Fun fact#397
Africa spans two hemispheres twice
Africa is the only continent crossed by both the equator and the two tropics, so it touches all four hemispheres.
Africa: 149 stories, quotes and facts
Deserts that were once green, rivers that never reach the sea, and a continent bigger than any map admits.
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Deserts that were once green, rivers that never reach the sea, and a continent bigger than any map admits.
Countries on this page
Every country page collects its entries in one place, with a fact sheet and the guides for going there.
Entries on this page
Story#155
Marrakech at first light
At six in the morning the Jemaa el-Fnaa is empty except for cats and a man sweeping. By nine it is a market, by seven a food court, by eleven a drum circle. Same square, four cities.
Fun fact#399
The Sahara is bigger than Australia
At roughly 9.2 million square kilometres, the Sahara is about the size of the United States and larger than Australia.
Fun fact#401
Sahara dust fertilises the Amazon
Winds carry millions of tonnes of phosphorus-rich Saharan dust across the Atlantic each year, feeding Amazon soils.
Story#159
The tea ritual
Three glasses: the first bitter as life, the second strong as love, the third gentle as death. Our host poured from a great height each time and would not let us leave until all three were drunk.
Fun fact#402
The Nile has two sources
The White Nile rises near Lake Victoria and the Blue Nile at Lake Tana in Ethiopia. They meet in Khartoum.
Fun fact#405
Egypt's pyramids predate mammoth extinction
The Great Pyramid was already old when the last woolly mammoths died out on Wrangel Island around 1650 BC.
Quote#694
Ubuntu
Ubuntu: I am because we are.
Fun fact#406
Cleopatra lived closer to us than to the pyramids
Cleopatra's lifetime is nearer to the invention of the iPhone than to the building of the Great Pyramid.
Story#162
Sand in everything
Two months after we came home I found Saharan sand in the spine of a paperback. It had crossed a continent inside a book and I could not bring myself to shake it out.
Fun fact#409
Egypt moved a temple
Abu Simbel was cut into more than 1,000 blocks and reassembled 65 metres higher to escape the rising Aswan reservoir.
Fun fact#411
Alexandria's library burned more than once
The famous library declined over centuries through several fires, funding cuts and political upheaval rather than one dramatic blaze.
Story#165
Blue in every doorway
There are at least nine blues in one alley and the paint is refreshed by hand each spring. A woman repainting her step let me help for two minutes and then politely took the brush back.
Fun fact#412
Sudan has more pyramids than Egypt
The Nubian kingdom of Kush built over 200 steep-sided pyramids at Meroe, roughly twice Egypt's total.
Fun fact#415
Ethiopia keeps its own calendar
Ethiopia runs a 13-month calendar about seven years behind the Gregorian one, and the day starts at sunrise.
Fun fact#416
Ethiopia carved churches downward
The eleven churches of Lalibela were cut down into solid rock in the 12th century, roofs level with the ground.
Story#169
Bargaining badly
I accepted the second price and the seller looked genuinely disappointed. He explained that the negotiation was the point, poured tea, and gave me a better price than I would have got.
Fun fact#419
Coffee likely began in Ethiopia
Wild Coffea arabica still grows in Ethiopian forests, and the country's coffee ceremony can take well over an hour.
Fun fact#420
The Danakil is one of the hottest places
Average yearly temperatures above 34 degrees make the Danakil Depression among the hottest inhabited regions on Earth.
Story#172
The felucca captain's nap
The wind died and our captain tied off the sail, lay down on the deck, and slept for forty minutes. We drifted backwards. When he woke, the wind came back within five minutes as though he had ordered it.
Fun fact#422
Eritrea's capital is modernist
Asmara holds one of the world's best-preserved collections of 1930s modernist architecture, including a petrol station shaped like a plane.
Fun fact#425
Djibouti has a lake saltier than the sea
Lake Assal is about ten times saltier than the ocean and sits 155 metres below sea level.
Story#176
Sunrise on the Nile
Twenty balloons went up at once over the Valley of the Kings. From the ground it looked like the sky had been decorated. From the basket it was completely silent except for the burner.
Fun fact#426
Somalia has the longest mainland coast in Africa
Somalia's coastline runs roughly 3,300 kilometres along the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden.
Fun fact#429
Kenya's rift is splitting the continent
The East African Rift is slowly tearing Africa apart, and in millions of years a new ocean may fill the gap.
Quote#698
Hakuna matata
Hakuna matata: there are no worries.
Fun fact#430
The wildebeest migration never stops
Around two million wildebeest, zebra and gazelle circle continuously between Tanzania and Kenya following the rains.
Story#179
The bus with no timetable
The bus left when it was full and not before. Full meant something different than we expected. We made friends with everyone in three rows and arrived eleven hours later knowing four words of Amharic.
Fun fact#432
Kilimanjaro has three volcanic cones
Africa's highest mountain is made of Kibo, Mawenzi and Shira. Kibo is dormant rather than extinct.
Fun fact#434
Zanzibar fought the shortest war
The Anglo-Zanzibar War of 1896 lasted under 45 minutes, the shortest recorded war in history.
Story#182
Coffee three times
The ceremony took an hour: green beans roasted in the room, ground by hand, brewed and poured three times. Refusing the third round, we were told, is a small insult. We stayed.
Fun fact#436
Ngorongoro is a collapsed volcano
The crater is a caldera 20 kilometres wide, home to around 25,000 large animals that rarely need to leave.
Fun fact#438
Uganda has half the world's mountain gorillas
Bwindi Impenetrable Forest shelters roughly half the remaining mountain gorillas, whose numbers have slowly risen.
Fun fact#440
Lake Victoria touches three countries
Africa's largest lake is shared by Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania, and supports tens of millions of people.
Story#186
Priests in the rock
A priest unlocked a church cut down into the ground and held up a cross older than most European cathedrals. Then he sat back down on a plastic chair and continued reading his phone.
Fun fact#442
Rwanda banned plastic bags early
Rwanda outlawed non-biodegradable plastic bags in 2008, and bags are confiscated from arriving travellers.
Fun fact#444
Rwanda has a monthly cleaning day
On Umuganda, the last Saturday of each month, communities across Rwanda close shops and work together on public projects.
Story#190
The gorilla that walked past
We were told to stay seven metres away. Nobody told the silverback, who walked within an arm's length of my knee without breaking step. The guide's only instruction was to look at the ground.
Fun fact#446
Burundi's drummers are UNESCO listed
The royal drummers of Burundi perform with drums carved from single tree trunks, a tradition recognised as intangible heritage.
Fun fact#448
The Congo is the deepest river
The Congo reaches depths over 220 metres, deep enough that fish in the same river have evolved in isolation.
Story#192
Crossing the equator twice
The sign said equator and a man demonstrated water draining in opposite directions three metres apart. The physics was nonsense and the performance was excellent, and we tipped him anyway.
Fun fact#450
Congo rainforest is the second largest
The Congo Basin holds the world's second largest tropical rainforest after the Amazon and absorbs enormous amounts of carbon.
Fun fact#452
Gabon is almost entirely forest
Close to 88 percent of Gabon is forested, and the country set aside 13 national parks in a single decree in 2002.
Story#196
The migration crossing
We waited five hours at the river. Then, with no signal we could detect, four thousand wildebeest decided at once and the water turned brown. It lasted eleven minutes.
Fun fact#454
Sao Tome sits on the equator
Africa's second smallest country is two volcanic islands where cocoa once made it the world's leading exporter.
Fun fact#456
Cameroon is called Africa in miniature
Cameroon packs desert, mountains, rainforest and coast into one country, which is why it earned the nickname.
Quote#702
Pole pole
Pole pole: slowly, slowly. The pace that gets you up Kilimanjaro.
Fun fact#458
Lake Nyos released a deadly cloud
In 1986 a sudden release of carbon dioxide from the lake suffocated nearby villages. Degassing pipes now vent it safely.
Story#200
Matatu music
Our matatu had a sound system worth more than the vehicle and a hand-painted portrait of a footballer on the back. The conductor hung out of the door collecting fares in traffic and never miscounted once.
Fun fact#460
Nigeria is Africa's most populous country
More than one in six Africans is Nigerian, and Lagos is one of the fastest-growing cities on Earth.
Fun fact#462
Nollywood outproduces Hollywood
Nigeria's film industry releases thousands of titles a year, second only to India in volume.
Story#204
Slow to the summit
The guide said pole pole about four hundred times in five days. On summit night, walking at half the pace felt absurd until we passed the fast group sitting down in the dark.
Fun fact#464
Ghana named itself after an empire
Modern Ghana took its name from the medieval Ghana Empire, though that state was located further northwest.
Fun fact#466
Ghana keeps fantasy coffins
Ga carpenters build coffins shaped like fish, aeroplanes or cocoa pods to reflect the life of the person inside.
Fun fact#468
Ivory Coast has the largest church
The Basilica of Our Lady of Peace is the largest church building in the world by floor area.
Story#206
Zanzibar at low tide
The sea went out nearly a kilometre and the whole village walked out onto the flats with buckets. Children raced the incoming tide back to shore as if it were a game invented that morning.
Fun fact#470
Senegal has a pink lake
Salt-loving algae turn Lake Retba pink in strong sun, and collectors coat their skin in shea butter before wading in.
Fun fact#472
Gorée Island remembers the slave trade
The House of Slaves on Goree stands as a memorial to the transatlantic trade and is visited by heads of state.
Story#210
The dhow builder
He was making a boat with no plans, using a stick with notches as his only measuring tool. His father built the boat next to it. His son was sanding a rudder and complaining about it.
Fun fact#474
Mali built a mud mosque
The Great Mosque of Djenne is the largest mud-brick building on Earth and is replastered each year by the whole town.
Fun fact#476
Timbuktu held vast libraries
Timbuktu's private libraries preserved hundreds of thousands of manuscripts on astronomy, law and medicine.
Story#214
Salt and pink water
The collectors work waist-deep in water saltier than the sea, coated in shea butter to protect their skin. They fill a pirogue by hand and it takes most of a morning.
Fun fact#478
Burkina Faso means land of upright people
The name was chosen in 1984, combining words from two local languages to replace the colonial name Upper Volta.
Fun fact#480
Niger has dinosaur graveyards
The Tenere desert has yielded some of Africa's richest dinosaur fossil beds, including giant sauropods.
Quote#708
Inshallah
Inshallah: if it is meant to be. A useful attitude when the bus is four hours late.
Fun fact#482
Chad's lake keeps shrinking
Lake Chad has lost most of its surface area since the 1960s due to drought and irrigation, affecting millions.
Story#216
The griot's version
We asked about the history of the town and got a song instead of a date. It lasted nine minutes, named six generations, and was more accurate than the guidebook.
Fun fact#484
Libya has an underground river project
The Great Man-Made River pumps fossil groundwater from beneath the Sahara through thousands of kilometres of pipe.
Fun fact#486
Tunisia hosted a film set that still stands
Underground Berber homes in Matmata were used as film locations and are still lived in and rented to travellers.
Story#220
Mud plaster day
Once a year the whole town replasters the mosque. There are teams, there is a race, and there is a great deal of mud. Being clean that day marks you as a visitor.
Fun fact#487
Carthage rivalled Rome
Carthage was one of the Mediterranean's great powers until Rome destroyed it in 146 BC, then rebuilt it as a Roman city.
Fun fact#490
Algeria is Africa's largest country
Algeria covers 2.38 million square kilometres, most of it Sahara, and became the continent's biggest country after Sudan split.
Story#224
A sandstorm and a shop
Visibility dropped to about four metres. We took shelter in a shop selling only mattresses and phone credit, and the owner made tea for eleven people until it passed.
Fun fact#491
The Sahara holds prehistoric art
Rock paintings in Tassili show swimmers, cattle and hippos, proof the desert was green within the last 10,000 years.
Fun fact#494
Morocco has blue and white cities
Chefchaouen's lanes are painted in dozens of blue shades, a tradition variously credited to Jewish refugees and to repelling insects.
Fun fact#496
Fes has a car-free medina
Fes el Bali is one of the largest car-free urban areas in the world, where goods still move by donkey.
Story#226
The night the desert froze
Nobody warns you that the Sahara gets cold. At three in the morning we wore every item of clothing we had brought and still slept badly, then watched a sunrise that made it fine.
Fun fact#497
Morocco built a giant solar plant
The Noor complex uses mirrors to concentrate sunlight and can store heat in molten salt to generate power after sunset.
Fun fact#500
Goats climb argan trees
In southwest Morocco goats climb argan trees for the fruit, a sight that has become a roadside attraction.
Story#230
Table Mountain in cloud
We took the cable car up into total white. Visibility was eight metres. Then the cloth lifted for ninety seconds, the whole city appeared below, and it closed again like a curtain.
Fun fact#501
Mauritania runs an iron ore train
One of the longest trains in the world hauls iron ore over 700 kilometres across the Sahara, and travellers ride it free on the ore cars.
Fun fact#504
Cape Verde is entirely volcanic
All ten Cape Verdean islands are volcanic, and Fogo's cone still has villages farming on its crater floor.
Quote#854
He who does not travel
He who does not travel does not know the value of men.
Fun fact#505
Guinea-Bissau has a maze of islands
The Bijagos archipelago has around 88 islands, most uninhabited, and is a UNESCO biosphere reserve.
Story#234
The penguin commute
African penguins crossed the boardwalk at their own pace and in their own order. A queue of humans waited politely, which felt like the correct arrangement.
Fun fact#507
Liberia was founded by freed people
Liberia was established in the 1820s as a settlement for freed African Americans and declared independence in 1847.
Fun fact#510
Sierra Leone means lion mountains
Portuguese sailors named the peninsula for mountains whose thunderstorms sounded like roaring lions.
Story#237
Braai rules
There is one person at the fire and everyone else offers advice. Nobody touches the tongs. The meat is ready when the person at the fire says it is ready, and not before.
Fun fact#511
Togo is narrow and long
Togo is only about 110 kilometres wide but stretches 550 kilometres inland from the Gulf of Guinea.
Fun fact#514
Benin has a lake village on stilts
Around 20,000 people live in Ganvie entirely on stilts above Lake Nokoue, moving by pirogue.
Story#240
Waiting for the ferry to Ilha
The ferry was scheduled for nine. It left at two. In between, someone produced a guitar and someone else produced grilled prawns, and by the time it arrived nobody wanted to board.
Fun fact#515
Angola has waterfalls few visit
The Kalandula Falls drop about 105 metres across a 400-metre curtain and see a fraction of Victoria Falls' visitors.
Fun fact#517
Namibia protects its whole coast
Namibia was the first African country to write environmental protection into its constitution, and its entire coastline is now protected.
Story#244
The delta by mokoro
Our poler stood at the back and pushed us through reeds taller than the boat. He stopped once, silently, and pointed at an elephant twenty metres away that we would never have seen.
Fun fact#519
Sossusvlei's dunes are among the tallest
Dunes here reach over 300 metres, coloured deep red by iron oxide that has been oxidising for millions of years.
Fun fact#521
Deadvlei's trees never rotted
The camelthorn trees died around 900 years ago but the air is too dry for decomposition, so they still stand black against white clay.
Fun fact#523
Namibia has the world's largest meteorite
The Hoba meteorite weighs about 60 tonnes and has never been moved from where it landed roughly 80,000 years ago.
Story#247
Stars over the Kalahari
The Milky Way was bright enough to cast a shadow. Our guide named constellations we had never heard of, from a sky map that had nothing to do with Greek myths.
Fun fact#525
Botswana's delta flows inland
The Okavango River never reaches the sea. It spreads into the Kalahari and evaporates, creating a vast seasonal wetland.
Fun fact#527
Botswana has the most elephants
Around a third of Africa's savanna elephants live in Botswana, concentrated in the Chobe region.
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