For the non-extreme travelers out there, there is one thing that I need to make clear before I go much further. West Africa is hard. Like really, really hard. This is probably the one region of the world that many travelers leave until the very end because dealing with the logistical issues of traveling here is simply too much of a headache. Although I have met a handful of people who started their travels in West Africa, they are few and far between and frankly, I have no idea how they could even do it, especially if they aren’t a francophone.
Now that that is out of the way, I can take you lovely readers through my journey through eight West African countries. I did the trip relatively quickly because a) I was very limited time-wise as I started a new full-time job on June 1st.
Mali
The journey began in Mali (you can read all about my guided tour here!) where I was lucky enough to see the beautiful mud mosque of Djenne, hike through the gorgeous landscape of Segou, and take a boat ride along the famous Niger River. While Mali has more than its fair share of problems, this was by far the easiest part of the journey thanks to my wonderful driver and guide as well as a good friend who let me stay at her place in Bamako.
Mauritania
From Mali, I flew to Mauritania where I met up with my friend Nena and our guide who spent the next few days showing us the highlights of this vast desert country and managed to get us on and off the fable Iron Ore train in one piece. To be completely honest, my memories of Mauritania are a bit fuzzy, not because of the amount of time that it has taken for me to actually write this blog post, but because of the vast amounts of flu medicine that I was on while I was there. (After spending many miserable weeks traveling through dry countries and feeling like my head is being squeezed by an elephant, I have finally discovered that I may be allergic to dust and that I react very badly to it.)
From what I remember, Mauritania basically consisted of a whole lot of desert and not much in between. We visited a small oasis where fish nibbled at our feet in the creek and explored the ancient city of Chinguetti. We then made the long drive to the village of Choum where we boarded the Iron Ore train in the mid-afternoon to begin the six-hour train ride to Atar. The train ride was quite an experience since you are literally riding on top of a giant pile of iron ore as the train zooms through the desert. As you can probably imagine, it was very hot at the start of the ride and freezing cold by the end of it when night fell. It was also very, very dusty which did nothing to make me feel better. Suffice to say, I was relieved when the ride was finally over (but I would love to do the full thing at some point in the future!)
We finished the tour back in Nouakchott and I spent a blissful night sleeping in a comfortable bed before heading off on the next leg of my adventure.
Senegal
From Nouakchott, I took a minibus down to the border of Senegal. I was stamped out of Mauritania and took a boat across the river where I went through Senegalese immigration. I had heard horror stories of crossing that border but didn’t experience any issues at all. From the border, I took another minibus to the old colonial city of Port Louis where I spent the evening wandering around the streets of the old town. Although the city was charming in its own crumbling way and I debated on spending another day there, I decided to push on the next day towards Dakar as I was eager to see as much of Senegal as possible.
Although I thought I had gotten an early start, I had to wait four hours for my bus to fill up before we could make our way south toward Dakar. Due to this lengthy delay, I ended up not getting into the city until late at night. I showed up at the hotel I booked and was told that there was no room for me. After a lot of huffing and puffing, they finally agreed to give me a room and I spent the night in a depressing hotel room that may or may not have been very recently vacated by another occupant.
The next morning, I got the hell out of there and made my way to Goree Island. Lying just a short ferry ride from Dakar, Goree Island was once the home of thousands of slaves before they were sent across the Atlantic Ocean. Despite the sad history, the island is a peaceful place full of historic mansions and narrow streets I spent the night at an adorable little guest house whose proprietor had a penchant for guinea pigs and told me that I had more cellulite and more wrinkles than she did despite being significantly younger than her. I also met the village lothario who insisted I should have sex with him. When I told him that I didn’t even know him, he told me that that would be the best way to get to know each other. I politely declined his generous offer.
I headed back to Dakar the next morning and despite initially planning on spending the night there, I decided to continue on toward the beach town of Saly. I had heard a lot about Senegal’s beautiful beaches and I am honestly not entirely sure what I was expecting but it definitely wasn’t a dirty beach, a ramshackle town, and sex tourists. I spent a few hours walking around, took one look at the dirty beach and decide to skip going for a swim, grabbed dinner, and headed back to my guest house for an early night. With disappointment building for Senegal, I set out the next morning for the border of Gambia, a tiny sliver of a country protruding into Senegal’s midsection, hoping for the best.
The Gambia
After another long bus ride, I made it to the border of Senegal and Gambia. I took yet another ferry across to the town of Banjul where I walked around for a bit looking at what felt like an entire city made up of storage sheds. Rather than staying in the city center of Banjul or at one of the many beach towns, I decided to stay at a little guest house right in between. The guest house was run by a Northern European woman who immediately began telling me about her “husband”. From the sounds of it, he was roughly the same age and in my mind, I envisioned a cute old man in his 60s with a graying beard. The next day, I spend many hours walking around the nearby neighborhoods and beaches and after deciding that there wasn’t really all that much to do there, I decided to take advantage of a very cheap flight to Freetown and needed a ride to the airport. Turns out, the “husband” was a Gambian guy in his 20s who was clearly milking this lady for all that she had. It was an awkward drive to the airport as he kept asking me if I also wanted a “husband” and I desperately felt like I needed to take a scalding hot shower afterward.
Sierra Leone
My flight arrived in Freetown late in the evening and I took the private ferry from the airport across the river to the outskirts of the city. This worked perfectly as I had booked the Hotel Barmoi which was just a short walk from the ferry pier. The lovely boat crew walked me to my hotel and made sure that I could check in ok before saying goodbye. I was able to have a delicious meal of Indian curry and a Sierra Leonean beer before passing out for the night.
The next morning, I got up early to go take a walk along the beach nearby. Unbeknownst to me at the time, this strip of sand is one of the most happening spots in the city in the evening, and during the morning, it is effectively the largest open-air gym that I have ever seen. Everywhere I looked, men were running, playing soccer, or exercising and I quickly began to feel very self-conscious of my fat rolls.
I headed back to the hotel, checked out, and got a taxi to the Tacugama Chimpanzee Reserve. This spectacular place is located just a short drive from Freetown and is home to dozens of chimps. Best of all, they also have little cottages that you can stay in so that you can spend the night in the park. I had booked a cottage for the night and was super excited to do a tour of the reserve. During the tour, I saw dozens of chimps ranging from teenagers to adults and watch as the chimps threw rocks at the little fenced-in area where we were standing. I knew that chimps could be aggressive but wowsers. That night, I fell asleep (and woke up to) to the sounds of chimpanzees shrieking. What a unique experience!
Although I was originally thinking of exploring more of Sierra Leone, as luck would have it, I managed to connect with an Australian guy who was trying to find someone interested in going to Guinea Bissau and Guinea Conakry. This trip had been on my radar but I had tossed it into the “too hard” bucket considering how painful managing the logistics of West Africa had been so far. I spent a few more days exploring Freetown and organizing my Guinea visa.
Ecstatic that I had found someone to do the Guineas border crossing with me, I excitedly packed up my bags and took a taxi from my hotel in Freetown to the “bus station”. My driver decided to be helpful and try to find me a spot in a shared taxi that would be leaving relatively soon. He eventually found out and negotiated a price and I climbed into the front seat to begin the long drive.
I had heard even more horror stories about corruption in Guinea Conakry and began to feel a bit suspicious when the driver started mentioning that I needed a special pass to be able to get to the border. I had the Guinea Embassy’s number saved on my phone after having to contact them repeatedly to secure a visa and messaged them to see if this was the case. They assured me that I didn’t need one and that all I needed was my visa. I told the driver this repeatedly and started to get very worried when he passed the village where I should have been let out to get a motorbike to the border.
We drove about 10 minutes further and he stopped at a gas station. I got out to use the bathroom and when I returned, there was a woman wearing a Guinea immigration uniform. She got in the car and drove with us to the border. She took my passport and proceeded to parade me past all of the Sierra Leone officials, got me stamped out, took me into her office on the Guinea side of the border, and abruptly put my passport in her desk drawer and asked for a bribe. I refused to give it and we sat in the familiar deadlock that I am sure happens every day in that shithole of a place. The driver came in frequently to yell at me and tell me that I had to pay but I still refused. I began to get a little worried about being stuck there all night and not getting into Conakry in time to apply for my Guinea-Bissau visa before the embassy shut so I finally decided to just pay the bribe so I could leave that godforsaken place.
Guinea
I escaped the clutches of the corrupt immigration woman and was soon on the back of a motorbike heading to the bus stand where I would catch the bus to Conakry. The roads were relatively decent and we made it to the outskirts of the city in just a few hours. As luck would have it, I was able to hop out close to the Guinea Bissau Embassy, walked in, and secured my visa on the spot. I knew already that I was going to love that country!
I spent the rest of the evening wandering around the streets of Conakry which was a surprisingly nice place as far as West African cities go. There wasn’t a huge amount to see but there was a scattering of decent restaurants and a funky bar that resembled an enormous wooden shack set on stilts high above the ocean. I stopped in for a quick beer and was surprised by how the entire bar seemed to move with the waves.
The next morning, I headed to the port to try and find a boat to the nearby island of Kassa. The boats that make their way across the harbor are tiny and the trip is a fast one. When I arrived on the island, I took a very terrifying motorbike ride to the closest beach, a beautiful spot strewn with enormous boulders. There, I met a local guy who spoke perfect English and insisted on chatting with me. He gave me a mini-tour of the island including the main village before dropping me off back at the boat pier to head back to Conakry.
My soon-to-be travel buddy arrived that night and we had an early dinner and attempted to get a good night’s sleep. This was challenging as we were sharing a tiny double bed since he had originally planned on Couchsurfing that night and didn’t seem to understand the logistical nightmare that that would have presented the next day when we tried to find one another to make the long and arduous trip to the Guinea-Bissau border.
After a not-so-good night’s sleep, .you newfound travel companion and I headed to the “bus station”. We managed to get a spot in a shared taxi that was supposed to take us to the spot where we would get a motorbike to take us across the border. Although the route was long and slightly dangerous, there was no other way to get there besides doing a very out-of-the-way car route. After quite a few annoyances after dealing with dodgy Guineans which included getting trapped in a cell phone shop and a short stint of me having to sit in between the driver and passenger seat (on the stick shift), we were finally on our way.
The “road” to the border was tiny, dusty, and bumpy without a considerable amount to see besides trees, trees, more trees, and the occasional village. It took us close to five hours to make it across the border and I ended up having to bribe the young border guard to let us cross while my travel companion sat there dumbly next to me unhelpful as always. It was either that or having him start going through my bags which would have meant that he would likely have stolen anything of value while I simply had to sit and watch it happen. Needless to say, I was very happy to leave that country behind me.
Guinea Bissau
Before we left Conakry, I had asked my travel companion to check as to whether or not there were hotels on the other side of the border and he promised that there were. Turns out, he didn’t actually check and after around 9 hours of traveling, we found out that there was nowhere to stay and that we would have to go all the way to Bissau that day. The road from the border town to Bissau was even worse than the trail that crossed the borders and it was a hellish ride complete with potholes so big that I thought I was going to break my neck. Luckily, I was able to get a SIM card at the border town and was able to at least make a hotel booking so that we would have somewhere to go that night.
We arrived in Bissau sore and battle-wary but were luckily able to check into our room right away and pass out. The next morning, we set off to explore Bissau which ended up being a delightful little town full of friendly locals who took pity on my lack of Portuguese skills and responded to my half-ass Spanish. Both of us were too exhausted to even consider trying to see another part of the country so we just hung out for a few days until it was time to catch our flight to the next country we would tackle together – Cabo Verde!
Cabo Verde
My travel companion and I caught a flight to Cabo Verde where we were meeting his friend. The plan was that we would all share an Airbnb and I was honestly very excited about it. It seemed ideal to share an apartment with a few other travelers and I imagined evenings spent drinking beer together and chatting about the world. Instead, I arrived and encountered a slightly insane woman who really, really hated being in the city we were in and was intent on getting out of there as fast as possible. So she left for a few days and took one of our two sets of keys with her which left my TC and I attempting to share one set of keys while having very different schedules.
While the situation was tense, we were making the best of it. However, everything came to a head when I was going out to meet him to pick up the keys. On the way, I got groped by a crazy man and although gropings are fairly frequent, the circumstances around it freaked me out a bit. I met TC and he laughed it off while I had to walk back home the same way. He arrived in the middle of the night and excitedly told me that he had met some locals and they told him that where we were staying was the most dangerous part of the city. I told him that I was fully aware and went back to bed.
The next morning, I asked him if he still wanted to go to the northern part of the island and he told me that the situation was too stressful and that he just wanted to travel on his own. That was my cue to get the hell out of there and I booked a one-way fly to the cheapest place I could go which just happened to be the Azores, Portugal. I ended up seeing very little of Cabo Verde in the end and while I am sure that it is a lovely country, the whole experience left a very bad taste in my mouth and it is one palace that I definitely won’t be going back to ever again.
