Hazel drinks capuccino twice in one week

Good afternoon readers!

Our week of travelling is almost an end and it will soon be time to get back to the grindstone. But it's been fun while it's lasted.

After one night in Abuja on Saturday, we made the four-hour journey to Jos, a city located on a plateau giving it a much cooler climate than the rest of Nigeria. Hazel even had to wear a fleece at one point but, then again, Hazel would wear a fleece in a furnace! Our guide for the week was a man called Tom Gata, a geologist working for an NGO called TASTE. This organisation uses specialist equipment to drill boreholes, giving communities access to clean water. They also train local people to maintain these boreholes.

Our visit to Jos took in the zoo and the wildlife park. In both of these establishments, knowledge about or concern for animal welfare was sadly lacking. We also had the opportunity to visit a hydroelectric power station. This was established in 1929 and the machinery hasn't changed since then. NESCO, as the company is called, provides electricity at half the price of Nigeria's mainstream power company, NEPA, experiences far fewer power cuts and is much less damaging in terms of climate change. Critics would argue that the station and accompanying power lines are a blot on an otherwise beautiful highland landscape but I would say that's a price worth paying.

On Wednesday, Tom took us to Kano, the main city in the north of Nigeria. This heaving metropolis is noticeably hotter and dryer than the south of Nigeria where we are based, a situation made worse by the traffic fumes. The main difference between the north and south is that life is dictated by Islam rather than Christianity. We arrived in Kano at the start of Ramadan so we had to wiat until after sunset for our supper. Fortunately, we were able to get breakfast despite being up much after dawn. Thursday was spent exploring the old city originally surrounded by a mud wall, some of which is still intact. The most fascinating part of the old city was Nigeria's oldest market, a labyrinth of narrow alleyways in which traders were selling traditional crafts (souvenir-type shops are actually very rare in Nigeria). Hazel bought some beads while I rummaged through some old West African coins.

We're now back in Abuja with our British friends, Polly and Julian, and their son, Fin. We are just about to go to our second supermarket of the day where we hope to stock up on essential supplies for the coming months. We return to Abia state tomorrow.