Originally Posted by
Tony Taylor
I paid off in Dakar in 79, left the ship about 4/5 miles offshore. We were landed in the docks (about 8 o us) which were deserted and left waiting for at least half an hour then one car turned up and took four away, the remainder of us stood for about another 15 minutes then another car turned up and picked us up, none too soon as we were being eyed up by some ugly looking characters who were slowly edging their way towards us and my wife was getting a bit edgy.
We were dropped at the security gatehouse where the other guys were waiting and we were told that we could leave but we had to leave all our luggage there which we refused point blank, so the security people then said we could leave but had to leave radios, cameras etc.and again we refused, so it was a stand off. Eventually the agent arrived and gave a bung to them and we left.
Spent a couple of days in a reasonable hotel run by a French couple.
When we arrived at the airport, porters snatched a small bag each and ran inside with it ignoring our protests, then demanded 20 bucks eack but got given rather less.
Arriving at passport control we were told we could not leave unless the porters were paid 25 bucks so the old man coughed up.
Looking back after going through we saw the porters divvying up with the passport control guys.
At least there were no bloated dead bodies lying in the street which I have witnessed in Lagos.