Banjul
The capital city and seat of
government of the Gambia, the town is a good starting point for trips
to all parts of the country and coastline.
Georgetown
The old second city of colonial days and sill an administrative and
trading centre of the region. Here stands the old slave market, a sign
of hard days gone by.
Basse
Santasu
The major trading centre for the upper reaches of the Gambia River.
Handsome trading houses built at the turn of the century can be seen.
Flora and Fauna
Gambia is a paradise for the ornithologist. The riverside, lagoons and
creeks near Banjul have recorded over 400 species of birds. Dolphins
are often seen up river as far as Albreda. There are also large numbers
of wild pigs, monkeys, baboons, hyenas, jackals, and antelope together
with some hippopotami and crocodiles. The Abuko Nature Reserve is
situated about 24 kilometres from Banjul.
Fort Bullen
This fort was built by the British in 1826 to protect the trading route
of the Gambia River and repel any attacks on what was Bathurst, now
Banjul, on the opposite side of the river estuary. A few ramparts,
crumbling turrets and toppled rusting cannon lie around the historic
site. There is a small beach here and a guard post, but little else
remains of one of the Gambia's earliest fortresses. It was renovated in
1996 as part of the Roots Homecoming Festival and is open to visitors.
The large square fort has low around towers at each corner, and one can
walk along the battlements overlooking the river mouth. An informative
leaflet on fort's history is available from the National Museum in
Banjul.
Ginaki
Island
The island has a good range of habitats and is very good for
birdwatching - especially waders and water birds, but many other
species can be seen, including birds of prey. Dolphins are often
spotted from the shore, and turtles nest on the beach. The Niumi
National Park, which incorporates the island, protects small
populations of manatee, crocodile, clawless otter, hyena, bushbuck and
duiker, plus various species of monkey. There are even reports of
leopard occasionally wandering in from the Fathala Forest over the
border with Senegal.
James Island
James Island is in the middle of the River Gambia, about two kilometres
south of Jufureh and Albreda. On the island are the remains of Fort
James, built in the 1650s and the site of numerous skirmishes in the
following centuries. It was used as a slave collection point by British
traders until 1820, and was finally abandoned when the British built a
new fort at Bathurst on Banjul Island. Today, the ruins of the fort are
quite extensive. Information about the fort is available at the
National Museum in Banjul.
Wassu Stone Circles
Fascinating circles of standing stones around Wassu have now been
identified as burial grounds more than 1,200 years old. Made of hewn
laterite there are scores of these sites dotting the landscape.
Throughout an area
including parts of southern Senegal, down across eastern Gambia as far
south as Guinea, a collection of ancient megalithic sites still puzzle
archaeologists. These are the famed stone circles of West Africa.They
consist of rings up to eight metres in diameter of 10 to 24 rounded,
reddish-brown, laterite pillars, from one to two-and-a-half metres in
height.
Apart from the
attraction of the stone circles at Wassau, the nearby Baboon Island
National Park offers pleasant sightings of the famous olive baboon and
several troupes of chimpanzees. Baboon Islands are a group of five
forested islands. It is in this park that the rehabilitated apes raised
in the Abuko Wildlife Reserve near Banjul are released into the wild.
Mungo
Park Memorial
Historians may want to head for Karantaba Tenda, about 20 kilometres
directly due east of Georgetown. Near this village, on the riverbank,
is the memorial pillar marking the spot where the Scottish explorer
Mungo Park set off into the interior to trace the course of the Niger.
River Gambia
The Gambia, the smallest independent country in Africa, is named after
the Gambia River, which flows through its entire length from East to
West (into the Atlantic ocean) for more than 300 miles. Its sister
Republic of Senegal surrounds it on three sides - the western boundary
being the Atlantic Ocean with its glorious beaches and wide river
estuary at Banjul, the Capital, once known as Bathurst.
|
