When I travel, I try to spend as much time as is possible in one town. I hate wasting the time of packing, transporting, finding etc. If a bike is involved, one saves the madness of carrying all your possessions on the bike, or rerentings or even worse carrying the bike with you on the bus/train! Of course this mode of travel is not suited to many trips like seeing Scotland or Equador but generally I stick to it.
The bike trips, Cancun, Claremont, Lagos, really lend themselves to the above. I move in for a couple weeks and ride every day, often in a different direction. But in each case, especially when I am alone in Cancun or Lagos, it is very important that I try to establish a home bar. I’m alone. It provides me with socializing. It is a place where I know the people. I see them day after day. I can tell them about my day and hear what they are up to. While I am riding alone, I will think about what I will ask them and what stories I might tell.
Valentino at Baffi Bar in Lagos and Stephanie at Back Abby in Claremont are the classic examples. I am very happy to talk to the regulars or the random customers at the bar but just in case they do not show up, it is wonderful to have a bar keep I enjoy. In Lagos, I have occasionally used Lighthouse, a bar over in the heavily ex-pat british marina. The owner hirers wonderful young women. There are lots of older single sailer customers. The bar is a little harder for me to establish in. You mainly have to sit at tables. The young staff seems to work diverse shifts. Each year I give it a couple tries but it has been a long time since I really settled in there.
The situation in Cancun is different. My bar, Surfin Burrito, really works well, probably better than anywhere. But, I am totally dependent on the customers. I know the bar tenders, I enjoy them, but they are very occupied in waitress duties and usually have less english. As you can read about in Cancun pages, I count on the daily customers for conversation and they rarely disappoint.
Ok, enough on the background, lets gets to Shaker. The key to any bar is the bar tender with the personality to enjoy me, entertain me and hopefully attract other customers for me to make friends with.
Carley is an ex-pat. Probably from Wales? I will be corrected if I am wrong! Brits take this stuff seriously while I could care less that I was raised in Pittsburgh. She tried Crete? in Greece first as a young traveler and settled into Lagos at least 7 years ago. And she has been at Shaker a lot of that time.
Shaker is a strange place. There are 3 or 4 small tables outside on the edge of the street. No food. A long bar with at least 3 TVs. Really set up like a railroad car. Not a lot of room but plenty for moving around. It is right in town along with at least 2 other dive bars. There are more upscale ex-pat bars, many way upscale over on the Marina, 3 less upscale, more pubs, down gathered together on the back streets leading from the Marina to downtown Lagos and a couple in the tourist Lagos. But Shaker and its neighbors give off a CLEAR image of dive bar. I have one image to post.
You can not see the bars further down the street on the left. Note the red building with Bon Vivant lettering. A couple years ago I worked the bar on their top floor. Had Margaritas. Nice to be outside in the sun. But no real bar keep and while the other patrons were interesting, they were at tables and hard to engage in conversation. Coming and going to Bon Vivant I somehow noted Carley and switched my home.
Dogs. Again, sorry I did no not have an image. There are two dive bars on the left before you get to Bon Vivant. The one closest to Shafer has a great small white and brown dog. The dog chases balls or some thrown toy. The dog probably belongs to a patron rather than an employee. The dog has the perfect disposition for working the neighborhood. You can not tell it from the above image but the street is on and off full of people and even the occasional car. The dog’s object can be thrown as far as Shaker or across from Shaker. The dog will race up to where it has landed but if it is under a table or too close to people, the chaser will just make it clear what they are here for but not dive in until there is an opening. Sometimes dogs are walked past this chaser and start barking. The chaser never engages unless there is a clear calm opening. I see some other similarly well behaved dogs, even one is with a regular Shaker patron.
Sooo, enough with the dogs, Tom, who are the people? I do not speak to the man who is aharing the table with me. He always sits outside.
I wonder when I occasionally sit out on the street instead of at the bar what people make of that look. I of course have the Hawaiian shirt on. Carley always comments on it. That exchange is a hand shake. Carley does hug on first and last days but I am not a real hugger and I am pretty sure she is not either, though much more than stiff Tom.
Shafer is a very different place late at night. I have never been there! Maybe I have to set the alarm and go down some morning! I think it basically stays open until everyone leaves, 4-6am. Carley has a 2 year old and does not work that shift though I bet she did in the day. She has a party girl side that only pops out occasionally now.
I better get on to the rest of the crew.
He is in “His Seat”, at the end of the bar, closest to the street but back to it. On the rare occasions when he is missing or sitting at a street table, I do not take his seat but I sit at the bar next to it.
I just realized that I do not have an Hawaiian shirt for the day I took these pictures! This was during my sick week!. I’ll see if I can not find a Hawaiian day but indeed there may not be even one from 2024.
Being only a 2 week visitor in Lagos, I am not at all up to speed on the “Visa levels.” Such is a constant concern and status symbol with the ex-pats. 3 months is the normal visa. But at the end of 3 months I think you have to leave for 3 months! Jim is not an owner, which is another marker in the ex-pat scale. He is a long term renter. This might be his third year. Whatever kind fo “more then 3 month” visa he has, he is not in that category. This year he was talking about a trip to Hawaii, stopping back in San Diago. He also has been feeling the pressure to live up to one of his “claims”. He would articulate that one of the reasons he moved to Portugal and Lagos was that he lovew to travel. But then he never did! This year he went to Spain, took his fold up bike with him in a rental car. His focus in Spain was seeing forts. I rarely meet others who talk about needing a focus. Jim also took a week long trip just recently to Morocco. I should have questioned him more about his daily life on these trips. Our conversation just did not go down that route.
Jim has a pretty set daily schedule. He goes out for coffee. Probably has an assigned morning seat in a couple establishments! He walks. I think he may even have a stop counter? He reads, sometimes outdoors on the beach or on a bench. There is a second hand book store near his apartment. The store is right on the river, on the way from downtown Lagos to the Marina, so I pass it often. They have some crazy deal where you buy 10 books and then get to exchange 5 for free. I think that Jim really reads a lot. He never reads at Shaker. I do. I always have the book with me, along with all the things I now need in order to read. The reading glasses and the head lamp! Quite a look! I read if there is no one to talk to and if Carley is not really available. Writing this reminds me that I really would love to delve more into her story. Greece? Her early days in Lagos.