We arrive at Tanji beach at around 4pm, just as the locals are gathering to greet the fishing boats returning on the incoming tide. Our guide, Alaji, parks his ancient Land Rover by the roadside and leads us through a warren of low-level shacks, where row upon row of bonga fish and mackerel are packed tightly together, slowly blackening over smouldering wood fires. Sweating, grime-streaked men emerge from the smoke to shout greetings. If anywhere in the Gambia deserves the term "Dickensian", this is surely it.
The beach, when we finally reach it, is bustling with activity. Tanji's fishing fleet comprises a dozen or so pirogues decorated in bright geometric patterns. When they land with the day's catch in late afternoon, people descend on the beach in their hundreds, briefly transforming a tranquil fishing village into a loud, colourful marketplace.
As lines of men unload the day's catch – baskets of catfish, ladyfish, mackerel (known locally as "English fish"), small sharks and sea snails – groups of women shout out to barter for them. Local youths carry baskets piled high with bigger fish to cold- storage containers that will transport them across Ghana into Senegal and beyond. Small boys dart here and there picking up stray fish from the sand.
If you are, as we were, caught in the middle of all this frantic activity, it is almost overwhelming, particularly after a day spent lazing in the sun further up the coast.
We had glimpsed the brightly painted boats about an hour earlier from our bamboo sun loungers on a deserted stretch of Tujering beach a few miles south of Tanji. There, with nothing to distract us but the odd jogger and the occasional herd of cows meandering in single file by the water's edge, the day had passed in a soporific haze. After a lunch of fried fish and rice at a ramshackle beach bar half-hidden in the trees that fringe the entire southern coast, we had passed the afternoon staring at the white waves of the Atlantic, and occasionally braving them for a head-clearing swim.
Back there, it was easy to forget we were in Africa, but after just a few minutes at Tanji's impromptu fish market, the culture shock hit us like a slap in the face. The Gambia's southern coast prides itself on its laid-back attitude but – like almost everywhere in Africa – it is a place of extremes, where tourism, sunshine and friendliness coexist with poverty, dirt and persistent hustling.
The Gambia had not been near the top of our list of places to go for a winter break when my wife and I decided we needed some December sun, but the website for Hibiscus House –"a stepping stone to explore the real Gambia" – swung it for me. In the middle of the village of Brufut, about a 20-minute drive down the coastal highway from Banjul airport, it may be the closest the Gambia has to a boutique hotel.
The tastefully decorated, ethnic-style rooms are set back in the trees around a swimming pool in a stunning garden – the hibiscus was in full bloom – that attracts an array of brightly coloured small birds.
The food is good, if simple – eggs any style or an exotic fruit platter for breakfast, fried fish and vegetable curries for dinner – and the staff, of whom there are many, are extremely friendly and accommodating.
The owner, Susan Clifford-Webb, is an Englishwoman who came to the Gambia on a whim more than a decade ago and stayed. She is a mine of information about what to do, where to go and what to avoid. And, for those needing some therapeutic rejuvenation, she also offers massage and reflexology. The frazzled and the work-weary might be tempted to stay within the confines of Hibiscus House for the entirety of their stay. (I speak from experience.)
Put simply, if you want to avoid the tourist resorts of the nearby Senagambia strip, which attract hordes of Brits every summer, Hibiscus House is your place, an oasis of calm, order and understated luxury. Be warned, though, that it is situated right in the middle of a sprawling African village whose tin-roofed shacks abut the hotel's walls. Once you venture beyond the gate, you are in the real Gambia, a place of concrete and corrugated tin, dust and potholes, subsistence living and visible poverty.
Although I have travelled a lot in Africa over the years, I did find the stark contrast a bit unsettling. The Gambia, like much of Africa, makes for neither a guilt-free nor a hassle-free holiday. A stroll though the village and across the highway takes you to Brufut beach. Along the way, we were trailed by small children chanting, "sweets!" and "mints!", and by the curious stares of men lounging in whatever shade they could find.
From a walled religious school came the sound of children reciting the Qur'an, a reminder that the Gambia is predominantly a Muslim country. A newly painted mosque sits resplendent amid the concrete and corrugated tin, and around the corner, on the main road, there is what looks for all the world like an English public school complete with cricket pitch.
Brufut beach is a rough and ready strip of the Gambia's 60-mile Atlantic coast. We walked past gaggles of youths jogging on the spot and doing press-ups, then stopped for some refreshment at a beach bar built of wood and bamboo and run by two smiling Rastafarians. They were happy to show us around their allotment behind the bar, pointing out the one-room concrete hut that was their home and the well that they had sunk to provide water for their plants. We could have been in Jamaica, but for the crashing, grey-white waves of the Atlantic.
A few days later, we hooked up with Alaji again and set off in the ancient Land Rover for the Abuko nature reserve. Alaji is Hibiscus House's resident driver, guide and birdwatcher. Even if you twitch at the very mention of the anorakish word "twitcher", you'll be mesmerised by the Gambia's bird life. We spent a relaxing few hours at Abuko, having driven along the coastal highway past villages with brightly painted shop signs: the Obama bakery, the Kutz Barbing Saloon, the Timeless Restaurant and, my favourite, the African Botcher Shop.
Like many of the Gambia's much-touted attractions, the Abuko nature reserve is, to put it kindly, low-key. It is two square km of protected forest just off the highway, criss-crossed by dusty walking paths. But thanks to the eagle-eyed Alaji and his young apprentice, who had tagged along for the day, we spotted three types of kingfisher – giant, blue-breasted and African pygmy – as well as several blue-bellied rollers – the national bird of the Gambia.
Alaji was a font of ornithological information. Did you know that there are eight types of bee-eater and 14 types of plover in the Gambia? Me neither. The highlight of the day was a brief glimpse of a violet turaco, which flew above our heads, a flash of petrel blue and bright crimson. When I asked Alaji to name the king of all Gambian birds, he thought for a moment and then replied, "Bill Oddie".
In the afternoon, at Alaji's insistence, we paid a brief visit to Lamin Lodge, another tourist attraction, where a row of pirogues sat forlornly on the Gambia river. This is where most riverboat trips begin, but today business was slow and the river did not look that inviting. Instead, we drank cold beers on a raised platform as a horde of surly monkeys watched our every move, then snatched the empty bottles off the table.
At Hibiscus House that evening, we dined on butterfish in lime and capers with curried vegetables, while two large fruit bats swooped above us and then hung upside down from a towering banana plant.
Night falls quickly in the Gambia, with the dusk greeted by a torrent of birdsong. As the darkness descends, the village comes to life in a different way: voices are carried on the breeze, the trees and tall plants in the hotel garden rustle in the gentle wind, and the barking of a dog is answered by the braying of a donkey.
Towards the end of our stay, we decided to venture into town by taxi to dine at a Lebanese restaurant on the Senagambia tourist strip. This, it turned out, was a mistake. There is only one thing more depressing than mediocre food in a ritzy setting and that is overpriced mediocre food in a ritzy setting.
Although the Gambia is one of the world's poorest countries, and most of its population live at subsistence level, it is by African standards a relatively expensive destination. To add insult to injury, my wife spent the penultimate day of our holiday curled up in bed with a stomach upset, while I lazed even more guiltily by the pool with only Elmore Leonard for company.
In many ways, the Gambia reminds me more of Jamaica than of any African country I have visited. It has the same laid-back attitude, the same in-your-face extremes of wealth and poverty, and a breathtaking natural beauty alongside a makeshift, down at heel-ness that is hard to ignore.
So stark is the contrast between the haves and the have-nots that at times you may find yourself wondering – as I did more than once – what exactly you are doing there. It's an easy-going country, but I found it a strangely difficult place to really relax in.
