01 A lake made on purpose
The disconcerting part is not the moat but its urban position. On the far side of the water there is a retaining wall, a metal railing and an avenue with cars going past. The distance between a basking crocodile and the city's ordinary traffic is a few metres.
Over the years the site has become the compulsory stop for anyone passing through Yamoussoukro, ahead even of the monumental architecture around it. There is no admission, no signposted route and no timetable: you arrive, park and look from the pavement.
02 What animal this actually is
The site's popular name speaks of caimans, but the animals you see are Nile crocodiles, Africa's own large species. Adults comfortably exceed three metres, and the largest individuals in the lake are described as considerably longer.
On how many there are, the circulating figures do not agree: from a couple of hundred to over three hundred, with no public count to back it. What you can verify by eye is that at feeding time several dozen come out of the water at once and occupy the rock platforms along the bank.
03 August 2012
The keeper had been feeding them for three decades. In August 2012, during the feeding, one of the animals killed him.
That episode is the reason this section exists. The man who looked after the lake, around seventy years old, had spent thirty years feeding the animals and moved along the bank with a familiarity that had become routine. In August 2012 he was attacked and died during the daily feeding, in front of those watching.
There is no need to dramatise it: the fact is there to calibrate the place. If thirty years of daily contact were not enough to make it safe, the conclusion for a visitor spending half an hour is obvious. You watch from the railing and from the top of the bank, not from the water's edge.
04 How it is visited today
The visit is free and unorganised. The lake still rings the presidential compound and is seen from the public street, with a wall and a railing as the only separation along most of the perimeter. There are stretches where that barrier is damaged, and informal guides offer their services locally at a price best agreed in advance.
Timing is the only thing to plan: around five in the afternoon. Earlier, in the heat, the animals are submerged and all you see are eyes and snouts above the water. That is an enormous difference between driving past and actually seeing something.
