Liberia- Monrovia, Libassa and Kpatawee Waterfalls

3 hours ago
3 min read

So my next stop in West Africa was Liberia. Beautiful, but small country. Lush green countryside and friendly people. I'm glad I stopped here. I almost bypassed it and I'm so glad I didn't! I hope you enjoy the pictures-I will say the tourism infrastructure is not really there, but I made it through due to my wonderful tour guide, Bassie, again! Now, the border crossing was chaotic! I had an evisa, because I originally planned to fly into the country. Well, they can only take evisa at the airport, so it was a process to get it printed(paid of course) and get it accepted. Then arguing with customs because they wanted to search my luggage, but I would have to wait until they finished a long line of searches- remember that overloaded van? They were packing that back up when they said they wanted to search my stuff...it would have been HOURS!!! Luckily my driver was able to get us out of that(Thanks James!!!) And we were off for the African Massage for 3.5 hours(extremely poor roads. Pot holes that could swallow up the entire car!) I should also point out that the roads were so bad that I lost a diamond earring. I suppose the seatbelt pulled it out of my ear at some point. I didn't realize it until I was in the hotel room about to shower- then I look in the mirror and one is missing. I freak out and start running through the halls thinking maybe I lost it when I was taking off my backpack and interrogating the staff(Even though I don't speak the language and they spoke broken English-truly comical!) trying to find out if anyone turned it in etc...luckily I found it the next day, but I had a rough night.

As I said, I traveled to Liberia by land, so these are pictures of when we were just entering the country and heading to the capital, Monrovia. Once in Monrovia, we stopped at the Presidents Museum. That's me standing at the Presidents' podium-lol!

Above was the city tour in Monrovia. Finishing up the Presidents museum, the waterfront and unification square, Providence island and the new mall that just opened. Below there is: Dukor Hotel- the first 5 star hotel in West Africa- unfortunately it is no longer in business. I couldn't actually get pictures of the hotel due to the fact that you can see into the US Embassy, so no pictures are allowed. I can say it was once a beautiful hotel. Too bad the civil war caused it to close down. I think they said they are going to try and rebuild a new hotel on the same site- which would be nice. It's a beautiful location!

Finally the Kpatawee kwaterfall. Beautiful area in the mountainside. It was about a 3 hour drive from Monrovia, but beautiful countryside. Unfortunately the villages look like this... there's a hotel on the grounds in case you don't want to make the 6 hour roundtrip trek in one day. They are individual bungalows with private bathrooms, WIFI and electricity.

I also spent the night in Libassa, Liberia(below) at an eco resort. I absolutely loved it! Part of it was because there was only 1 other couple there and beautiful grounds to explore all on my own!