Our Planned Route Through West Africa
The planning of the route and schedule through West Africa is in full swing, as is applying for the visas. Let's take a short look at how it goes and what the future holds.
As we told you in a recent post, we have finally decided to drive through West Africa!
This plan was in the cards from the beginning of our overlanding life more than five years ago but was abruptly disrupted by COVID-19 at the beginning of 2020 and has been on hold since then for various reasons.
But after zig-zagging all over Southern and Eastern Africa for so many years, the time had come to explore new scenery and finally drive back to our home country, Finland.
The last few weeks have included several embassy visits, during which we applied for visas for the DRC and the Republic of Congo. A Nigerian visa was supposed to be possible here in Windhoek, too, but when we went to their embassy on February 10th, we were suddenly told that they had ceased to issue visas for foreigners! Even though they had given them to Dutch nationals without any problems just in January!
They also gave us no reasons why they had ceased it, even though we tried to ask several times. That’s Africa for you…
This information was not included in any official statement, so we should have received the visas. However, we tried for several days to no avail. Devastated by our bad luck and the highly unhelpful staff, we now hope to secure the Nigerian visa on our way.
Hopefully, that will be possible in Congo Brazzaville! Otherwise, we’ll be in deep trouble, as we have to drive through Nigeria. There are no way around that because of serious security issues in the surrounding countries.
The rest of the visas will also be obtained from embassies on the way or online.
We’ll later gather all the visa information in a single file and give it to you for download here and on our website. It’s been pretty hard to find all the visa information online when traveling from south to north. Most people seem to drive the West Coast of Africa the other way, and you can find lots of information about the route and visas from north to south.
Also, we have another bigger project brewing, considering the West Coast. But more about that later on… :)
Applying for all the necessary visas has been time-consuming, and even sorting out the information about how to take Honey Badger the Defender, a Namibian-registered car without a Carnet de Passage, to our home country was a bit more challenging than expected.
After some serious digging and email inquiries to Finnish Customs and Tax Authorities, we got a reply that we can take the car to Finland for six months without paying expensive Finnish road/car taxes. After a maximum of six months, we need to get the car out of the EU, but that won’t be a problem.
Technically, we can drive to Norway, a non-EU country, or maybe visit Russia (if the borders would open, so far, they are still closed). Just beyond the border from Kuusamo, there are many beautiful places, like the Paanajärvi National Park, which was part of Finland before the wars in the 1940s.
What other preparations than applying for visas?
You guessed – car repairs! 😂
The transfer case was removed for the third time –and hopefully, for the last time!– and appropriately reconditioned. It has never been better than it is now.
We still have a weird symmetrical sound when using the first and second gears in the high range, as we have for the last year. It’s turned out to be a tricky one, though, as even highly skilled professionals haven’t figured it out. The sound has luckily diminished quite a lot when the transfer oils were changed to other, better quality.
We have also resolved a small yet irritating leak in the right front corner of our Icarus pop-top roof. We only noticed it during heavy rain, specifically in the Caprivi region of Namibia, when our mattress became wet inside that corner. However, that issue should be resolved now.
Thanks to our insurance, we also received a brand new driver’s door to replace the one we dented in Bwabwata National Park. Defender doors are not cheap, so we’re glad we had the insurance.
Honey Badger the Defender have also got a thorough maintenance and should be ready to go as we speak.
Oh, and we also treated and repainted our bullbar and rock sliders matte black, so there will be no more ugly, rusty patches!
So, it’s been busy times here in Windhoek. :)
The Planned “Skeleton” Route Through West Africa, So Far
So, this route is in the plans for now. We have quite a tight schedule, as we’d like to be in Finland by the end of June or early July. If it’s even possible to be there earlier, the better. But let’s see.
We still want to visit National Parks and see lowland gorillas, forest elephants, red-river hogs, mandrils, and other unique wildlife.
Then, we’ll shift our schedule to areas with little to see and drive through them more quickly.
So here is the skeleton route plan:
Angola will be our first stop when we leave Namibia in late February. We have scheduled approximately two weeks to explore Angola and will apply for the Ghana visa in Luanda.
Next, we’ll spend a maximum of a week driving through the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) towards Cabinda. This remote western corner of the country offers little to see, but we’ll cross the Congo River and see where it falls into the Atlantic Ocean.
Our Congo Brazzaville visa is valid from the 14th of March forward, and then we aim to cross the border. The Republic of Congo has many interesting places we’d like to visit, and it’s a country where we have allocated a bit more time.
I.e., visiting the Odzala-Kokoua National Park in the north would be great, but let’s see how the diesel availability will be in Congo in March, which will also dictate a lot. Recently, we heard about diesel shortages in the country.
Next is Gabon, a fascinating country where you can also see forest elephants, lowland gorillas, and mandrils in its beautiful National Parks.
After Gabon, the following countries, Cameroon and Nigeria, will be places we’ve been planning to drive through pretty quickly. However, there is a pangolin rescue project in Cameroon near Yaondé, which we’d love to visit if we can make it possible!
Benin and Togo should also be quite interesting places. However, they are small countries, and we should be able to explore them pretty easily and time-efficiently.
Ghana will pose a challenge for us because we don’t have a Carnet de Passage (CDP) for our Defender. They are reluctant nowadays to give a Passavant (Temporary Import Permit), even though it’s a perfectly legal document. We will probably need to inquire a lot about a smaller border where we can get it (as going around Ghana is not an option again because of security situations).
The Ivory Coast is quite an unknown country to us, but let’s see what this place is going to be like.
If all –hopefully!– goes approximately according to plan, we should be in Guinea around mid-May.
Senegal will also be a bit tricky for us to get in with our vehicle, for the same reason as Ghana; for not having the Carnet de Passage. The Passavant should be free according to law, but they still try to charge approx. 250€ for it on many borders! Especially if your vehicle is 8 years old or older. Honey Badger the Defender is a 2009 model. ;)
This is a scam everybody knows about, but they also have the power to refuse entry, so many people just pay it to avoid camping at the border for a week… Wish us luck here, too!
Mauritania and West Sahara will be places we’ll probably drive through quite quickly. Riding the famous Iron Ore train of Mauritania is maybe not as possible as it used to be, but let’s see how it goes here, too.
We'd love to see many fantastic places in Morocco, like the Atlas Mountains, but let’s see how much time we have left to reach Finland. Ideally, we’d be in Morocco around mid-to late June.
Then, we’ll cross the Gibraltar Canal to Spain and Europe. When we reach Europe, we'll drive as fast as possible to Finland. This is mainly because we won’t have much time left to reach Finland during the best of Borealis summertime, and our friends and families are already waiting for us.
Also, we have again agreed to work with the brown bear's next summer, 2025, so they are waiting for us, too! ;)
Updates from the road will be coming up
We’ll try to keep you updated as best as we can from the road. We still rely on getting local SIM cards and data packages and using the occasional working Wi-Fi, so bear with us! ;)
Maybe we’ll get a Starlink by the end of this year for future travels, as that would make things so much easier…
This will be an Adventure, for sure! But somehow, we’re already itching to hit the road!
Stay Wild and Stay Onboard!
PS. Do you like to read books about wildlife? If you do, here is a superb book about elephants, their unbelievable communication skills, documented and studied by a Stanford University field researcher in the Caprivi (nowadays called the Zambezi) region of Namibia:
The Elephant's Secret Sense: The Hidden Life of the Wild Herds of Africa
One of the best and most interesting books we’ve read about elephants! Highly recommended!