A Little Piece of Paradise (for Congo)

Then I saw the Congo, creeping through the black, Cutting through the jungle with a golden track. -Nicholas Vachel Lindsay, The Congo

There was a boat and a river and they took us to Kinshasa's Utopia.  Who knew that just a short jaunt up (down?) the Congo River would turn into a day-cation.  I was skeptical when colleagues spoke of "the sandbar," and "the boat," and "picnics." I was thinking "standing waist deep in a practically drowned sand bar as the river's strong currents whipped me about," and "wooden pirogue with a water-logged engine," and "some pretzels turned stale from the humidity." I was wrong. (Note this occasion because I don't say I'm wrong very often.)  

Looks like a real beach!

The boat was sound and had lots of seats to enjoy the ride out; it's name is Pili Pili, after the hot red pepper sauce that the Congolese put on everything. The sandbar was a nice stretch of beach in the middle of the Congo River. Lovely sand and soft waves lapping against the shore. You can see Brazzaville and Kinshasa from the sandbar, just barely through the hazy, humid sky. We set up a tent and tables and chairs for a picnic, a real one, with potato salad and fruit salad and salt and pepper potato chips (Thank you Amazon!) and a variety of sandwiches. Oh, there was some beer too. There was a cool breeze, a nice change from the stale heat of Kinshasa. And best of all, there were no weird smells! 

A view from the sandbar. It looks
idyllic, right?

The river in this area has a fast current so it is safe to go in (standing or still-ish water in equatorial Africa has lots of things, i.e. parasites like bilharzia, look it up, it's quite horrible). The water is brown, quite brown, but I like to think it's just because the river moves fast and spins up a lot of dirt. You cannot swim out too far because the current will take you, and if you have seen any of those documentary's on Discovery Channel about giant fish in the Congo River, well, bad things could happen, least of all drowning. 

A fishing village near Kinshasa.

After a nice day in the sand and sun, we returned to the port. Past the fishing village shanty towns and getting a whiff of the smells of Kinshasa, in case we forgot that we were in Congo. It's good to know, nonetheless, that there is an escape if you ever need it.