Which way through Africa?
 

Good evening everyone.

Next year I will be realising my long term ambition of traveling through Africa. I now know I will have the budget, and the plan is to leave work and with up to a year avaliable travel down to Cape Town.

My leave date is set for just after easter 2014. The homework is now being undertaken in earnest, and is unsuprisingly throwing up many questions as I plan and prepare.

So, one of the first decisions is which way? Whilst I am not trying to be too specific I am unsure of east coast or west coast. I have been reading various bloggs and reports. But am still a little unsure why people choose the route they do.

Any advice would be welcome.

East
 

I went east as I wanted to see Ethiopia & also the animals on the East Coast.
However I do plan to do the west at a later date.

Cheers
Paul

down West - up East
 

Hi,

I'm going down along the West coast and up East, starting next January. The idea is to first travel the less obvious and perhaps more uncomfortable countries in West Africa, such as the Guineas, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast, DRC and Angola, and experience the relatively easier Eastern countries in the second half of my journey. However, as I'm planning to include South Sudan and Somaliland to my itinerary, and with the turmoil in Egypt, I can't foresee which route will turn out to be more challenging.

Safe travels,

Gee

If you make it to Kinshasa before July, then u have a place to stay. Just send me an email when you know.
Cheers


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Hi Claudio,

If all goes as planned (which, of course, it seldom does) I'll be in Kinshasa beginning of June. I'll send you an email!

Travel safe,

Gee

West or East coast route?
 

Zedsdead,

I was heartened by your message. I'm struggling with the same question, both routes have their attractions. Mulling it over I think I'm going to go down the western route - but I won't make a final decision until after the HUBB meeting here in Australia which happens in a months time. Hopefully I'll be able to get some good solid advice there.

Good luck with your planning - and maybe see you on the road. I plan to leave the UK in the early part of next year so maybe slightly ahead of you.

Thats a good question - where to start. We did the west route, because it looks like the bigger "adventure" in a much less touristic environment.

Often there are no Restaurants, no Hotels, no Lodges or Campsites arround. You can drive routes where the locals dont have seen tourists over years. You can find spots who are more naturalness.

The eastroute is more common, more tourism, more explored and provide on the other hand more infrastructure.

I guess my english skills arent good enough to talk/write deeper about :(

Currently some travellers avoid the west route because of security issues. But there are some travellers - like described much less than on the east route.

Surfy

Thank you everyone.
I am still looking and reading blogs, still none the wiser!

I was originally looking at the western route, but have recently been swayed the other way. My reasoning being, less borders so maybe less hassle to cross, easier route due to tourism and better infrastructure, and Kilimanjaro with all its trappings.

Navalarchitect, I would be interested to here what information get from the meet. Ahh decisions, always the start of something. My aim is to have the route and all its home work done be december.

Hi,

We've been travelling the East coast with our car.
Not sure if you gonna travel by car?
But if you go with the car, you come in places were also aren't a lot of tourists. We've been in Sudan and Ethiopia in places where there isn't tourism at all. As you go to Kenya you get to see more tourists.
It all depends witch places you go, I think that you can find in every country a place where there aren't many tourists.

As they say, if you go the west coast, you don't see a lot of tourist (might be none), no restaurants, no hotels,...

In the east you can have both, depending on what you want :)

Feel free to have a look at our website
Home
(left corner you can change the language)

or http://www.facebook.com/waarisworteltje

Watching this post with interest.

We plan to travel around Europe from mid next year and then head South to Cape Town when it starts getting cooler.

(Two up on one motor bike)

Kiwi Mike

Well I think my route will be the eastern side. I have to prepare for a given route and my gut feeling is I want to go this way.

So far I believe I will get across to Tunisia, go through Libya, Egypt and down to the Sudan. After that I am not yet sure, I have given myself until christmas to get my route established.

I plan to be traveling for a year so no rush once I am there. I will be on a motorcycle, I am very much looking forward to it.

I'm enjoying reading the blogs, inspiration is a wonderful thing.

Have you considered heading down the west coast from Morocco to Cameroon then crossing over to the east coast via CAR and/or South Sudan to continue down? Not sure if such a route is possible but would be keen to hear from anyone who has done it.

We're also planning this route next year on bikes. our only query is how to go about Libya, is it still possible to get a business visa and therefore no guide required or if not then how does one go about organising the guide?

zedsdead,would appreciate any info on this please?

assuming that is that Libya is still possible. if not then i guess it'll be the ferry over to Egypt. :helpsmilie:

PaulNomad.
I hadn't considered this, however it still involves the gaggle of west coast countries and their visa/border hassles. Maybe I am just trying to simplify it too much, but less borders seems less hassle.

Dippy.
Libya I am currently doing homework on. I have started a thread in the sahara travel forum and will put all my finds and info up there. I have no idea what the situation is at the moment and I know it's like looking into a crystal ball but whatever, any information will be of help.

A couple of friends of mine are in Libya right now or are about to cross from Tunisia. They have a website I think...and are definitely on this site. Look up Alps2Africa.

I went through Libya last year and it was a fantastic experience. At the time there were visa issues in that they weren't issuing tourist visas if you were entering via a land border, BUT they were allowing business visas. So, we got business visas and crossed from Tunisia. The Tunisian border was closed, but they allowed us to cross since we had Libyan visas with that border point listed (which kind of blew their minds).

Hopefully you'll get to go!