The day has arrived! After months of worrying that Dave won't get his passport in time, Marissa will go to the wrong airport, Kaye will arrive a day early and I will forget my hair straighteners, we are all safely at Terminal 2. The only thing forgotten is my dietary emergency card in French which last time I saw it was being used as an ice scraper on Vomit.

We have:

• Dave who is so laid back he makes even Dylan from the Magic Roundabout look like he's on speed.



• Marissa who has every eating place and village sorted. Last year she got off the plane in ***** instead of Burkina Faso so I will be keeping a tight hold of her.



• Kaye who will be great in talking us out of tricky situations.



• And me.



• But I have the toffee vodka.
  
  Our trip will take us to the cities of Cote D'Ivoire, beaches and fishing villages, virgin rain forest, mask dances, the Liberia border ( oops didn't tell all of you that bit ) and an African dictator's cathedral monstrosity. Hopefully there will be no illness and no encounters with huge men with tight baby doll nighties on brandishing axes as per one of my previous trips to West Africa ( Tim don't get excited and change your booking).
  
  The last time I ever wrote anything major was an Ebola policy and the last time I wrote a diary was when I was holed up in Timbuktu so bear with me! Next stop Abidjan......