Spring Break: Peace Corps Style

At the end of March my training group (all 48 of us) got back together for In-Service Training (IST) in Ngaoundere, which is the regional capital of the Adamawa.  It was a week of training flashback, both good and bad.  We got to see each other and hang out, but we were basically in class all day.  It was kind of rough to have a 8-5 schedule again after not really being too busy for the last four months.  On the bright side, since we are now PCVs instead of PCTs we had a lot more freedom.

The week after IST most volunteers took the opportunity to "do a little tourism" in the Grand North of Cameroon since it takes a while to get up there and we recieved a travel stipend for IST.  You'll have to look this up on a map, but I left Ngaoundere to go to Lake Lagdo, then from there I stopped in Garoua for a few hours, then on to Maroua.  Waza National Park was a day trip from Maroua.  Maroua was my favorite city so far in Cameroon.  It's really nice, well laid out, and there is a lot of stuff to do.  I spent most of my time in Maroua shopping in the Artisinal Market, eating hamburgers and drinking fruit juice, swimming in hotel pools, etc.  It was a great trip, but traveling from place to place is rough, so I was really happy to finally be back in my house and my own bed.  I didn't take too many pictures of the trip (mostly because I was paranoid that I was going to get robbed since I had so much with me), but here are a few shots of the two highlights:

LAKE LAGDO - North

Lake Lagdo on a hazy morning.

The beach with a little bit of the hotel we stayed at.

The little guy on the left is a hippo coming up for air.

WAZA NATIONAL PARK - Far North

Soo excited to see some animals :)

Not sure what this thing was, but it was cool looking and actually really cool feeling inside.

Elephantz wuz here.

We didn't actually see any elephants (they migrate in dry season) or lions (only come out super early), but we did see a lot of other animals.  Most notable were the ostriches, giraffes (saw a bunch, and even a group of about 10), warthogs, and most of the cast of the Lion King.  I'm not going to bother posting the pictures of animals that I took because they didn't come out very well, but it was awesome.

This picture should seriously be on the cover of something to promote Peace Corps.

This is a part of a mural at the entrance to the park.  From what I gather, the man being dragged is a poacher and he will be shot by excited military men.  Pretty effective for people who can't read.