Thorn Tree travel forum

1

Lonely Planet West Africa has good information on getting from Dahkla (the southernmost city in the Western Sahara) all the way to Timbuktu. Here's some basic info on transport:

From "normal" Morocco (Fes, Marrakesh, etc.) you find regularly running buses that go as far as Dahkla
From Dahkla to Nouadhibou, Mauritania, you have to hitch a ride in a private vehicle, but this is easy to do and costs about 30 Euro
From Nouadhibou, you can take a series of bush taxis via Nouakchott and south eastern Mauritania to end up in Bamako, Mali
From Bamako, you can either take a boat to Timbuktu (boats are seasonal, but if you're there in, say, October that's the perfect time) or a couple of buses and bush taxis

It's a long way. Even if you were rushing, which I wouldn't reccommend, you'll need at least 10 days to get from Marrakesh to Timbuktu this way. Take your time and you can see much more. Day to day costs can be quite cheap, especially if you eat locally, stay in cheap hotels (often on roofs or under tents in this part of the world), etc. You and your girlfriend together could definitely get by on 20 quid a day, possibly even less.

Finally, your question regarding visas:

Morocco - you don't need a visa
Mauritania - visas can be bought in Rabat; alternatively, 3 day visas are issued at the border for 10 Euros and these can be extended to 1 month in Nouakchott for about 15 Euro
Mali - you need a visa in advance, but you can easily buy one in Nouakchott although I'm unsure of the cost

Giora

2

Thanks for this information it is really helpful. We ended up travelling from Istanbul->Cairo (via Iran) instead of going to Egypt and Morocco this summer but we could be going to Morocco->Timbuktu next year depending on money. It'll either be East/South Africa for two months or the Morocco trip instead.

When you said £20 quid a day, did you mean per person, or together, for both of us. We found that in the Middle East £20 quid was easily enough for both of us in the vast majority of places (obviously ignoring Israel here).

Thanks again, Andrew & Lizzie

3

Interestıng, Im ın Turkey at the moment (the bastards wont let me ınto Iran). Its been awhıle but I thınk I probably meant the two of you could get by on 20 quıd ın total, although the value of the GBP has been down sınce I wrote that. Morocco and West Afrıca ıs much cheaper than Turkey anyway....

4

Thanks. Hopefully we'll head to East/South Africa, but if the cost is prohibitive West Africa will be our destination. Do you have any advice for a two month trip? There's a lot to see, so I'm not really sure what to visit. I've heard Ghana is a cool place and Agadez sounds like an adventure, but trying to find a route through all of these countries is a headache, especially since we're only going for two months.

If you want to visit Iran, try iranianvisa.com. We got our visa code through them and they only charge around 30 euros for the fee.

5

Ive never been to Ghana and Agadez ıs DEFINITELY out of bounds at the moment. Morocco ıs fantastıc, I spent 2 months there alone. Senegal-Malı ıs probably a nıce trıp for 2 months, wıth some tıme ın Guınea ıf thıngs there are stable. If you start ın Morocco you could try to make ıt down to Dakar or Bamako. Ive been to East/South Afrıca before, and you can travel around there just as cheaply as ın West Afrıca. Its just that tourıst ınfrastructure there ıs a bıt more developed and there are lots of expensıve thıngs (safarıs, Kılımanjaro, gorıllas, zanzıbar) whıch lots of tourısts do. But theres PLENTY of fun cheap stuff to do as well.

6

Yeah the activities are definately expensive! I don't think gorilla tracking/kilimanjaro would be on the agenda, but a safari in Serengeti is what we're really looking forward to! Definately going to spend a while in Zanzibar as well. Wildlife/activities aside, is there plenty to do (nice towns/stuff easily accessible by public transport etc)?