Return to Yaounde

Our flight back was scheduled for Wednesday morning. We arrived and waited with about forty plus people for a twenty-four seat plane. I guess the airline couldn’t keep track of all of the hand-written tickets they handed out. After waiting some time, the announcement was made that the plane was not going to arrive that day. My nervousness subsided when Darrell and I went to the airline’s ticket office and discussed with other passengers how to get back home. Some people were going to try to make it to Garoua (3 hours away) to take the next days flight at noon (which wasn’t guaranteed). Others were going to take the train. Darrell and I returned to the hotel to discuss what to do. We then left our luggage there and went to the voyage agencies. Should we hurry and leave to Garoua now? Try to take the plane tomorrow? Or take the train?

We ended up deciding to take the train. So, after a night’s rest at the hotel, we woke up at 4:30am to get to the bus station at 6am. We took the bus 8 hours from Maroua to the train station in Ngoundere (in the North province). We waited for the train for three hours. We then rode the train for thirteen hours to Yaounde. The train was actually fun. At certain train stops people bought food and drinks from vendors outside windows. We even had a nice dinner on the train. Once we arrived from our twenty hour journey from Maroua to Yaounde we took a taxi home and relaxed and reflected on our journey.