I am planning to depart for the West Africa Route at the end of Feb 2010.

I will be in Nigeria and Cameroon around June/July and I expect to rain.

What are the weather conditions really like this time of year ?

Thanks.

No personal experience, however, I am sure you have seen this post already:

http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...her-info-41259

I am planning west route too, and am wondering the latest time I can leave and still manage to not encounter *too* much mud. Will be in a 4x4 though, not a bike and will be doing it in 3 months max.

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http://toyotalandcruiser90.weebly.com/

July is about the peak of the rain season in Nigeria and Cameroon.

Do you have any direct experience of heavy tropical rain?

During heavy rains, it goes dark, visibility is reduced to a few metres and the roads get flooded. You should be ok on most Nigerian roads though but for very extreme rains, its better to pull over and wait it out (although sometimes a few metres ahead may be clear and you wait for an hour not knowing that!!)

Whether it rains or not, its still stays hot and very humid. Temp of above 30 deg average in the southern parts and above 36 deg in the northern areas ( I have registered 42 deg in Kano, when we found a shade).

Humidity in the Southern areas is always at a 100 or close enough not to matter. Above the middle of there is a drop in humidity.

The high areas of Cameroon are cooler of course.

Crossing into Cameroon, the roads at the border is classified not-passable from May to about November each year, I did Ekok Mamfe, 60km in 6 hours on a bike and that was in the dry season (March).

Let me know if you need more info.

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inyang

Port Harcourt, Nigeria

Ekok Mamfe road (Cameroon) in july will be ALOT of fun but slow going...its a pretty poor road. In the rains its a muddy mess, with huge holes big enough to swallow the truck. They say this area of Cameroon aroud here and Korup nat park has the 3rd highest rainfall in the world? Not sure thats correct but somebody read that to me.

An alternative is to enter the north of cameroon near Maroua or Mora (sorry forget the name). The raad south to Ngoundere is potholed tar though they are working on it in places (Lagdo Bleu def worth a stop for a night).

The road then to Foumban from Ngoundere is mostly dirt, with some new tar to help you get up and down the hills.....but if it rains, that road will be pretty bad in places. Some big holes too, but the road is geneally wider so you can avoid them. On Ekok Mamfe the road is right through the jungle at times so not easy to avoid the holes with a bigger vehicle.

I saw a UK biker who said he crossed into Cameroon from Nigeria about half way up the countrys borders, but that you could only do it in a bike, a bigger vehicle would find it impossible. Not sure if thats true, just word of mouth

Cameroons roads are definitely more testing to drive on in terms of conditions (esp in the rain), but Nigeria is worse for crazy drivers...watch out for those bikes, esp around Abeoukouta, Kano, Lagos, Akure, Enugu etc!

Have fun.