On this day, we drove out of Dakar but I'm pretty sure that we stayed in the greater Dakar area. In other words, we were out of Dakar proper but not too far away from the actual city of Dakar. We took in some sights, made several stops, and got to see some other areas of Senegal.

Our first stop on this day was the African Renaissance Monument. This monument stands on one of two volcanic hills called Collines des Mamelles, not too far outside of Dakar. The bronze statue is 171 feet tall. What was more critical to our visit was that it was 198 steps up to get to the monument. We walked up all the way.

The monument was the idea of former Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade. It was initiated as part of his Senegal prestige endeavors, trying to symbolize a new era of African Renaissance. The entire project took four years and was dedicated in 2010 to commemorate Senegal's 50th anniversary of independence from France.

This monument is supposed to celebrate the rebirth of Africa, its cultural heritage, and its aspirations for a brighter future. We heard, of course, several versions of the significance of the statue from various local guides. One said it signified the rising out of slavery and moving to the light of a brighter future. I figured that I could take my pick of which particular story I wanted it to represent. You're welcome to do the same. I'll mostly remember walking up 198 steps to see it up close.

I'm also including a second photo, taken from the top of the steps, behind the monument, just to show some of the area around the monument.

Our next stop was the Mosque of the Divinity. It was built on the beach and completed in 1997. The location is the ancient fishing village of Ouakam which is not far outside of Dakar. Our guide gave us quite a bit of information about a holy man who inspired the building of the mosque. While it was built at the site of an ancient fishing village, I would add that it must still be an important fishing village. To the left of the mosque, there were dozens of fishing boats along the beach, and if you look out into the ocean, you can see many more fishing boats.

Our next stop was at an art gallery that specialized in "sand paintings." While we had a lecture and demonstration by the head of the gallery, I decided to show two photos of one of the artists working here that day. The idea with sand paintings is that all the sands are from Senegal and are different colors from different areas of Senegal. The artist first draws his picture, then adds glue, or something, and then pours small handfuls of sand onto the different areas of the picture.

Most of the sand paintings that were on display were more complicated than the one that this fellow did but we were here to watch him do the whole painting.

My next photo is just a place we passed on our drive. But we were stuck here in traffic for some time, so I took this photo. Senegal gained independence from France in 1960 and began to deliberately distance itself from the influences of Western architecture. They wanted to create a distinct African architectural style, characterized by strong geometrical forms, rocket-shaped obelisks, and the use of rammed earth. One example of this new architecture is the Institute of Social Hygiene.

This institute also plays a crucial role in Senegal's healthcare and it is a level two hospital providing medical care to key populations of the Dakar region.

We are still driving outside of Dakar proper but still in the greater Dakar area. I will mostly show some of the streets and areas that we visited. I wasn't brave enough to take many market photos. I got yelled at multiple times, just for taking my camera out of its case. These were not, however, great markets. We visited the market in the Medina area and then we visited the Kilen Market. The Medina market was mostly second-hand goods being sold cheaply. It was hot, dusty, dirty, and stinky. The Kilen market was better but still not great. It had a wider variety of goods and some of the produce looked okay but we encountered many angry people here.

My first photo is just a roundabout. It was really a large one with many roads coming into it. It also had way more traffic than it could easily accommodate.

The next photo will give you an idea of what it was like to drive through some of these areas. It was very slow and adventurous driving.

Next is just a place that we passed that I would say was typical of much of our drive. These were very small fruit and vegetable sellers, probably just for real locals.

I found the "local busses" to be interesting. They really crammed the people in. The guy on the back in the multi-colored shirt is the Conductor, collecting the fares.

The rest of these photos are at the Kilen Market. They are all general photos as I was trying hard not to upset the vendors. It also wasn't a very impressive market.