The 87 year old man in the Cleveland, Ohio Scout uniform was the chief of the village we stayed in last night - wizened face, slow but steady in his movements, and in pretty good shape for his age. He gave Sabine two fine looking chickens as a gift last night and as he waited on the bank to see us off just before 0800 this morning, he was extremely friendly and courteous. Beside him stood an old lady,who I first thought was his wife, very dignified in her bearing, face full of character and very smiley eyes. She told us (through a translator) that she wanted to ask us so many things, but because we didn't have the language (Lingala) and she didn't speak French or English, she couldn't. What a pity. These two could have told us a few tales.

Later the same day we saw the other side of the Congo. We had pulled in to the bank to get bread and a few other things at the market in Makanza - site of one of the oldest Catholic missions.

For the first time on our trip there were a lot of cattle around and whilst taking a photo of some young calves, a local guy came up and started yelling and shouting at me. It was initially hard to make out what was upsetting him, but I eventually twigged that what he was saying was that I needed a permit to take photographs of the cattle!!

Worse was to follow. Some chap that had obviously been drinking saw members of our group in the market. He had a few unsuccessful attempts to engage them in conversation before picking on Geoff (our leader) and haranguing him. By the time they got back to the boat this guy had completely lost it. He came up the gangplank after Geoff and berated us all - the Belgians, Americans and English were all trying to rip off the Congo. It was his country and he was going to kill us (somehow tuer sounds much less unpleasant than kill, but it still wasn't pleasant).

The farcical element to all of this was that he was making these threats literally over the heads of the usual squad of officials (DGM, police, intelligence, Navy and Maritime) seated on our boat, who just kept their heads down and continued filling out their forms as if nothing was happening.

The guy would not shut up and I thought there was going to be fisticuffs, particularly when Vince, our captain, came back to the boat. Vince always looks a bit surly at the best of times and this guy was not improving his humour. Even Gracien, our mild mannered teacher (and chef de liaison with officialdom), was in danger of losing his rag, but Gracien eventually prevailed and ushered him off the boat, where he continued to abuse us from the bank.

So .... anyone reading this and thinking of calling in for bread at Makanza on a Saturday lunchtime - use yesterday's and toast it.