Why this ride
A 184 km round trip from Lamin - roughly 6 h 57 in the saddle. The stops in between: Six-Gun Battery, Saloum Delta and back through Six-Gun Battery. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
CFAO Building and Saloum Delta
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 184 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 6 h 57
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. CFAO Building
CFAO stands for the Compagnie Française de l'Afrique Occidentale, a big French trading company that built warehouses and shops across West Africa from the late nineteenth century, and its building at Albreda is the last layer of commerce in a place with many. By the time it was built, the slave trade was over, the French had given up the enclave to the British, and the money was in groundnuts, rubber and imported cloth, tinned goods and tools. The company's staff bought the crops from the farmers, graded them and loaded them on to river steamers, and in return sold a range of European goods, so the building was both a shop and a depot.
Read the complete CFAO Building write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
CFAO Building is where the day begins. Next is Six-Gun Battery.
2. Six-Gun Battery
The Gambia is a long, narrow country that follows its river, and Banjul sits at the mouth where the river meets the Atlantic, on a low, sandy island that feels like a sandbar with ambitions. The city was founded by the British in 1816 as Bathurst, a base to suppress the slave trade, and the Six-Gun Battery is one of the military remains from that era. It forms part of the UNESCO site called Kunta Kinteh Island and Related Sites, which also includes Fort Bullen on the opposite bank at Barra, and together they tell the story of the Gambia river as a route of the Atlantic slave trade and of the later effort to end it.
Read the complete Six-Gun Battery write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Six-Gun Battery comes up about 40 km into the recorded legs. Next is Saloum Delta.
3. Saloum Delta
The Saloum Delta is where the river Saloum and its arms dissolve into a maze of mangrove channels, sandbanks and low islands before meeting the Atlantic, about halfway between Dakar and the Gambian border. It is a flat, watery, shimmering place, where the horizon is a line of mangroves and the only things standing taller than a man are baobabs and the occasional village water tower. Locals call the narrow creeks bolongs, and they wind through the delta like veins.
Read the complete Saloum Delta write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 92 km into the recorded legs you reach Saloum Delta. Next is back through Six-Gun Battery.
4. back through Six-Gun Battery
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Six-Gun Battery write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Six-Gun Battery, late in the day. Next is CFAO Building.
5. CFAO Building
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete CFAO Building write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Back at CFAO Building. That is the ride.
Leg by leg
CFAO Building to Six-Gun Battery
CFAO Building → Six-Gun Battery is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Six-Gun Battery to Saloum Delta
Six-Gun Battery → Saloum Delta is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Saloum Delta to back through Six-Gun Battery
Saloum Delta → back through Six-Gun Battery is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Six-Gun Battery to CFAO Building
back through Six-Gun Battery → CFAO Building is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.