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The US state Department does a pretty good job of issuing travel advisories. Travel advisories provide information to US citizens traveling abroad to let them know that either the area they are in may not be particularly safe or to make would be travelers to a particular region reconsider their plans to go there in the first place. The recommendations in these advisories range from telling people to be “vigilant and alert” to recommending against all “nonessential” travel to a particular country or region all together.

At the beginning of the expedition, we were paying fairly close attention to these travel advisories. Our proposed route around the world had us going through at least a dozen or so countries where the State Department had current travel advisories in place. I guess the travel advisories serve a useful purpose, but they also seem to give you a fairly negative impression of a place, especially if you are going there. When you read that there are terrorists operating in a certain country, active abductions and hostage takings, and the general potential for something bad to happen to you, it can start a vicious cycle of negative scenarios popping up in your mind and you can find yourself walking on eggshells when you could be enjoying the experience. Eventually, for better or worse, you start to take these travel advisories with a grain of salt.

Maybe the advisories have served their purpose by placing the possibility of something bad happening in our minds and subconsciously that affects our behavior in a certain country. To date, we have been through at least half a dozen countries on our trip with active travel warnings and about half the time, we are driving through the region of a particular country that directly applies to that advisory. Fortunately, we have had no problems whatsoever. In fact, we have felt quite safe in some of the places that have been issued particularly serious advisories.

We drove through the northern part of Mali where we were led to believe that Tuareg rebels were lying in wait, ready to ambush us on the road and kill us, and we passed through the Niger River Delta region in Nigeria where we thought it would be just a matter of time before we were kidnapped and held for ransom by militants there. Maybe we have been lucky. Maybe it is because we have our own vehicles and have more control over our movements than someone traveling on public transport. Who knows. Whatever the case may be, we actually felt pretty safe there and in Nigeria, we were treated with the utmost hospitality and even more so it seemed because we were Americans.

We made lots of friends in the Niger River Delta States

To the credit of the State Department, I guess some of the areas we were traveling in were dangerous. One night in Nigeria, some security forces on patrol stopped by our campsite with AK-47’s at the ready. They found out what we were doing and suggested we follow them and camp in front of their headquarters where they could “ensure our safety.” I think they were going a little bit out of their way to make sure nothing happened to us, as the potential danger was not from rebels, but from local farmers hassling us because we were camping on their land. But at the same time, this was in a part of Nigeria that had no current travel advisory in place.

There are more prominent risks to your health in some places than gun-totting rebels

I can sense that I am rambling here a little bit so I will get directly to the point. I do feel the State Department has an obligation to inform its citizens traveling abroad that there is the potential for danger. At the same time, I think the language in the advisory itself can sometimes be a little strong and does people a disservice. The bottom line is, use your head. Common sense can go a long way to ensuring your safety. (Maybe the State Department feels that citizens traveling abroad are total morons)

Mark and Shoppman seem more concerned with what the street food will do to them…

By reading the travel advisories, you are meant to think that the rest of the world is this terribly dangerous place where people are lurking around every corner waiting to turn your trip into a total nightmare, and by traveling to these places, it will ensure that your photo is not only on your personal blog, but on CNN as well. Yes, there are dangerous places in the world and you would serve yourself well not to go for a roadside picnic in Somalia. But at the same time, I would also be wary of pitching a tent for the night in a park in East Oakland or taking a midnight stroll in parts of St. Louis, but you do not really see advisories on these domestic places where the homicide rates exceed those of some of the “conflict zones” we have been through.

For those of you that like to keep tabs on us and where we are, the timeline is now updated.  It should be generally accurate for the next couple of months and we will keep changing it as our schedule changes.  Click the link below to check it out.

Timeline

Planning our route through Africa has been quite an ordeal. We are pretty much always on the move so it is hard to keep tabs on what is going on in Africa, whether or not to pay any attention to what is going on in Africa and what sort of things we can expect to encounter and strive to avoid. The research - from border crossings to which roads are not mined to how much of a pain visas are… all of the information needed to successfully navigate our way south with as little problem as possible is a huge task. Unfortunately, we are not in a position to do as much research as we would like given our location and access to reliable internet, but luckily, we have some amazing people helping us out back home. I would like to send out a huge thank you specifically to Doug Tucker for all of his help in researching Africa. Doug not only researched the necessary things to help us better plan our route and to help us stay safe, but he also provided a lot of information about all the the fun and interesting things to see along the way. Based on the amount of information Doug compiled for us, I imagine he spent quite a few hours scouring the internet and other sources for things that can help us out. These are hours that we did not have, so thanks Doug for helping to give us a clearer picture of over-landing through Africa!

As most of you are all aware, someone broke into the Sequoia in Kazakhstan and robbed us and in the process of the robbery, the rear passenger window was completely shattered. Since the break-in, we have been using a blue plastic tarp as a make-shift window and have been dealing with the added cold, noise and inconvenience of discovering new, tiny shards of glass pretty much on a daily basis. Having a tarp for a window also poses a little bit of a security concern and it has definitely contributed to some added stress levels from time to time. We have tried unsuccessfully on a couple occasions to get the window replaced but we did not have our hopes up too high knowing that finding replacement parts for a vehicle that is not sold or manufactured anywhere near where we were was going to be a long shot. We came close to finding a new window surprisingly enough in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, but alas it did not pan out. We tried again at the main Toyota dealership in Istanbul but again, most people at the dealership had not even heard of a Sequoia let alone seen one. Another option was to get a replacement window shipped out from the states, but since we are pretty much on the move all the time, we were finding it difficult to coordinate just exactly where to ship the window, who to ship it to and how to do it without spending a fortune.

Finally, two months after Little Pepe’s window was smashed out we were able to get it replaced. Our friend Lori laid the groundwork for us at a Toyota dealership in Prague, Czech Republic and when we arrived three days before Christmas, the boys at the dealership were waiting with a brand new, rear passenger window that even had the same color tint. It was quite an event at the dealership because according to the manager, they only see about two Sequoias per year and this was the first that was in the middle of an around the world expedition. The staff at the dealership were very helpful and within a few hours everything was fixed and fixed for a lot less than we had anticipated. So, many thanks to Robert and everyone else at Toyota in Prague… having a new window is a relief and now Swinger has an entourage.

Toyota said they could help with the window but the mess and the smell is our problem

You guys want this tarp back?

Swinger’s new Toyota posse

Group photo at Toyota Prague

I think I am starting to loose my mind. How do I know this? Well, every time a new curveball is thrown our way in terms of our route through Africa, I just laugh. It is almost like I expect something to go wrong. After dealing with getting ourselves and our trucks through China, I though we had seen the worst of it, but I am beginning to get a sense of déjà vu, Sahara-style.

When we originally planned the route, we tailored it after Who Needs a Road? trip back in the 60’s. We would take the ferry from Spain into Morocco and then head east though the Sahara along the Mediterranean highways in Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and finally into Egypt. At the time, this seemed plausible enough, but after a few hours of research, it was clear that Algeria was going to be a problem. Morocco had already closed its border with Algeria and not long after, both Tunisia and Libya followed suit. Theoretically, you could still get in an out of Algeria if you were determined enough, but given that Colonel Muammar Gaddafi had reason enough to close his border, I am not necessarily sure we would even want to go to Algeria even if there was a way through. This was the state of affairs in Algeria when we first started planning the trip and two years later, nothing has changed… Algeria is still a no go for multiple reasons.

It was time to start thinking of Plan B. We still wanted to see Morocco and the enchanting cities of Tangiers, Fez and Casablanca but doing so would be quite a feat. It was possible to enter Africa via Morocco but a route that is ripe with a whole new Pandora’s Box of potential problems. In order to go south from Morocco, we would essentially follow the course of the Paris-Dakar rally through to Senegal. The next obstacle we would face, however, would be the Southwest coast of Africa encompassing Sierra Leone, Liberia, and the Ivory Coast. This region of Africa is still extremely volatile and having the images from Blood Diamond fresh in our minds, we decided that it would be best to find a way around these countries. A route around the “danger zone” is possible through Mali, Nigeria, Cameroon, etc. but then you are faced with getting through either the Central African Republic, The Democratic Republic of the Congo or the Congo itself. Unfortunately, you have no choice geographically but to pass through one of these countries and blanket US State Department travel advisories warning of adoption schemes are replaced with warnings of serious and credible threats to your personal health in this region of Africa. So much for plan B.

Hey Bouey, Algeria still won’t let you guys in…

The next seemingly feasible option was to catch a ferry from Italy across the Mediterranean to Tunis, Tunisia. With this option, we unfortunately be skipping Morocco, but more importantly be on the “good” side of Algeria. At the time of our research, Libya was somewhat difficult to get into, but people had done it. In fact, Long Way Down took this route on his most recent motorcycle jaunt. Even though he is Obee-Wan Kanobee, if Ewan can get into Africa, I figured so can we. Fast forward to a few weeks ago when Libya started tightening up the restrictions they had eased in 2004 for foreign tourists. I did not think it was a big deal as I have gotten quite used to jumping through hoops over the course of the last 10 months, but it quickly became apparent that no matter how good of a jumper you are, there have to be hoops to jump through in the first place. Although Libya has not officially stopped issuing visas to Americans per se, it appears as if all of the travel agencies that issue the required invitation letters have. I, along with several individuals helping us out, have not had any luck in finding an agency who can help us poor Yanks out… U.K. resident… no problemo. We are now down to our final few options and I have to admit, I am not feeling too good about our chances.

You look like a reasonable guy, please Mr. Gaddafi, let us in

(Image courtesy of nazret.com)

Plan D was short lived and entailed trying to find a ferry service or RORO vessel to get us from Europe to Egypt. It quickly became apparent that most of the trans-Mediterranean services to Egypt have either A) been canceled altogether, B) have ceased operations for the winter season, C) only go through Israel - if we have an Israeli stamp or visa in our passports, Sudan will not let us in the door, or D) are too expensive to even consider.

So here we are researching Plan E. This entails backtracking to a certain extent though Italy, Greece and the land of $10 a gallon gas in Turkey. From Turkey, we can head south through Syria and Jordan (avoiding Israel) and enter Egypt at the Sinai Peninsula. From all indications, it does not look like it will be too difficult to get in or out of these Middle Eastern countries, although there may be some heightened security concerns and a few places to avoid. But in the end, who really knows, things in this part of the world change on an almost daily basis. Our pal Col. Gaddafi has just kicked off a trip to France to negotiate some trade deals. Maybe our friends in France can put in a good word for us and Libya will once again ease restrictions on foreign visitors within the next few weeks. Like Leonardo said: “TIA - This is Africa.” In the meantime, let the laughter roll.

Starting to run out of options