My wife and I had our honeymoon in the Gambia. As we came out of Banjul airport, our bus to the hotel was surrounded by fire-eaters, stilt walkers and acrobats.

The luggage was held in "place" on top of the 40 year old bus by the driver's assistant sitting on it. When the bus started off in the direction of our hotel, it got about half a mile before the military checkpoint. In short, every cliche about Africa was presented to us in the first 5 minutes.

Forget the cliches. The reality is that the hotels are little bits of Europe transplanted to a hotter climate. After our initial trip from the airport, all the buses were air conditioned and brand new.

Our great memory was visiting a training scheme in Serrekunda to see if they could be helped. This training scheme was run by the formidible Satang Jobarteh, a fabulous lady but I wouldn't have wanted to get on her wrong side.

The training scheme greeted my wife and I royally. We had 4 speeches of welcome, I had to give a speech and then a choir of students sang to us. It was only after this, when we entered Satang's office that we saw the photo of Prince Edward being greeted in the same manner.

The photo shows me surrounded by students. Satang is in the gold dress.

Unfortunately, Satang fell victim to cerebral malaria and died in 2001.