Africa

[Visited: April 2018]

After the inevitable negotiations with a driver of a normal car in Sassandra instead of the much more costly driver in his 4WD, we are heading north from the coastal town. The car turns out to have been imported from our home country in Europe: it is a little weird to imagine that after a life of driving on smooth asphalted roads it is now serving these potholed, strips of asphalt and bumping up and down untarred tracks in the jungle. We pass through a small village which has market day today, and a little further north, the driver parks the car on the side of the track, and we walk towards the arched part of Pont Weygand. An arched bridge built during the Second World War (or, according to some sources, before that), it is considered the first concrete bridge in Africa.
Moreover, it is a uniquely shaped bridge: it does not run in a straight line, but is curved. In addition to that, the width of the bridge varies, and quite a large part of it does not have a rail anymore. A group of Ivorian women dressed in those attractive colourful African dresses walk by, bowls balancing nonchalantly on their heads. People cycle by, probably wondering why we are walking their bridge. Their village is on the other side of the Sassandra, which is a mighty river, wide and deep, so they just need this bridge to walk back after having visited the market in the village we have just passed. We have just come here to walk across, listening to our guide while he explains about the efforts to build this bridge, why the engineers had to adapt the course of the bridge when they discovered boulders on the riverbed, which explains the curve in the bridge.
The western part of the bridge has a double arch; after the curve, the bridge becomes narrower, has long parts without a rail, which means that you walk on a rickety bridge surface with cracks allowing views right into the river below. This is also the part from which you have the best views of the landscapes of the Sassandra river. Trees and boulders in the river make the landscape outstanding, and we stop several times to enjoy the views, with the clouds reflected in the calm waters of the river. At the eastern side of the bridge, we see the rusting wreck of a car at the roadside, and our guide tells us how this car crashed into the river, killing most of its passengers. We get a better understanding how the railing of the bridge has disappeared over the years, and on our way back to the car, we see the railing crumbling away from the main bridge structure. We once again look back at the landscape of the river, a sole pirogue crossing the tranquil waters of the Sassandra, and are happy we have taken the trouble to come here.

Around the World in 80 Clicks

Personal travel impressions both in words and images from Pont Weygand (Ivory Coast). Clicking on the pictures enlarges them and enables you to send the picture as a free e-card or download it for personal use, for instance, on your weblog. Or click on the map above to visit more places close to Pont Weygand.
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Pont Weygand > Ivory Coast > Africa

[Visited: April 2018]

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