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Surprise, we are still in Pointe Noire, Congo. We were originally planning on passing through the Congo on our way south in only two days but the powers that be decided that we needed to spend a little bit more time here. One month to be exact. We have been here for so long, I should probably look into hiring a real estate agent. To make matters more interesting, we have now overstayed our Congolese visas which is potentially a big problem, but here in Africa, even when you see a problem like this looming on the horizon, you are in many cases powerless to act on it. In the continuing saga of hearing absolutely nothing from the Angolan consulate on the status of our visa applications, we anticipated that we might be here longer than our original visas permitted, so last Wednesday, we started the process to extend them. The visa extension process was reportedly only supposed to take a day, but three days later, we still do not have our passports back. The main reason for the delay in processing the extensions is the arrival of the Congolese president here in Pointe Noire yesterday. Apparently, every public official and half-ass, passport stamping bureaucrat was needed to prepare in advance for his arrival and to attend all of the ceremonies celebrating the great and wonderful things the president has done for the country.

Being stuck here in the Congo for a month longer than anticipated has forced us to change a lot of our plans. Zambia and Victoria Falls will have to wait for another day as will the wildlife reserves in Botswana and South Africa. I came to Africa hoping to see some exotic wildlife, however, I fear that the only wildlife I will most likely see on this segment of the trip are the lions and cheetahs prancing through the savannah in faded paintings hanging in the musty office of the Angolan consulate in Pointe Noire. “C’est tres tragique!”

We were also on a relatively tight timeframe so that we could fly back to the States from South Africa to attend the wedding of Steve S’s sister, Katie. In order to avoid a lifetime of regret and condemnation to the dog house, Steve was forced to spend an extra $1,500 to ensure that he did not miss this important event. In total Steve spent about $2,900 on his flight back to Denver including the original ticket. Mark and I on the other hand had no choice but to stay behind and continue to try and get the trucks and ourselves out of the Congo and past the giant roadblock that is Angola. Steve waited until the last possible moment, but was ultimately forced to fly home yesterday. Luckily for Steve, he flew out in the morning because officials closed down the airport a short while later to receive the president and his entourage. Steve will make it to his sister’s wedding, but will miss the last 5,000 or so kilometers of Africa and the trip down to Cape Agulahs; the southern most point on the continent and the end point of the “cape to cape run.” (North Cape, Norway to Cape Agulahs, South Africa) So TWBR is one man down until we are reunited in Argentina… a country that for the time being feels like it could not possibly be any farther away.

I don’t know what time it is. I don’t know what day it is. I don’t know what month it is. Luckily someone reminded me that it was Mother’s Day so fortunately, I did not let that slip by without letting my Mom know that I am still alive… where, I don’t really know.

TWBR crew in from of La Pyramide, Pointe Noire, Congo

It has been over three weeks now since we arrived in Pointe Noire, and it seems like we are no closer to getting our Angolan visas than when we first applied for them. “Come back tomorrow,” “Come back Wednesday…” I do not think they understand that I no longer want to come back. If I had my way, I would forget Angola even existed. Unfortunately, reality interferes with my fantasies of jumping off bridges with bungee cords and going to rugby matches in South Africa, Angola clearly out of sight in the rearview mirror of the Tundra. Reality forces me to acknowledge Angola’s existence and come to terms with the fact that we have no choice but to drive through it.

We tried to see if it was feasible to skip Angola, we really did. We investigated shipping the trucks, a drastic step considering how painful the shipping process has been in the past for us, but we have reached the point where we are willing to endure that pain to progress the expedition. In true keeping with our past experiences, the shipping companies informed us that for hefty fees they will be more than happy to transport our trucks around Angola in the amazingly quick time frame of 50 days. No one was ready subject themselves to that type of pain just yet.

Thinking of ways around Angola

We investigated driving back around to Brazzaville, through the “pool area” where rebel groups known as “Ninjas” lurk in the jungle waiting for vehicles to pass, collecting valuables from motorists with the aid of rusting, yet still fully functioning Kalashnikov assault riffles. The funny thing is, in considering this option, the Ninjas are not our biggest concern. We have instead been focusing on the reports of overlanders being turned away at the D.R.C. border for not having onward Angola visas, (even though they are reportedly issued at the border town of Matadi) Having already paid large sums of money to take the ferry across the Congo River to Kinshasa, with the end result of being denied entry, coupled with an expired Congolese visa and a mounting pile of “paperwork problems,” aka financial problems, this option could backfire and leave us in a much worse position than the one we are in now. We do have some Dutch friends whom we met in Nigeria that are in the process of making the Brazzaville-Kinshasa-Matadi run this week and based on what we hear back from them, will decide if we will follow suit.

Little did we know, another problem was looming on the horizon

However, even if we wanted to pack up shop and make a run for it, there is no fuel in Pointe Noire and both trucks are nearly on empty. That’s right, they ran out of petrol a few days ago, gasoil (diesel) is expected to run dry in the near future and according to our friends at the Toyota dealership, the supplies will not be replenished for another few weeks. The situation is so bad, that they do not have any more Jet-A aviation fuel at the Pointe Noire airport, so all airport operations have been temporarily suspended as well. Apparently, the supplier has had some refining issues that have resulted in production shortages. All this is very ironic considering how many times we have watched the sun set over the Atlantic at La Pyramide over the last three weeks and subsequently watched as the flaming, burn-off of gas from oil rigs a few miles offshore slowly lit up the darkening sky. Signs of petroleum production are everywhere here in Pointe Noire. In fact, on some days you can even smell it, yet for some reason, there is no fuel.

Oil is coming out of the ground here in PN, but it goes somewhere else

To top this all off, I have somehow managed to contract malaria again, only days after starting to feel better from the last bout and Shoppman finally lost his odds battle with the local mosquitoes as well. Twilight Zone I tell you, Twilight Zone.

We have been here in Pointe Noire, Congo for over a week now. Just what are we doing here you might ask? Well, we are playing the waiting game. We are waiting for our visas to Angola, the link in the chain that currently separates us here in Central Africa with our rendezvous the south. We knew that getting visas for Angola was going to be tricky but I do not think anyone knew just how difficult it would be.

We have heard horror stories of overlanders before us being forced to backtrack hundreds of kilometers because they were unable to obtain visas for Angola, and others who simply gave up and found another way around, usually by sea. Without a doubt, securing visas for Angola has been one of the most difficult exercises in bureaucratic navigation and patience to date. We do have a great contact here in the Congo who has been helping us out tremendously with the visas, but even with his help, the whole process is far from transparent and totally frustrating. Right now we are basically trapped with very few options other than to sit and wait it out.

Luckily, we have been “marooned” in a place where we are being treated extremely well. The owner of a really cool beachfront bar and restaurant here in town, Patrick, has let us pitch our tents near the volleyball court of La Pyramide, so we have been camping on beachfront property most of the time. Before that, Christo and the South African telecom workers put us up in style for a few days at their house here in town. There have also been a steady stream of patrons at La Pyramide, curious and excited about what we are doing, who have taken us under their wings in various capacities, feeding us, letting us do laundry at their homes, letting us jump on the internet, and including us in the fascinating ex-pat community here in Pointe Noire. If it were not for people like Patrick and Sabine at La Pyramide, Elin, Nathalie and Didier Bardin, Asmah and Christophe, and Christophe the commercial diver, our wait for the elusive Angolan visas would be a lot more painful.

Africa has been rough on both the trucks and the drivers here at The World by Road, but the wheels keep turning and the gas tab keeps adding up. Here are the most recent fuel rpices, and distances covered.

http://theworldbyroad.com/wordpress/mileage-fuel-consumption-and-cost 

We have covered a lot of miles on The World by Road and the terrain we have driven is as diverse as the countries we have passed through. Obviously, the road can get pretty bad from time to time and it always leads to the same question: Is this the worst road we have been down? There have been quite a few occasions where the answer to that question is an assertive “YES!” However, on a road trip like this, just when you think you have seen the worst of it, there is always something else lying in wait around the next corner.

The road that was waiting for us just on the other side of the Nigeria-Cameroon border on the way to Mamfe was a beast, and for the time being, it is without a doubt, the worst road we have been down on the expedition. We had been warned about this stretch of road, but the warning did little to prepare us for what we actually encountered. Mud pits, fallen trees, more mud pits, etc. Hopefully there will not be any roads in much worse shape than the road to Mamfe because if they are, they are for the most part impassable. In fact, I can hardly believe that we actually made it through some of the obstacles on the way to Mamfe. I guess that is a testament to the durability or our Toyotas and our driving skills!

Kilometer 26 of the worst road yet

This is the MAIN road from Southern Nigeria into Cameroon!

The current No. 1 was no problem for The Thundra

All this talk of bad roads led us to sit down and reflect upon all the rough stretches of road we have had to navigate during the course of the expedition. The end result of that reflection is a list of the worst roads on The World by Road. So without further adieu, here is The Top Ten Worst Roads On The World by Road. It is funny looking back and remembering what these roads were like at the time… when we went through Poipet on our way to the Ankor temples in Cambodia, that was the worst road any of us had ever been on. Now, that stretch or road barely makes the top ten. Obviously this list is subject to change before we are through with this whole thing, but for the time being…

The Top Ten Worst Roads On The World by Road

* Outside of UB, there are very few stretches of paved road in Mongolia. In fact, I would not even really consider most of what we drove in Mongolia to be a road. If you are going anywhere in Mongolia, most likely, it is off road and can get a little bumpy every now and then.

** The road surfaces in Nigeria are pretty good for the most part, however, the drivers there are so reckless and bad, that simply venturing out on the roads in Nigeria is a risk to your health. Nigeria may not have the worst roads in the world, but hands down, they have the worst drivers so we had to include them on the list.