A Lagos-to-Ogun Travel Tale

Traveling is fun and more enjoyable when you experience comfort in the journey. As much as I love traveling, I haven't made a long-distance trip since after the last yuletide season, but one trip I had in the first quarter of this year was in Ogun State. Ogun State is just a neighboring state to Lagos State, Nigeria, where I reside. It was supposed to be simple travel, but the experience during the journey was an annoying one.

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In the first place, the journey was to visit my childhood friend who gave birth. This lady has been a good friend to me right from my teenage years. We did a lot of things together , got admission to the same university, and graduated in the same year. She got married and has been living in Ogun State, while I live here in Lagos State. When you gave a good friend , even distance shouldn't be a barrier. Personally, I try to keep my good friends , keep in touch, and get committed for a better relationship. That's why, hearing that she gave birth , I didn't hesitate to make this trip for a visit; after all, she did so for me when I had my babies too. Btw , seeing her newborn calmed my nerves over the travelling stress I had while on the trip.

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I expected to reach Ogun State at the latest by 10 am, as I left very early around 6am that Saturday morning. I left my kids at home for this journey , and the plan was to get there early enough, spend quality time with my friend and her the newborn, and then take an early morning bus back to Lagos the following day. However , the journey that was supposed to take 4 to 5 hours ended in 12 hours! From 6 am, I left Lagos; I reached there around 6:10 pm, feeling exhausted and hungry.

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One crazy thing that most drivers over here do is pick up their vehicle in the morning and, without checking if all things are okay, drive out for the day. The road was verrrrry bad, coupled with many times our bus was breaking down on our way. Then the inside of this bus was something else; a lot of the structures of the car had worn off. I was seated in what looked like an iron instead of a comfortable chair designed with foam. For each gallop , I felt pain; for every traffic, I was sweating much due to how compacted we were in the bus, yet we paid a very high fare. As of 3pm , I was still on the road, very hungry, like if I should faint, with no place to buy food except snacks, which wasn't solving the hunger issues .

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Yet our car broke down again inside one village we passed. For over an hour, we were all standing, waiting for the driver to perform mechanic work on his car. It wasn't funny. My friend and her husband called until they got tired. They were afraid that perhaps I entered the kidnappers' bus, lolz. The journey was simply unusual , and sincerely nothing that I enjoyed except for the little time I finally spent with my friend when I arrived at 6pm before I fell asleep.

The next time I plan to travel is during summer this year, and that would be at Jos. I already made a blog about it and all the things I hope to do on that trip. You can read about it here . I simply can't wait to behold that soon coming travel, and for sure, I will make the travel blog here in this space after the experience; hopefully , it will be a great travel experience with lasting memories.

_{Images 1 & 3 were taken from canva while image 2 is mine}