angolian visa now impossible on route?
 

ok so
after repeated denials in ghana, togo, nigeria, gabon, dolisie and point noir i am wonder is the visa now impossible on route?

dolisie has just changed their policy thanks to the african trails overlanding company, not sure what they did but i arrived just as they were applying for their visas. there was a minor issue with my invitation letter so i got that sorted and the african trails mob were issued transit visas. on returning to the embassy the told me that in the last hour i was their that everyone had flown to brazzaville, and that they wont be back for 3 days.
so i travel to point noir to try, no suprise there they wont give me a visa.

back to dolisie where all of a sudden there is a new letter in the window explaining that nobody out side africa will recieve transit visas. i talk with them for ages explaining i was there for a week before the letter and that we did everything they wanted. they told me the reason they changed the policy was because of the overlanding company and my last chance was to get the immigration in luanda to ring the consulate and tell them to issue me a visa.
luandas stance? get it in your home country.
well for that to work you god damn morons you need to have an embassy in every country. i am australian and the nearest embassy is japan.
so my last chance is the drc. i am running really short on time now and am not willing to attempt the kinshasa lumbashi road alone. my other options are sell the bike in point noir for a tidy profit or fly the bike to proabably jo burg which kind of defeats the purpose qs my trip is ending in south africa

any one have any words of wisdom???

help me? ?c?

I'm in the same situation as you, I've been researching this for the last weeks and it doesn't look good. Only 2 guys I know of got a transit visa in januari (I heard because they had very good contacts high up)

African Supertramp: Angolan Sprint
Others tried for weeks and then shipped
Pointe Noire – Deel 4 | Nederland – Zuid Afrika trip (in Dutch)

Me too am not too keen on taking on the Kinshasa - Lubumbashi road so for the moment my options are (I'm still in Burkina): to ship from Accra to Namibia (as my friends are going to do very soon) or ship futher down (as I allready got Nigeria and DRC visa)
I wouldn't try for the visa for more than a week, if I don't get positive news from other overlanders soon I'm not gonna bother even applying I think, it's just to much they ask and the chances are slim.

Oh, these guys flew from Kin to Lumbumbashi
DRC and the curse of the Angolan visa | Pikipiki Safari

and there is a new Belgian-Congolese airline company starting flights very soon, so that may be on option too.
Let us know what you decided on, safe travels
www.tony-roundafrica.blogspot.com

we had a big struggle to get our Angolan visas, eventually got it in Kinshasa.

We were at our wits end, and were about to send our passports to Cape Town to an agent who can get the visas done for you. Takes 2 weeks. She organises intro letter, etc etc

If possible I'd recommend finding a nice place to relax for a few weeks, then courier your passports to Lezle Combrinck and let her sort it out for you.

info@angolangetaways.com

Lezle Combrinck:
Angola Travel Services
The Travel Lounge
145 Sir Lowry Road
Cape Town
8001
Tel: (021) 4626401
Fax: (021) 4625834

Angola is worth the effort, I know it doesn't appear like it now, but when you're there you'll love it.

Good luck.

I used a visa service and they also promised me the visa within two weeks like it sais on the angola embassy webpage but did not mange. The onely thing they managed was to send me the bill when i wanted my passport back after 4 weeks.

Matadi
 

I got a 5 day transit visa in Matadi near the Angola border in DRC. This was 2010 mind you so things may have changed. At the time that was the best place to get one; it took a few days but no big problem - was around 70 dollars I think.

thanks for the replies. in kinshasa now trying to see what it may cost to fly the bike to lumbumbashi. will post up what i find.