Waypoint Journeys Presents
Seven Countries, One Road
14 Days
Abidjan to Banjul, Overland Through Seven Countries
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Day 1 is on the Ebrié Lagoon in Abidjan; Day 14 is at Banjul, where the Gambia meets the Atlantic. Between them lie seven countries, and the official language flips five times on the way: French in Côte d'Ivoire, English through Liberia and Sierra Leone, French in Guinea, Portuguese in Guinea-Bissau, French again in the Casamance and English in The Gambia. All seven are small, each keeps its own border post and its own paperwork, and we cross them one after another in supported 4WD vehicles, without a single flight.
Follow the water and the route makes sense. Two days in Côte d'Ivoire take in Yamoussoukro's basilica and the Zaouli in a Guro village. Then we drive west by Man into Liberia and down to Monrovia, over the Mano River bridge into Sierra Leone and on to Freetown, its houses stacked up the hills of the peninsula. From there the road turns inland and climbs to Guinea's Fouta Djalon, the plateau where the Gambia and the Senegal have their sources: Fula market towns, cattle on the uplands, nights cool enough for a sweater. Off the far side come Gabu, Bissau on the Geba estuary with its Portuguese street signs, the creeks around Ziguinchor on the Casamance River, and last of all the river that began up on the plateau, meeting the sea at Banjul.
Some days are long and slow. One border post stamps you through in an hour, the next keeps you there all afternoon, and paved road can turn to red dirt mid-morning and back again by lunch. Expect plain rooms in Kindia, Labé and Gabu. We drive only in daylight, leave spare hours in every stage and have local fixers waiting at each frontier, so a hold-up usually costs an afternoon in the shade rather than a day. What you get back is the handover from one country to the next: Liberian English turning into Krio in Freetown, Guinea's French giving way to Portuguese signs in Bissau, the Fula towns of the plateau followed by the Jola rice villages of the Casamance.
"By Labé you've switched official language twice and currency three times, and you're up on the plateau where the river you'll finish beside in Banjul begins."
Côte d'Ivoire first, The Gambia last, and Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau and Senegal between them. We drive all six frontiers, starting with the inland crossing from Man into Liberia. Our fixers reach each post before we do with the paperwork already moving, so your job is mostly to hand over a passport and find some shade.
Senegal's southern strip sits below The Gambia, which puts a whole country between it and Dakar, and it feels like its own place: rice paddies, palm groves, mangrove creeks. It comes near the end: a night by the beach at Cap Skirring, then a drive past Jola sacred groves to the riverside quays of Ziguinchor on the way to the last border.
The Gambia and the Senegal both start on this Guinean plateau. We cross it in two days: the climb from Kindia with a stop at a waterfall, a night in Labé, then the slow descent toward Guinea-Bissau. Look for Fula market towns, cattle on the grass and nights when a jumper is welcome.
Monrovia goes back to 1822 and the free Black Americans who settled it; Freetown to the 1790s, when people freed from slavery arrived with British backing. Liberia's flag is a one-star version of the Stars and Stripes, and Krio is what you hear on Freetown's streets. Each city gets a full day, with the road between them on Day 6, so you see the two side by side.
Félix Houphouët-Boigny's basilica, modelled on St Peter's in Rome, was consecrated in 1990 in his home town. We get there on Day 2 in the low sun, with the dome standing well clear of the palms around it. Stroll the colonnades and the gardens, then make your own judgement about the president who had it built.
The Zaouli belongs to the Guro people of central Côte d'Ivoire: one dancer wearing a carved mask and full costume, musicians alongside, and fast, precise steps. We watch it on the morning of Day 3 in a village in Guro country, put on by the families and musicians who keep it going, then head west toward Liberia.
Fourteen days that begin on Abidjan's lagoon and end at the Gambia's estuary in Banjul: thirteen nights and six borders, every one of them crossed by road.
Abidjan to Banjul
Fourteen days and seven countries overland up the Atlantic line: Abidjan and Yamoussoukro, west by Man into Liberia, then Freetown, the Fouta Djalon, Guinea-Bissau and the Casamance to Banjul.
At Félix Houphouët-Boigny airport you're met by the expedition leader and the drivers, and you have the afternoon to recover from the flight. In the early evening the group meets above the Ebrié Lagoon with the route map on the table, and we talk through the thirteen days ahead and the six frontiers in them.
An easy run north on good tar from Abidjan to Yamoussoukro, arriving with enough daylight left to see the Basilica of Our Lady of Peace while the sun is low, its dome rising alone over the palms. The evening is unscheduled on purpose: the next two days carry us west to Liberia by road.
The morning belongs to a village in Guro country west of Yamoussoukro and its Zaouli, a Guro mask dance: one masked dancer and musicians from the village. Then on west through Daloa to Man, a town ringed by forested hills close to the Liberian border, for the night.
Out of Man early, over the hills to Danané and the first border, into Liberia, then from Ganta south on the paved road through Gbarnga to Monrovia, arriving as the light goes. With the border it is ten to twelve hours, and we say so plainly. A different crew is waiting on the Liberian side.
Liberia's capital dates from 1822, when free Black Americans settled here, and it still shows in the flag, the street names and the English you hear. The day covers Providence Island, the waterfront neighbourhoods and Broad Street, with Liberians who were there for the city's recent history and are willing to talk about it.
The hardest driving day of the fourteen, alongside the run into Liberia. We cross into Sierra Leone on the Mano River bridge, a border post that is seldom quick, then work our way through the forested south-east, one small river town after another. The kilometres aren't many; the road surface is what costs the time, and Freetown comes into view as the light goes.
The drivers get a day off and we walk: first the stone steps climbed by the settlers of the 1790s, then the packed markets at the east end of town, then after lunch the white sand beaches down the peninsula. We also call in at a Freetown community project that Waypoint supports.
A last view of Freetown's green, built-up hills above the Atlantic, then we leave early. The Guinean border is the day's open question, and we'd rather have hours in hand there than need them later. Past it, the road leaves the coast for Kindia, known around Guinea for its fruit, where we spend our first night in the country.
North through wooded valleys and up onto the plateau, pausing where streams spill off its edge and, if the road gives us time, walking down to the foot of a waterfall. You'll notice the cooler air before you notice the height. We sleep in Labé, historically the Fula capital of the plateau, and the evening call to prayer drifts across its red-earth streets.
The road down is the slowest of all fourteen days, and at the bottom of it sits a remote border post. In Guinea-Bissau the land levels out into open bush. The Kaabu kings ruled from Gabu; today it's a market town at a crossroads, and our simple stop for the night.
Through Bafatá and on across savannah where the open bush slowly turns into cashew plantations, on tarmac that stops and starts. The street signs in Bissau, at the end of the drive, are in Portuguese. There's time before dinner for the old quarter, Bissau Velho, and the port; the city moves slowly, and so do we.
North through more cashew trees to the border with Senegal, never a fast one, and into the Casamance, cut off from Dakar and northern Senegal by The Gambia. Cap Skirring, where the road ends, comes in the late afternoon: pirogues lying on the sand under the casuarinas.
A swim or a walk on the beach first thing, then east through Jola country, its sacred groves and round impluvium houses, to Ziguinchor on the Casamance River for lunch on the waterfront. Then north through paddies and palm groves to Seleti, our sixth and final land border, and into The Gambia, reaching Banjul for the last dinner of the trip by the water at dusk, where the Gambia River meets the ocean.
Breakfast close to the river mouth, then your transfer to Banjul International Airport, set by your flight time. You started beside a lagoon and finish beside an estuary, with seven countries' stamps in the passport between them.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Expedition Investment
per person, twin share
Includes the supported 4WD vehicles and your expedition leader, fixers on the ground in all seven countries, all six border crossings handled for you, thirteen nights' accommodation, daily breakfast and every listed experience
Excludes international flights, all visas, travel insurance, lunches and dinners. Single supplement $540 USD. Runs in the November–February dry window; routing may adjust in real time with road and border conditions
Reserve Your SpotEach of the seven countries on this route has its own risk picture, so we assess them one at a time and keep every assessment current. Your expedition leader can change the route whenever conditions call for it. Driving stops at dusk, the vehicles stay in touch all day, and local fixers move a stage ahead of the group, including at the borders. On this coast the real hazard is the road itself rather than crime, and the pace and the daylight rule are designed around that. We keep watching conditions until departure, and every confirmed traveller gets a detailed briefing before leaving home.
