December 25th, 2019 Leaving for Los Angeles, then to Nadi, Fiji

7AM I took the bus to the airport. It took an hour. I ate at the Giants Clubhouse and tried to board. The flight was full so I took the 500 dollar credit on Alaskan Airlines and opted for the 2:30PM American Airline flight to Los Angeles. I even sold the food vouchers and went back to get mussels at Yankee Pier, which was awful.

2:30PM I left for Los Angeles and landed at 6PM or so. I then went to Terminal 6 to Alaska Lounge. I got onto the waitlist and then went to the Point the Way Cafe, which only served four dishes, nachos, flatbread, fish tacos and pretzels. Of course they would run out of fish tacos first. I had some nachos before going up to the lounge. They were closing at 9PM and I found out my Tuvalu flight was canceled. I went on the phone for 2 hours to try to resolve this. I eventually gave up and decided to deal with it once I get to Fiji.

December 8th, 2019 West Africa and Jamaica

West Africa is again unimpressive uniformly. Monrovia had the best infrastructure out of all these countries. Freetown comes in second. Jamaica was far better with good roads. It is another Caribbean Island with better infrastructure.

December 8th, 2019 Financials

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I spent 3588.15 USD on this trip. The biggest portion of this is comprised of airfare and almost one hundred USD on visas. I wouldn't say each individual location is expensive but it does cost a lot to get there.

December 4th, 2019 Leaving Kingston, Jamaica

4AM I then got gas before getting to the airport. I stayed at the airport for a long while before the plane took off for Charleston, South Carolina.

 Club Kingston

December 3rd, 2019 Kingston and Montego Bay, Jamaica

3AM Fortunately air train was back on so I took it from terminal 4 to 5 and boarded for Kingston, Jamaica at 5AM.

9AM I arrived at Kingston, Jamaica and took off for Golden Eye. I arrived in a few hours but the door lady requested my reservation. They spent the next thirty minutes asking and looking for it. I gave up waiting. From experience, they wouldn't have let me through. I drove around and found some boats in the nearby pier. The boatmen told me so me fake stories about Ian Fleming but wanted to charge 2,000 JMD for going to see Golden Eye. I took too long for bargaining and took a rowing boat instead. It was the wrong idea and he took it half way and we didn't get to see the actual house. He kept saying we couldn't see it anyway. I am not sure.

5PM I started driving toward Montego Bay. I arrived at Pier One. The food was awful for 53 USD plus tax. I then stopped by Margaritaville and took a long while before napping on the road for a couple of hours.

December 2nd, 2019 Casa Blanca, Morocco to New York, New York

4AM I left for a layover in Casa Blanca, Morocco.

8AM I arrived at Casa Blanca and took a great shower. I stayed in the departure lounge until 3PM.

5PM I took off for JFK Airport. Air Moroc threw away my hair wax. The flight was 8 hours.

7PM I arrived at JFK. The air train was down to a small fire earlier. I stood in snow with 30 passengers to go from terminal 1 to 8. They didn't let me in there. Luckily, I got in terminal 4 and used Air India Lounge and Wingtip Lounge until 3AM.

December 1st, 2019 Monrovia, Liberia

12PM I watched Game of Thrones Season 1 until I thought I had to check out. I first walked to Evelyn's Restaurant but it was closed. They recommended Royal Hotel Restaurant. I walked there but their restaurant didn't open until 5PM. I then tried to check out Boulevard, which only had an Indian Buffet. I then walked to Nice Cream which was awful. I got pineapple and cappuccino flavors but they didn't taste like either.

KTC guesthouse

Nice cream

2PM I took a shared taxi to the museum. A man tried to take me around the back but I got through. The museum was not closed as advertised on TripAdvisor. It was 5 USD. I decided not to do it as the first floor was not impressive.

3PM I watched to Mamba Point to look at their lunch menu, which was Indian. I then took a motorbike to Anglers. I took a look at the menu and spoke to the Italian chef. I told him I was trying to decide between them and Royal. He told me they are European and Royal was Thai. Neither is local. Only Evelyn's is. I decided to stay and bought the seafood platter. The portion was large but was dry. I had diarrhea for days.

5PM I took another motorbike to Royal, where I bought a 1.5L water and watched Game of Thrones. I bought a coffee from Kaldi's for 4.24 USD and the manager gave me a donation to make spare change 150 LRD.

11:45PM I was picked up by James, the local driver who worked for a Lebanese man working there. It costed 20 USD and I paid 50 LRD for part of the parking fee.

November 30th, 2019 Freetown, Sierra Leone to Monrovia, Liberiia

4:30AM I woke with the mosquitoes bothering me. I played Hitman Sniper until 8AM and left for the cotton tree.

8:30AM I walked to the cotton tree and continued to walk toward Ferry Junction. I took a shared van until Ferry Junction and then another motorbike to the Kissy Ferry Terminal. I haggled and ended up getting the speedboat for 1 USD more than cost at 25,000 SLL. The speedboat took 30 minutes and then I shared a tut-tut with two women for 10,000 SLL to the airport.

Speedboat to Tagrin

12:30PM They didn't let me in until 12:30PM even though I had a ticket. I then spent the next 3 hours in the lounge. They only had sodas and Indian flavored Chip, which was pretty good.

4:45PM I arrived and hitched a ride from a couple of travelers, one from Ukraine and one from Russia. The one from Ukraine is well-traveled, a little less than me though, I believe. They said the shuttle should have been paid for by their Russian travel agency.

6PM We arrived at Corina Hotel. They wouldn't let me share the room with the Russian so I refused to pay for the shuttle which everyone thought was paid for by the travel agency. We had a stalemate and I was held against my will. I finally got done with this when I was able to reach Pepsec Shuttle company by Whatsapp. It was then forgiven and I was finally free. The Flower Chinese Restaurant was charging 80 USD for Chinese and 100 USD normally. I didn't take it and took a motorbike to find Kollie's guesthouse, which I thought was near the Christian Fellowship Church. I took a motorbike that way as I didn't know the exact location. People told me it was dangerous around. I was led to a guesthouse that I guessed was unsanitary as it was just 5 USD. The room was taken anyway so I didn't get to take a look. The old lady there asked his grandson to help me look for Kollie's guesthouse. We didn't find that but we found KTC guesthouse, which I thought was 40 USD on Kayak. But when we checked, it was 65 USD so I took the AC room for 55 USD.

November 29th, 2019 Conakry, Guinea to Freetown, Sierra Leone

4:30AM I woke and played Hitman until 7AM. I walked to Obama Cafe, which was a shack off the water and then took a stroll to the Saint Mary Cathedral. I then found a cab for 40,000 GNF to the airport. The drive was long with a lot of traffic. It has been 30 minute and already 8AM and we are not there yet still.

8:15AM We arrived and I waited in the badly run VIP lounge until take off. At least they didn't give me bad looks like they did at the lounge in Bamako, Mali.

11AM We arrived. I went to take a 40 USD water taxi with a Lebonese guy from Lungi to Freetown. This is probably the first airport where the airport was separate from the capital city by water without a bridge.

12PM It took me 1 hr to figure out my stay with the AirBNB. I then took a motorbike to drop my bags off there at 12 White Street. I then took another taxi to the Tacugama Chimpanzee Sanctuary. The driver stopped midway and then I hopped on another shared taxi to get to it. It took another 40 minutes or so to walk up the hill.

2:30PM I reached the sanctuary but they told me they only fed at 10AM and 4PM, which were the visiting hours. I was exhausted and it was very hot. I waited until 4PM. The tour was nice. I didn't get to see the baby chimpanzees, which were "off limits" to tourists. I finished in 45 minutes and walked down with the two young guides. It was hard to catch a cab. It took another 30 minutes to get on a shared, locally converted van, which in the beginning carried 28 people. We reached Wilberforce. I took a motorbike there to get to 12 White Street. Alfred the local who was married to Layna, the American girl took me in. There was no running water so I had to take a shower with a bucket. The AC in the living room was broken so he offered his room. I accepted, of course, and went to bed at 7:30PM.

Van with 28 people

November 28th, 2019 Bamako, Mali to Conakry, Guinea

6AM I woke to go to the Zoo. I first took a car wagon for free to the grand market. I then walked to the zoo from there. I spent an hour and half there. They had some lions and one elephant as the prize.

Van to the center

A very small, Nokia? phone

10:30AM I started walking back. It took a while and then hitched a ride. The driver got me pretty close for free. I then took another motorbike back. The driver stayed for a moment. I took a shower and left with him to the airport. I arrived at 12:30PM and that was way too early. They didn't let anyone in until 2:15PM. I went to the lounge. It was pretty basic. I had some fish and fruit salad. They came to grab me as I almost missed it.

Water

4:30PM The plane left for Conakry, Guinea. I was going to the twenty some USD hotel but was picked up by a Chinese guy working to get visas for other Chinese. He wanted to take me to a thirty USD room, which looked really clean. He then realized it wasn't available. I didn't want to take his fifty USD room so he hooked me up with a ten USD dorm room by another Chinese. We waited for another Chinese man and started driving. We were driving on their only highway. Traffic went both ways on one side of the road. We were stopped by two policemen and they wanted driving permit. After stalling for thirty minutes, he paid them 50,000 GNF bribery and tip to the middleman negotiating. There was a lot of traffic so we didn't get to town for another half an hour. We stopped outside of Xuehua's dorms for a second and then drove to the first guest's destination. His phone was snitched out of his hands by two men. I was made guarding the car while they went upstairs to negotiate. I waited for half an hour and the driver finally returned. We went back to Xuehua's apartment. I exchanged 20 USD with her and checked out Les Îles de Joie. It looked a little dirty. There was another foreigner there but I didn't see any food there. I went back to the dorm. I had some tea with them, took the first hot shower and went to bed at 10PM.

Main highway in Conakry, Guinea

November 27th, 2019 Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso to Bamako, Mali

8AM I finally woke up, took my bag with me and put on swim trunks for the scolding weather that was coming.

11PM I walked to the central market and the shore before coming back. I stayed until 2:30PM. The same guest from yesterday who helped me ask his own driver to drive me to the airport.

5PM I sat at the airport until takeoff.

6:30PM I arrived and hitched a ride from a couple of guys to the Millennium Hotel. Their price was high to be slightly prohibitive. I then took another taxi to the AirBNB. I thought he had gone the wrong way and stopped to him at a hotel to get someone to help translate. He was going in the right direction. I thought he had gone the wrong way first. He wanted to me 3,000 XOF when we reached the AirBNB. The guard didn't help and so I paid accordingly.

November 26th, 2019 Istanbul, Turkey to Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso

6AM We arrived at Istanbul. Though the hotel was free, I had to pay for the electronic visa, 20.55 USD to get through passport control. I guess there was the possibility of taking the city tour instead but I don't think that was a better option. We waited from 7AM until 8AM for this shuttle bus to take us to the hotel.

8AM We arrived at Retaj Hotel. It took 40 minutes going to the city. I had breakfast and lunch there. The food was bad and I got about an hour of sleep before I took the shuttle back to the airport at 2PM. It took an hour and twenty minutes.
















3:20PM I finally realized it was a brand new airport. The three old lounges didn't come up on the Priority Pass Application search. I was surprised. The old airport was not bad at all. This airport is great and probably the best one I have been to.

4PM The lounge was great. I took another shower here and left around 5:20PM for the gate.

6PM I boarded for Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. It is going to be a hot city.

8PM It was actually tolerable upon arrival. I then walked for a little less than 1 kilometer before getting a motorbike to get to Hotel Kavana. A guest staying there spoke Chinese and paid for my ride. I went to bed shortly after. It was 11,000 XOF just like Booking advertised.