Dakar Camping
 

Hay
Im going to be doing a overland with a Bedford mk/mj starting in January 2013
anyone know any place to camp out near Dakar, Senegal , i know there used to be Hippo camp near Rufisque but im not sure if it excists and the last i hear was that it had gone downhill

I want to pick up the visas for ghana there, there are good reports right now of the avilablity there

You can try Lac Rose which is about 30km outside Dakar, it used to be the final finish line for the Dakar rally. There are several hotels/auberges around the lake that allow camping in their carparks. Failing that you can wild camp in the dunes nearby. The place is a bit of a weekend retreat for expats and Senegalese to escape the capital. Its pretty but not the most exciting place!

thanks for the info..we will be stuck there for a few days ( or weeks) getting visas for the next couple of countrys
u any recomondations of places in lac rose

hey gazza171,
We will be passing through Dakkar in January>February on route through Senegal.

I'll pm you closer to the time and see if your still there...

Phil

will probley stay in the airport then ,as it would be good to get the ghanan visa...this is if Mali does not clean up

What is address for Ghana embassy in Dakar?
 

I've located it in Point E area, rue 6 ...... and this location is nowhere near 5 minutes from this SuNuGu restaurant or the airport

:confused2: YYX100

:yes: Sunungal Hotel give or take a sand dune is at N14.75228 W17.50186
:yes: Ghanian Embassy approx N14.75137 W17.49260
:whistling: distance.... a smidge over 1 km so, yes between 5 and 10 minutes on foot


and while I am here, here are some useful (hopefully) forms from their site
Do please update the coordinates to help others while you are there- thank you.

Sunugal no longer allow camping
 

Update as of April 2016 - Arrived here hoping to camp as described, after a day of fighting with Douanes to get CDP stamped, only to be told they don't do that anymore. Beach area had been redeveloped...their nearest suggestion was 25km away and I was brain-fried from StLouis-Dakar traffic so ended up with expensive hotel room.

Trying Ghana embassy in morning...

I have added the hotel and embassy to the OSM data base. No objections?
They should appear in the OSM map in a month or two. There is still camping indicated in the OSM data base for the hotel area... should I remove this?

Sounds like a good idea to me - shame about the camping, but seems it's a casualty of the sprawl and expensive-isation of the city.

I've been to "club de voile" near downtown Dakar: they have little cheap bungalows and if I think it's possible to sleep in your van there.
Nice place.
RR.

Hey, Can you tell me how you got on at the Ghana embassy? I'm heading there really soon and want to know if you can specify an entry date for a couple of months later. Thanks

Hi,

I dropped in to the Ghana embassy to ask. I was told that they only process applications for Senegal residents. It would be 'difficult' for a non resident...but in any case it was Friday and they don't do visa work on a Friday. Read that how you like, but I didn't spend the weekend in Dakar to find out. I'm hoping for better luck and timing further down the road...

Good luck!

@Vegan,

go back to Ghana embassy and kick them ... i got the Ghana visa w/o being reident ... i had prepared a package of info after that for all other pian-in-the-@rse countries spouting that line "visa only for residents"

Speak to Consul ... ghheez he even knew of my profession ... not many know what an actuary is ... but combine that with economics, law, and i push-back on such standard responses

I was reading a blog somewhere online and they got their Ghana visa in Sierra-Leone, cost $100USD.

Here is an excerpt from their blog:

"Ghana visa:

The embassy of Ghana (N8 28.283 W13 16.130) has recently moved from the city centre up the hill and is easiest reached by taking a poda poda up to Wilberforce Roundabout. The usually only issue visas to residents so it took us a couple of hours of explaining and waiting until our application was accepted. Having the Nigeria visa already in our passports helped as it proved our intentions to travel to South Africa. It took 6 days to process our applications as everything had to go through Accra and had to be done perfectly. Even the smallest mistakes on the application form needed to be fixed with correction fluid and rewritten.

You get one form from the embassy and need to copy it three times. The four identically filled out forms together with another form provided by the embassy and 4 passport photos should do the trick.

We paid 100US$ (no notes smaller than 50US$ accepted) for a 1 month single entry visa with entry within 1 month."

I am hoping to get the Ghana visa in Rabat...

Ghana visa in .... Senegal? Sierra Leone ? Morocco? etc

sure, some places it's difficult to get ...and at others it is available .... BUT....

as i wrote 3 years ago " there's getting Visa's and getting Visa's EFFICIENTLY"


cost of Ghana visa in SierraLeone $100 (expensive) and S.L. might not be on route

in Rabat , assuming that's start point... make sure enough blank pages to get enough along to a place where u can make a new passport if needed.
What is processing time in Rabat?

so, for EFFICIENCY, consider and evaluate for ur own situation
1. cost
2. processing time
3. route
4. pages remaining in passport
5. requirements (same country, but embassy in one city/country might want more info eg. Letter of Introduction (LOI) or Invitation Letter (IL) or Residency Card
6. risk of not getting it further along , based on success rate of recent traveler from similar-passport-countries


Traveling Africa (part of) again, on a quite different country-passport .... for the fun of it

I agree, he was talking about getting a visa further along. Sierra Leone was literally the only other place I have heard of it getting issued past Senegal. Think the Rabat one is probably the most efficient overall

As of mid 2013, Ghana visa was fastest, no residency requirement , cheapest in Burkina Faso

Hi - thanks for the advice - as it happens I'm back in Dakar having run into issues with Gambia (vehicle traffic blockaded at present, passable with big 'fees'), but in any case the Liberia and Guinea border issues led to rethink - heading via Mali now.
I'll pop into the Ghana embassy again tomorrow - public holiday today - and see where I get. I'll email Burkina and see if I get any joy...not getting any reply from London.

Man I really hope you can find it somewhere. I'm on the same route and can't afford to run into those problems

You'll be fine if you have enough time to spare - just not going to happen quickly...Rabat were quoting ten days. Dakar, not on a Friday, but 3 days if you have a good excuse/are persuasive...

Is a good excuse in Dakar having to send a passport all the way back to Australia if they can't issue the visa do you think?

I think I'll skip Rabat as I don't have 10 days, try Dakar with my Australian passport saying I'll have to send it back to Australia. If its still a no go I'll send my British passport back from Dakar to the UK and have it forwarded to a country further along.... What a pain in the ass

If you send it to the UK, you'll need a friend to go & pick it up for you, I do this regularly (every 2 years for multiple entry) but I very much doubt the Ghanaian High Commission will send your passport to an address overseas.

Phone a friend time!!!

Thanks for reply CREER, is that because you can't get a multi-entry anywhere else? I really need a multi-entry (from Dakar) as I have to fly out of Ghana for a couple of weeks and fly back to continue my trip. If Dakar says absolutely not for multi-entry, then I might as well get started on that now, pretty sure I'll have a friend or two in London.... Has anyone had experience trying to get a multi-entry Ghana visa on the road?

Just an update on my Ghana visa trail - just had application accepted in Ouagadougou.- pretty much the last chance saloon coming this way, but is apparently still reliable option if you provide a good excuse for not applying in home country. Who knows what the situation will be next month - Bamako is currently not issuing to non residents, though of course always worth a try if you're in town.

People travelling North cannot get a Ghana visa in Togo at present either. We tried in Ivory Coast and Mali..No joy...Burkina is the only option at present.