DRC/Cabinda/Congo – New Year 2007/2008

Route
We travelled from Nzeto in Angola to the Noqui/Matadi border with the DRC, then across to the DRC coast at Moanda before transiting Cabinda. After a couple of days rest in lovely Pointe-Noire we headed back inland, picking up a logging road that was not on the map but came out in Yene-ganou from where we headed north to the Gabonese border at Nyanga/Ndende. [For a possible alternative Congo/Gabon crossing see our Gabon report]. From Matadi to the Gabonese border took us six days driving plus a couple of rest days. In retrospect we wish we had spent a bit longer as it's beautiful and friendly.

It seems that this route is only really possible if you are going south to north; the problem when heading north to south is getting Angolan visas for Cabinda. All the travellers we have met coming south have had numerous applications turned down in the Angolan embassies in West/Central Africa, and the Pointe-Noire yacht club owner told us that many people had reached Pointe Noire and had to find another way (ship/sell the car/turn around!).

Therefore, other routes being used are:

• Pointe-Noire to Brazzaville, over the river to Kinshasa and then down to Matadi to get a 5-day transit visa for Angola. The Pointe-Noire to Brazzaville road supposedly requires you to have a permit from the army before you can drive it as the eastern end sees quite a bit of rebel activity, however we have met many people who have been this way without a permit (or a problem). One thing to be aware of is the stressful ferry crossing between Brazzaville and Kinshasa (see www.mikeybeckett.com and www.border-crossings.com)
• In Gabon, you can head to Franceville and Leconi and then over the border into Congo. On the Congo side you’ll need to pick your way across on logging roads to the good, tarred Oyo-Brazzaville road (tricky in the rain I think). Then over the ferry to Kinshasa and down to Matadi for the 5-day Angolan transit visa. Josh & Anna did this route going south to north (www.quadsacrossafrica.com)
• A couple of people have suggested that you can get Angolan visas in Brazzaville. If this is true it would mean that you could take a cheap flight from Pointe-Noire, get your visas in Brazzaville and then fly back and drive the Cabinda route. We’ve not met anyone who’s actually done this though.

Visas
We had our DRC visas already but Jessica & Chris, our convoy cronies, had to get visas on the border. The visa cost them about 100 USD for the two – lots more than ours had cost in Lusaka (141,000 Zambian or £18 each) but much less than they had been asked for in Luanda (about 150 USD each!).

As expected, we had to get 3-day transit visas for Cabinda (available on the southern border but not the northern border), despite being told by both Angolan immigration in Luanda and the British consulate that our Angolan visas were still valid. 78 USD each and a four-hour wait but at least we got through.

We all had Congolese visas so don’t know if you can get them on the border. We paid 500 Namibian (£38) each for ours in Windhoek.

We all had Gabonaise visas and, as there is no immigration at Ndende, I doubt very much that you can get them on the border. We got ours in Luanda for a hefty 150 USD each (100 if you’re prepared to wait a week). Luanda is not the place to get visas…

Borders and check-points
Our experience is slightly coloured by the fact we were travelling over the New Year period which meant we had a lot of requests for beer! Generally customs officials were unfamiliar with the carnet and needed supervising to stop them messing it up. Stops were mostly interested in seeing our passports, some asked for driver's licences but we never got asked for car papers or insurance.

Angola(Noqui) / DRC (Matadi) border. Quiet and sleepy on the Angolan side, busier on DRC but both sides friendly and helpful, if a little slow. We got through in about an hour and a half but Jessica and Chris had to wait four as the boss-man had to be brought from town to give them their visas. DRC customs made a cursory search of the car.

DRC. Once in Matadi you need to pay a toll for the bridge. This cost us (Land Rover) 1800F and the Germans (fire-truck) 9000F. You can pay in USD although they’ll give you a crap rate – plenty of moneychangers at the border and on the way into town will give you a much better rate. Matadi is full of traffic police in bright yellow shirts who were just very excited to see tourists and even more excited to give us directions. In Boma there are a couple of immigration checks where you need your passport.

DRC / Cabinda (Yema). This border is fairly hectic but not that used to tourists so not hassly (just people practising their English!). Plenty of moneychangers around if you need them. Exiting the DRC was quick and easy but the Cabinda side was full of pompous ‘petit-chefs’ and took nearly four hours to clear. Customs straightforward and no search.

Cabinda. We headed through here on NY Eve and NY Day so may not have had a typical experience. We were only stopped by a permanent block near Cacongo who wanted to write our details on a sheet of paper and ask us for beer.

Cabinda / Congo (Chicamba). Again the Angolan side was pompous and took ages even though we were exiting! By the time they had finished we had to camp at the border as the Congolese side was on half-day for NY. On the Congolese side we had to pay 2000 CFA each for the health ministry guy to add a Cholera stamp to our vaccination card. No actual vaccination required apparently…

Congo. There is a road toll between the Cabinda border and Pointe-Noire – 1000 CFA per vehicle. There are loads of police stops in the Congo but most are very friendly and the only slight trouble we had was on the stop immediately after crossing the border where the fire-truck got searched and we got a half-hearted request for a beer. Near the Gabon border they’ll all want to copy your details onto sheets of paper (does anyone ever match these up?!). Watch out for them using up pages in your passport with huge and unnecessary police stamps (we thought afterwards that we should have stapled in a loose sheet for them to stamp instead). In Pointe-Noire yacht club Chris got a sharp rebuke from a soldier because he was filming.

Congo / Gabon. This border is staggered for about 100km between Nyanga and Ndende. All of the posts along this border were very rural and relaxed. In Nyanga you get your carnet stamped out of Congo and you can get an immigration exit stamp too if the office is open. Otherwise carry on along the road north where you’ll pass through Congo immigration, a couple more police stops and then Gabon customs. Finally, the police station in Ndende can stamp you officially into Gabon.

General driving and accommodation
The roads were not half as bad as expected although, as usual, it would be a very different story in the rain. We (Land Rover) had the most trouble on the Boma road as the trucks had made deep tyre-tracks in the sand and we grounded our chassis on the centre rut a couple of times. Jessica and Chris (fire-truck) struggled more on the road out of northern Angola as it was narrow and steep. We had no trouble when bush-camping at the side of the road.

Specific roads and accommodation
The ‘driving time’ quoted is direct from our GPS and so doesn’t take into account breaks or stopping to dig ourselves out! When bush-camping beware the invisible flies that bite without you noticing until a day later when you will be covered in itchy red measle-like spots. Covering up and deet seems to help.

Matadi. We stayed in the Souers de la Charitie convent for 5 USD per person. Very central and OK bathroom (but no access at night as the fire-truck couldn’t get under the gate to get into the compound). S05.49.873, E13.27.664

Matadi to Boma (3 hours driving time). The good tar out of Boma turns into pot-holed tar after about 50k and then gets better again after the junction with the Tshela road. It’s a beautiful, twisty mountain road – just look out for the buses and trucks coming the other way! Bushcamping would be pretty hard as it’s very populated.

Boma. Busty trading town. We didn’t stay but it had plenty of guest-houses and a mission other overlanders have stayed at (S05.51.243, E13.03.402)

Boma to Moanda (6.5 hours driving time). After Boma the road becomes a dusty truck-route with rickety log bridges and a mix of friendly and non-friendly villages. The road is fairly substantial for 50km, then turns into a track and finally disintegrates into various converging and diverging sandy ruts. We got grounded on the sand but if it was raining we would have been well and truly stuck! Bushcamping on or near the road was straightforward – we camped in the forest up a side-road. Apparently there is a mission in Moanda (S05.55.885, E12.20.532).

Moanda to Cabinda border (45 mins driving time). Finding the road out of Moanda is tricky and once out of town there are loads of side-roads to oil-pumps (marked with blue numbered signs so don’t follow these!). Ask for the ‘Ruta do Yema’ - Yema being the the border town which is not marked on the map - or head towards the radio-mast which is right by the border.

Cabinda (4 hours driving time). There is a partially pot-holed tar road all the way through, which turns into brand new tar after the junction with the Buco-Zau road. Bushcamping not advised as they are very security conscious. We stayed in the Catholic Mission on the seafront in Cabinda City - free and friendly but no access to a bathroom when we were there (key not around). S05.33.740, E12.10.686. Cacongo has an expensive seafront hotel and a large mission, although no idea if you can stay here.

Cabinda border (Chicamba) to Pointe-Noire (1 hour driving time). Perfect tar, one toll, one police stop. The yacht club co-ords are S04.47.377, E11.50.859 – there is a good shower and camping is 3,000 CFA per person (beer expensive too).

Pointe-Noire to Gabonaise border (Ndende). (13 hours). The road out of Pointe-Noire is terrible and difficult to find – ask for the Route National 1 to Brazzaville. We were looking for the Mila-Mila piste other overlanders had used and so turned off RN1 after 33km at Hinda and found ourselves on a very good logging road through the jungle, both forested and deforested. After cutting though the savannah, the road eventually came out in Yene-ganou which is not on the Michelin map but is where the road north from Dolisie forks (south of Kibangou). We were not on the Mila-Mila piste but probably the best road of the moment. North of Kibangou the landscape opens up and there is a junction where you need to take the narrow track north, not the big road east (S03.13.932, E12.07.480). When we came through this was quite puddly and looks like it gets very muddy after rain. Bushcamping in roadside quarries and sidings is fairly easy along this whole stretch although at times the forest is steep and thick; we also saw an auberge in Kibangou.

Food, water, beer
DRC. Matadi especially is full of street food and produce. The villages as far as Boma sell fresh produce and Boma is OK but after this it runs out. Moanda had a small market but not a lot of fresh stuff to buy. Belgian and German style beers are good – if you like dark beer look out for the Munchen brand, otherwise the Primus is a good lager. Water is not that easily available so best to ask in the missions if you stay in them.
Cabinda. In contrast to the DRC, Cabinda has no street stalls, just bars with over-priced Congolese beer. There are loads of public water taps in the villages, which the locals were happy to help us use.
Congo. Pointe-Noire also had very little street food but it did have lovely cafes. Café Citronella was a great French patisserie and Pacha had good, cheap Lebanese food. Beer varied from 500-1500 CFA for a large bottle! Pointe-Noire yacht club had a useful outside water-tap and when driving through the jungle there are loads of rivers where you can stock up on water.

Money and fuel
There are no ATMs that take foreign cards in DRC, Congo or Cabinda (or Angola and Gabon). USD are best to change in DRC and Cabinda; we saw lots of street-side stall money-changers in Matadi, Moanda and Yema, and roving money-changers in the centre of Cabinda City. No hassle or problems. In Pointe-Noire the best place to change money is in the restaurants – we changed Euros to CFA in Café Citronella at the official 655.957 rate.

Note: the CFA is pegged to the Euro at 655.957. There are two versions of the CFA – the Central African CFA coverage includes Congo, Gabon, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea and Chad and the West African CFA coverage includes Niger, Benin, Togo, Burkina Faso, Mali and Senegal. They are not interchangeable.

We saw fuel stations in Matadi, Boma, Moanda, Cabinda, Cacongo, Pointe-Noire, and Kibangou. The Total in Pointe-Noire had a greasing bay.

DRC diesel price: forgot to write this down but it was more expensive than Angola/Cabinda.
Cabinda diesel price: as per Angola the fuel is 29 Kwanza/litre (20p) and, as per Angola, there are long queues.
Congo diesel price: 345 CFA/litre (40p).