I always follow through! I had originally planned to visit Burkina Faso last January right after my trip in Mali but when a coup d’etat took place in Burkina Faso’s capital city on January 23, about 2 days before I was supposed to visit, I ended up deferring the trip for another time. That coup lasted only 8 months, and since then things have remained relatively stable. Perhaps it was meant to be as I would have been essentially on my own in Burkina Faso if I had decided to continue with the trip last year, whereas waiting a year allowed me to find other like-minded travelers to join along with!
From NYC on January 31, I boarded the SWISS International LX23 direct flight to Geneva for a half a day layover, followed by Brussels Airlines flight SN2720 for an overnight layover in Brussels. Then on a direct Brussels Airlines SN 255 flight from Brussels, I arrived in the late afternoon at 4:35pm to Thomas Sankara International Airport in the capital city of Ouagadougou.
Showing my COVID-19 and Yellow Fever vaccination cards, I then was asked to fill out 2 nearly identical forms for my visa on arrival. I then needed to show a letter of invitation (provided by Papillon Rezen) and my hotel and the hotel’s phone number before being asked to pay 94,000 XOF/West African CFAs that I still had leftover from my Côte d’Ivoire trip 2 weeks ago.
After waiting for about 45 minutes, I received my passport with my fresh new Burkina Faso visa inside!
I was promptly picked up outside arrivals where we were then shuttled over to where the rest of the group was waiting at Hotel Lwili.
We then had dinner at the hotel, chatted amongst ourselves and headed to bed for a 7am wakeup call.
The next morning we set out for our 10.5 hour drive to Banfora.
- At time of posting in Koudougou, it was 26 °C - Humidity: 16% | Wind Speed: 10km/hr | Cloud Cover: sunny