The trip provided a welcome relief out of the concrete jungle that is Lagos City and was a reasonable interesting day.
Badagry has an interesting if sombre history as the West African slave port (from 16th century to 18th century) where more than 300 000 slaves were shipped across the Atlantic to labor in the cottonfields of the New World.
It was also a key entry port for many missionaries. The slave market was established in 1502 and the sandbar across the lagoon which stretches all the way to the Benin border is the 'point of no return'. Slaves left the mainland of Africa by rowing boat to this strip of land between the creek and the mainland where they were herded along a sand path for a few meters to the waiting ships in the sea on the other side. This was propbably the last they saw of their African homeland. Legend has it that there was a waterwell from which the slaves would drink for the last time and that this water had some sort of magical effect that made them forget everything they new.
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