Pointe Noire to Cabinda

It's not far to the border, Google said about 1:15 so we left at 8am. Poite Noire is just like many other African cities, crumbling roads, dirt, pot holes etc. Fortunately at that time most traffic was going into town, so the traffic leaving town was moving, albeit rather slowly. The border came up rather quickly, again, you know you're there when there is a lot of congestion and a rope across the road. We pulled into some parking and were immediately surrounded by hustlers and noisy money changers. Looking past that we sought out the calm money changer and it was a good move. He guided us to the police, immigration and customs offices. All very simple on the Congo side and we were cleared out of the Congo in under half an hour.

We changed some money with him and he then guided us through the Angolan side as well. We didn't ask him to and didn't expect him to but he just came along and showed us where we needed to go. We paid him for his help. You may not need a guide but it's a lot easier if someone can show you which doors to go to, who to speak to and in which order. The Angolan side dragged on for some time. Everybody was pleasant but it was slow. The visa office had no working lights so they went off to fix that. Then the officer decided to show someone how to print visas. That involved lessons on how to align the paper in the printer, how to use the software and so on. Some time later we had visas. Then off to pay. Can't do that without copies of the visa which they don't give you and of course as the visa was only printed 10 minutes before it's not something we could do in advance. OK, pay the money changer to go make the copies for us, then back to immigration to pay the $120 which must be in USD and the notes must be $5 denomination or higher. Once paid the officer wants photos of the bikes registration plates etc. then over to customs.

They peruse the carnets before correctly stating that Angola is not a carnet country and "we must pay". Those are familiar words by now, so we try to discuss it but with zero Portuguese this is not possible. A helpful local does a bit of interpreting and explains it's not much to pay. He's correct, it's 6336 Kwanza (about £9.50) so we agree and they start to process the paperwork. This takes time as they don't speak English and our bike papers are in English. Things like CC, colour, make, model etc. Then it's off to the bank as customs don't take payments. Bank teller is not in the office but arrives soon afterwards. Payment made it's then off to the police office.

An officer inspects all the documentation and writes all the details in a book. He stamps the piece of paper which serves as our import permit. We're free to go so we load up and ride on but wait, there's more........... we're stopped by a rope barrier. This guy wants to see the paperwork too. So, engine off, gloves off, helmet off, get the paperwork out. You get the picture I'm sure. Over 3 hours after arriving at the border, we're on our way to Cabinda. On our way until we come to a roadblock that is. They want the bike paperwork and are in no hurry to let us proceed. It takes a turn for the worse when the eagle eyed guy notices my bike has been listed on the Angolan paperwork as Green when it is clearly Red. This is a problem he declares. Fortunately Richard had been doing some great PR with the other guys at the checkpoint and they agreed to let the paperwork colour issue slide. After they had their photo opportunities with Richards bike, we were on our way again. It's not far to Cabinda but the road had completely disintegrated in places.

Arriving in town we needed to find an ATM. We passed a bank and waited in the queue for the ATM. It only dispensed a Max of 40000 Kwanza. We needed way more than that. We carried on to the ferry terminal. Unfortunately, the boat left earlier that day and the next one was in two days time. It took over three hours to buy two ferry tickets for us and the bikes. Can't explain why but now you've read the border crossing bit all I can say is that it was similar to that. Next it was off to find an hotel. Over 6 hours of bureaucracy but we had crossed the border and had the ferry tickets. For the tickets we had to pay 15000 per person and 93500 in cash for each bike but the receipt only showed a total of 101500. I guess you just have to consider it a tip.........!

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