March 10, Return to Garaha Larh, Lost in the Bush again.

Monday morning we returned to Garaha Larh. This was project is both training and water project. We were just going to install the new pump, test both pumps, show the chairman of the local water committee how to test the pump and have him change the seals on a pump piston.

Yakubu, Adams, and I drove across the Benue River and picked up Ruebin part way up the hill. There we also picked up some small breakfast cakes. A women was frying the small cakes in oil over an open fire along the road. These were made with corn flour and tossed in a mixture of spices. They were pretty good and plenty greasy.

Today we have the new Toyota Hilux. It is a gasoline powered small heavy duty 4 wheel drive truck. The last trip we drove the old diesel powered Hilux (I think it is a 1989 or early 1990s). It is a Lazarus truck. I has come back from the dead more than once. It has seen a lot of hard miles on bush roads. The old truck is not as bad as many vehicles on the road. Diesel here is expensive and is not subsidized.

Gasoline is subsidized and is relatively cheap (less than 95 Naira per liter about $2.15 a gallon). The problem is that to get the subsidized rate you have to go to the National Petroleum station. Currently, there is a gas crisis. The lines at the National Petroleum Station in Jimeta is close to a mile long at most times. The commercial gas stations in Jimeta rarely have fuel. They sell fuel at a little above the subsidized price. All of their signs say 95 Naira but if they have fuel they will charge you 110 to 130 Naira per liter during normal times and 160 or more now.

We start our trip at 7:30 AM with the fuel gauge between 1/8 and empty. There are stations open across the Benue. The closest ones charge around 160 Naria per liter. We went past the University and past a few open stations and went in to a small station that was charging 140 Naira. 10.000 Naira purchased 71.4 liters almost filled the tank

We made our third stop at the next larger village. This stop was for fried yams and Suya. These are snacks we can eat as we drive. Suya are small pieces of  meat or to be more precise I would say meat trimmings, that have been cooked over a fire and rolled in a combinations of spices. If I had not been driving I would have taken a few pictures. These are the normal stops that are made on trips like this. Last week we were late and we drove without food.

We made good time until after Gombi, The two Military checkpoints after Gombi were long. There had been an attack north of Gombi over the weekend. It is not known if it was Boko Haram or another group that had a conflict with the village.  A couple churches were burned and people were killed. Garaha ares is calm. We made it to Hong in 2 1/2 hours from Jimeta. We stopped there to get bleach to disinfect the borehole and a notebook to give to the water chairman to record his pump tests results. It was market day in Hong and the highway along the main street was already filled with vendors. We drove past the market and Adams got out and walked back to the market area.

Google Earth View of Garaha Area. 

Lost in the bush again. Last trip we got on the wrong trail after Garaha and went to the village of Dabna to the southwest of Garaha Lar and followed a motorcyle trail back to Garaha Larh. This trip we stopped and asked directions in Garaha. We got on the correct road but we had to leave the road because of a collaped bridge. As we came up out of the dry stream bed on the north side of the bridfe we took the road to the right. It is a little hard to see from where we emerged but there are three roads. The far left road goes to Dabna, the center road goes to Garaha Larh and the right road goes to Garagha Dutse. Dutse means Rock. Garaha Dutse is beside a large granite hill. I got my camera out to take a picture and to use its built in GPS to see which way it was to Garaha Lahr. The memory card was in my computer back in Jimeta. It had the previous pictures and coordinates of Garaha Larh.

In Garaha Dutse we asked directions. With a lot of hand waving a farmer told us the directions. Off we went as we left the village we saw a man at a pump I suggested we confirm the directions. Adams and Yakubu said no we should turn right on the bigger of two trails. The hand waving I remembered was around the rock and left. Two of our crew were native Kilba and this being Kilba Land I had to follow what they told me. After about 10 minutes later they said to turn around. We went back and found took the smaller trail. This may have been the first time a 4 wheeled vehicle had taken this route. It was a single rut trail. After a while we came to some women working in a field. We asked an older lady resting under a tree if we were on the trail to Graaha Larh. She said yes we were on the right trail and there were no more corners (as interpreted). I gave her two thumbs up and a double handed wave.

We arrived in the village and found out the Chairman was gone to Hong for market day. We found the other young men that had helped us on the last trip and the village chief. As the young men unloaded the pipes, tank and pump head from the truck, I got out the weighted tape measure and checked the depth to the water (6 meters) and the depth  to the bottom on the borehole. Adams had reported that the driller had bored to 23 meter. My first indication was that the bottom was at 19 meters. We added a second weight (bolt) to the tape measure. The casing was not exactly vertical and the tape was sticking to the side of the casing making it hard to probe for the bottom. We decided to only put on 5 pipes. The bottom of the hole is somewhere between 17 and 23 meters. I initial reading was 19 meters. The bottom of the cylinder, inlet will be at 15 meters. The static water level was found to be 6 meters the pump inlet will be in 9 meters of water (29.5 feet) and at least 2 meters above the bottom.

Pipes & tank installed connecting piston to operation rod

After we installed the pump a man pump and pumped until we filled the 2 1/2 inch riser pipe and got the water flowing. We (we meaning Adams and Yakubu in Kilba) were discussing with the chief and some of the men some of the things to do to keep the area clean and to maintain the pump, when someone said the water had stopped. We looked at the outlet and no water was flowing. Then we realized that man who had been pumping the handle got tired and stopped.

The pipes we had bought in Jimeta for this pump were used. Jimeta has many of these used pipes. Many of the pump mechanics in this area are only used to the Mark III. When they are called fix a Mark III they convert them into Mark II and sell the pipes in the market. They do not know that you do not need to remove the riser pipe to replace the piston seals.They remove the 65 mm PVC pipes and open top cylinders and replace it with the 32 mm steel pipes and closed top cylinders. Almost almost all of the 65 mm pipes I saw in the market have missing gaskets (we would call them O-Rings). Without these the joints leak. We used teflon plumbers tape and still had a little leakage. The leak test of the pump is to stop pumping for 5 minutes. Then count how many pump stokes it takes to get water. With this pump it took less than three. This is considered in the good range. More than 10 strokes is considered time for repair.

First Water from new borehole.

After testing the new pump we went back to the pump we repaired last week. At noon there was a line of buckets waiting their turn to be filled. The people were waiting under the shade of trees. In a village with adequate water supply they will have finished the morning fetching of water by this time. In the evening as the temperature cools the lines will form again. In villages without adequate water the will pump all day and late into the night. This overuse of the pump quickly wears out the seals in the cylinders.

Line for water at pump at noon. 

This pump had its original 65 mm PVC pipes with the seals. When we tested it for leakage by stopping pumping for 5 minutes, the water resumed with the first stroke. This pump has very little leakage.

In Kilba land and some other places they install used tires to the back of pump.This seems to give them a bounce and also prevents the pump handle from hitting the pump head. I have seen pump handles and pump heads that are bent from years of banging.

While waiting the 5 minutes for the leakage test I decided to take a picture fromt the pump handle prospective. I used the widest angle that my camera had and exaggerate the length of the handle. Ruebin is the man on the left, Adams in the center and Yakubu on the right.

Click to enlarge.

We returned by the direct route to Garaha and on to Hong. Yakubu had some bringing him a package in Hong so we stopped and waited. After a while the man showed up with a bag stuffed with a fried peanut cake. Sticks of fried peanut residue from peanut oil extraction. It is used in a lot of dishes or to make these sticks little treats.

At the check point near Pella there were people selling mangos, onions, and other things. They were asking 300 Naria for a bowl of around 12 mangos. Adams talked them down to 200 Naira ($1.20). In Jimeta they would cost more. Adams, Yakubu and I both bought a bowl each. Ruebin bought 2 bowls and 2 bowls of onions. About half way to Jimeta my eyes started to water from the onion smell.

We arrived back in Jimeta at 5:30. The trip was about 10 hours total. After we unloaded I gave Adams a ride up to the transport area by the Main Market and drove to Luka's Memorial Market (small store). Luka has good prices and the widest variety of goods. I found some fruit cocktail in fruit juice, peach halves, peach slices in grape juice, sardines in tomato sauce and a variety of other things that I will eat over the next six weeks. My pantry is now full.

Peanut cakes.

I hope there are not to many errors in this posting. the network is slow so I am going to post it and edit out errors later. Most of it has been read twice. I always find errors. Even if I proof read it 4 or 5 times. Yes there were a lot if errors. I hope it is a little better now. I am finding that the only good internet time is early in the morning. By 10 AM the network becomes overloaded.

Mangos from Pella.

Pantry of food.