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sub-Saharan Africa Topics specific to sub-Saharan Africa. (Includes all countries South of 17 degrees latitude)
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Photo by Carl Parker,
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  #1  
Old 14 Jun 2013
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DRC Visa in Lome was really easy.

RoC Visa in Lome was even easier, except that the embassy is in the middle of nowhere. I'll try to dig up the coordinates when I have my hard drive plugged in.

Crossed into Nigeria at Lagos which wasn't as bad as you might expect. Only one immigration guy gave me a hard time for money and he settled pretty cheap after the other guys in the office made it clear that he was being unreasonable.

Driving through Nigeria was surprisingly easy and I had almost zero problems with roadblocks.

Cameroon was surprisingly easy to drive through also.

Get your Gabon visa at the border, it's super easy.

Gabon is absolutely beautiful to drive through. Great roads and amazing scenery all around.

RoC is absolutely miserable to drive through because the chinese road isn't finished yet and the path next to it is destroyed. Bring a 24 pack of coke with you and bribe the guys who guard the paved sections and use as much of it as you can. Seriously, the road next to it is horrific.

Under no circumstances should anyone ever try the border crossing from Mindouli to Luozi. I still don't know how I ever got through it without breaking every part of my suspension and resolve. Cross at Brazzaville/Kinshasha. Trust me.

Also never try the "road" that goes directly south from Kinshasa to Angola. It's not a road. I got to within about 15km of the border before I turned back. Trust me, go to Matadi, it's a great drive and reasonable border crossing. Except the customs guy is a complete dick, so be ready for that.

Driving through Angola is surprisingly easy. For some reason I was given a police escort at first, but I ditched them because they were slowing me down and I figured they'd want a lot of money at the end to boot. It was strange. Anyway, most of the roads are great and there are very few checkpoints.

Crossing into Namibia was one of the most amazing feelings I think I've ever had.
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  #2  
Old 16 Jun 2013
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Great to hear ajc.
Do you know if the RoC visa is available at the border ?
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  #3  
Old 16 Jun 2013
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Quote:
Originally Posted by levelo View Post
Great to hear ajc.
Do you know if the RoC visa is available at the border ?
I couldn't say. But if you can get to the consulate in Lome it literally takes 4 hours from when you drop it off and there is zero hassle.
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  #4  
Old 12 Jul 2013
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ajctraveler View Post
DRC Visa in Lome was really easy.

RoC Visa in Lome was even easier, except that the embassy is in the middle of nowhere. I'll try to dig up the coordinates when I have my hard drive plugged in.

Crossed into Nigeria at Lagos which wasn't as bad as you might expect. Only one immigration guy gave me a hard time for money and he settled pretty cheap after the other guys in the office made it clear that he was being unreasonable.

Driving through Nigeria was surprisingly easy and I had almost zero problems with roadblocks.

Cameroon was surprisingly easy to drive through also.

Get your Gabon visa at the border, it's super easy.

Gabon is absolutely beautiful to drive through. Great roads and amazing scenery all around.

RoC is absolutely miserable to drive through because the chinese road isn't finished yet and the path next to it is destroyed. Bring a 24 pack of coke with you and bribe the guys who guard the paved sections and use as much of it as you can. Seriously, the road next to it is horrific.

Under no circumstances should anyone ever try the border crossing from Mindouli to Luozi. I still don't know how I ever got through it without breaking every part of my suspension and resolve. Cross at Brazzaville/Kinshasha. Trust me.

Also never try the "road" that goes directly south from Kinshasa to Angola. It's not a road. I got to within about 15km of the border before I turned back. Trust me, go to Matadi, it's a great drive and reasonable border crossing. Except the customs guy is a complete dick, so be ready for that.

Driving through Angola is surprisingly easy. For some reason I was given a police escort at first, but I ditched them because they were slowing me down and I figured they'd want a lot of money at the end to boot. It was strange. Anyway, most of the roads are great and there are very few checkpoints.

Crossing into Namibia was one of the most amazing feelings I think I've ever had.

Hi,

Could you please inform the address of ROC in Lome?

Highly appreciated!

Tian
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  #5  
Old 15 Jul 2013
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Quote:
Originally Posted by banegaard View Post
Hi,

Could you please inform the address of ROC in Lome?

Highly appreciated!

Tian
Here you go:

N 06.10.092
E 01.12.444
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  #6  
Old 11 Aug 2013
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we crossed Mindouli to Luozi. ina Bedford 4x4.....if we can do it anyone can...just as long as its DRY.......if it rains....WAIT
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  #7  
Old 11 Oct 2013
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best places for visa?

After changing my plans, I am now travelling down the road mentioned above. But I didn't get any visa in advance...

Based on this topic I will get the next few visa in these places:
- Cameroon in Abidjan
- Angola in Accra
- DRC in Lomé
- RoC in Lomé (or maybe at the border)
- Nigeria in Bénin

Any latest info on these?

In Ouagadougou I would like to get the 'visa touristique de l'entente'.
Anybody with (the latest) info on this?

Grtz from Nouakchott !
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  #8  
Old 17 Oct 2013
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ajctraveler View Post

Under no circumstances should anyone ever try the border crossing from Mindouli to Luozi.
We went that way in March. Enjoyed it a lot, but very thankful it was dry!
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  #9  
Old 18 Dec 2013
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We got our Guinea Conakry visa very easily at the consulate in Bissau. It's located just one street of Praca Che Guevara. Had to fill out one form, bring one passport photo and they needed to copy our yellow fever certificates. Collection of the visas was at 14:00 on the same day.
Costs were 30.000CFA for one, 60.000CFA for two and 90.000CFA for three months all multiple entry.
They also predated the visas for us which was nice.

Cheers from Bissau
Fabian
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  #10  
Old 23 Dec 2013
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UPDATE: I met 9-001-SEB in Windhoek, Namibia last week. Apparently getting your GABON visa at the border is NOT something they're keen to do anymore. He had to wait something like 5 hours before they would give him one, and they tried getting him to turn back. Hopefully he chimes in. So I would suggest anyone using this thread as a guide try to get their Gabon visa before the border.
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  #11  
Old 28 Jan 2014
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Just shortly our Freetown experiences:

Ghana visa:
The embassy of Ghana has recently moved from the city centre up the hill and is easiest reached by taking a poda poda up to Wilberforce Roundabout. The usually only issue visas to residents so it took us a couple of hours of explaining and waiting until our application was accepted. Having the Nigeria visa already in our passports helped as it proved our intentions to travel to South Africa. It took 6 days to process our applications as everything had to go through Accra and had to be done perfectly. Even the smallest mistakes on the application form needed to be fixed with correction fluid and rewritten.
You get one form from the embassy and need to copy it three times. The four identically filled out forms together with another form provided by the embassy and 4 passport photos should do the trick.
We paid 100US$ (no notes smaller than 50US$ accepted) for a 1 month single entry visa with entry within 1 month.

Liberia visa:
The Liberia embassy is situated close to the Ghana embassy and just opposite the British high commission. You supposedly need an invitation letter and reference but they did not care. We needed to fill out one form and bring one passport photo. The process usually takes 2 days but we said that we were in a hurry and could pick it up the next day. For 50US$ extra you can get an emergency visa the same day.
We paid 100US$ (Leone also accepted) for a 1 month single entry visa with 3 months time to enter the country. A 3 month multiple entry visa costs 150US$.

Cheers
Fabian
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  #12  
Old 7 Feb 2014
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We have also posted our experiences from W. Africa about visas, maps, routes, waypoints, repair shops and others at:

ΒΔ Αφρική - mad nomad

We'll keep posting throughout our way around the continent!
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  #13  
Old 27 Feb 2014
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Thumbs up Guinea Bissau visa in Zinguichor

Just went to the Bissau consulate in Zinguichor. Met the consul near the entrance. He filled out the form himself, and I left after 10 (!) minutes with a visa for one month (22.500 cfa). I congratulated him on what must be the quickest visa process in the whole of Africa!

Cheers,

Gee
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