but for one reason or another things never workout. When Peace Corps Volunteers go on safari it is usually for half-a-day because rooms and guides are ridiculously expensive, since it is catered to tourist who can afford it. Sarah tells me that they are going to spend two nights and three day at the park, she offers that they will pay for everything all I have to pay is the entrance fee, which is around 20 dollars. How could I say no to that?
How lucky am I? Very.

Parc National de la Pendjari is a 275,000-hectare national wildlife park is par excellence in this part of West Africa for spotting lions, elephants, baboons, leopards and hippos. The best time to go is around the end of the dry season from November till April when animals start to hover around the water holes, but in May the rainy season starts and everything starts to get green, trees, shrubs and the vegetation starts to grow and animals are less likely venture out and be seen, so we were told that we might not get to see as many animals and at first we did not see too many but after a couple of hours of riding around on top of an uncomfortable Toyota 4-Runner that soon changed. We were also fortunate to spend three days in the park so we were able to see lions, elephants, warthogs, hippos, monkeys and baboons, various types of deer, caribou, antelope and birds of all sizes and colors. Since it is the beginning of the raining season, food and water are abundant so it is also the birth season for animals; we got the chance to see just about everything baby, baby warthogs, baby hippos, baby monkeys etc and no matter how fat and ugly the animals are as adults, as babies they are all cute. It was interesting to see baby monkeys come close to the car and look at us with such curiosity and then runaway. I was amazed by the diversity of birds there are, small birds to huge birds that were easily up to 5 feet tall, birds of all colors, from dull brown to the brightest blue and red with shades and combinations of various colors. The elephants were the highlight of the safari, African elephant are huge and fearless, while other animals ran or flew at our sight the elephants would walk right by us or continue what they were doing without even bothering to acknowledge us, we saw a herd of 4 elephants playing on a puddle and wrestling.

The third and last day of our trip, we were all tired and ready to head back so we spent half the day on safari and then in the African heat of the afternoon we went swimming in the waterfalls that are at the entrance of the park. None of the pictures that I have posted or taken can justify actually seeing the animals and scenery of Africa.

I would like to thank Mike and Fran Haskins for making this adventure possible.