My first days in The Gambia

Very soon after the start of my graduation Project I began a trip to the Gambia because the best way to understand the country and its problems is to see it by yourself! To obtain a recent picture on the bathymetry of the coastal area I traveled to the Gambia with a echousounder and GPS to do some measurements by myself. The first problem that arose was that my suitcase with the equipment did not arrive at the airport...

A couple of days later my suitcase finally arrived but offcourse there was a problem at customs. The echousounder and GPS are 2 small suitcases with a lot of electrical equipment and the customs had some problems with this. The best thing is that you call your contact in The Gambia which comes to the airport, makes some calls and 10 minutes later you are outside without any problems and you are brought back to your hotel.

The first days in Gambia I had time to visit all the constructed projects in the Gambia. All the projects were looking very good and around Banjul and Cape point very nice beaches were present. The site of my project, Kololi beach, was looking a bit worse. There still was some beach left, but 25 meter is narrow when 6 years ago there was a beach of approximately 50 meters. It was immediately clear that the largest resorts, tourist bars and restaurant were present in this area (Senegambia area)  and use the Kololi beach. The presence of a nice beach is very important for tourism is this area. Reason enough to find the cause of the high erosion and find a solution for it!