PlanetCatfish.com

I'm looking for the best (quickest and/or cheapest) route from Dar es Salaam to a town on the shore of Lake Tanganyika. I'll be in DeS in the first week of December and have only a few free days in which to get to Lake Tang and back. Figure I can't go to Tanzania and not make the pilgrimage to Lake Tang.

Any and all advice would be much appreciated.

Dinyar

(in Japan)

I wish you lots of luck, Dinyar.

From what I hear, getting to the lake in a few days is no mean feat!

I plan to go myself, but Africa being Africa I expect to travel at least a solid working week (5 days) to get there; 1 day to fly to the capital (of Zambia), the other days to travel over land to the lake. Maybe it's possible to do fast, but expect to spend a crate of cash to do so, I think.....
Tanzania is even worse, I've heard; corrupt to the bone, almost impossible to reach the lakeside, as most tourists go to the game-parks (safari; and the like), not the lake. There IS a lake-attraction there: the Gombe Chimpansee parc, it's located somewhere about the center of the east coast. I can't find anything on diving possibilities, this parc is the one studied by Jane Goodall (name might ring a bell).

The poeople I've spoken in person that went there (Rene Kruter, Ad Konings, Evert and some from the club) spend weeks or even months there. According to Ad, the Tanzanian coast is dangerous.
Not because of the Tanzanian people, but because the Congolese rebels, pirates and criminals cross the lake and rob and even kill people on the Tanzanian side. Rarely, but it happens.....

I have to admit, I will ravel first to some other third world countries before I'll break my teeth on Africa's rampant burocratical system; but you're probably much more experienced than me (I've been to northern Africa and the Middle East and hated it, what a mess...the diving was spectacular, but definitely didn't like the rest).

South America was pretty OK to do compared to that. Not nearly as corrupt, and people actually try to make it work; the bus, train, canoe, offices, paperwork etc.

Hallooo

Unfortunately it is really hard to travel in africa and assume than any travel times are going ot be at least triple what they would be in North Ameria, assuming that there are decent roads available. I'm Malawi a 200km trip took about 6 hours, 5 if we made good time, and that on a good road.
The problem with going to the lake is of course the dangers from the stuff like crocs, and even from the natives themselves, who , from the stories I've heard, can be hard on non native travellers. And don't forget to add in your extra cost, road tolls, police, maybe even a lake use fee that you might have to pay to whatever tribal chief owns the land you wish to use.
That being said it would be an adventure, but I would say it would take much more than just a few days, as it would probalbly be at least 30+ hours in the car ,if there was a decent road and somewhere to go.
To give you one idea the distance., it says 1200 km by rail from Dar, to Kigoma.
http://www.trctz.com/kigoma.htm

Giid kuck with it and let us know how it goes

Ghost

There's no denying the distance and the severe challenge of racing to the lake and back to Dar es Salaam in a few days. I have no personal experience of Tanzania to date, but... I suspect you guys exaggerate the difficulty ofgetting around in the developing world. I'm no Livingstone, but I have traveled a bit. Tanzania couldn't be any worse than being on my own in Ethiopia in 1993, just as three decades of civil war had come to an end.

Outside New York, people have this image of New York as a city with dirty, dangerous streets and subways, drug-crazed muggers and rapists waiting to pounce on every unsuspecting tourist... People actually believe this stuff. And we in turn have similar misconceptions of the rest of the world. Sadly, our experience of other countries often lives down to the preconceptions we have of them.

Dinyar

Seems to me Dinyar that you're dismissing valid first and second hand evidence as preconceptions and misconceptions. To compare it with urban myth about foreign places might be a tad ill-judged.

I suspect you guys exaggerate the difficulty ofgetting around in the developing world.

Don't think I'd want that as my epitaph!

I agree with MultiPunk. Even if you got around in Ethiopia after a civil war, it will probably still be next to impossible to make the trip in a couple of days.

Another thing a little closer that may be worth visiting are the famous reefs off of DeS. It's a much shorter trip!

Rusty

I appreciate all the valuable feedback and apologize if I gave the opposite impression.

I am originally from a developing country and travel extensively in developing countries as part of my job, so my perception of the hazards may be a bit different from that of most members of this forum.

I submit for your consideration that there is a difference between statistical risk and the perception of risk, and the riskiness of many activities declines with experience. Driving a car in a developed country is statistically a relatively high risk activity, but most of us do not flinch from getting into a car because, first, we are inured to the risk, and second, we have driven long enough that we have confidence in our ability to handle the risk. For a villager from Tanzania, the perceived and actual risks would both be different.

Dinyar

Best wishes, Dinyar, in your adventures.

Yesterday evening I read a short article by Ad Konings on cichlidae.com describing a visit to the Tanzanian coastline of the Lake, probably insufficient detail for you but it made me think that you should try to contact him yourself.

don't know what you have tried ... but the advice to contact Ad Konings at cichlidpress.com seems like very good advice. Ad must know alot about travel in the area around the lake, and/or knows others who are quite experienced, and he would, i think, be very sympathetic about your desire to see the lake.
maybe he could give some advice, or give you somebody to contact, about the best places and best path.

Hi

I am new to the forum my name is Pieter, we collect and export cichlids from Lake Tanganyika. I see there is a lot of debate on traveling to the lake. I am starting lake safari's in the new year it would consist of about 10 day's, I will pick up my client(s) at Lusaka Airport and take them to the lake in a luxury VW Combi. We will stay in a lodge were the food are excellent. We will do 3-4 dives a day on a Rib with one of our divers to see the best fish, other activities would also be included. After ten day's they will be taken back by myself to the Airport.

Hope this will help some of you guy's.

Thanks
Pieter

HI!
Now I have searched the web over and over again, and finally I found what I read about a while ago.

There is a swedish diving company, stationed in Dar es Salaam, that has fish collection stations both at Lake Tanganyika and Malawi. The Tang station is situated near Cape Mpimbwe. They should know!

Their web adress is http://www.africandivingltd.com

And adress:

African Diving LTD
P.O. Box 7095
Dar es Salaam
TANZANIA
E-fax: +44 870 126 7334
Fax Sweden: +46 418 432025
E-mail: info@africandivingltd.com

Try this, and you might have luck! I hope you will be able to do this trip!

An advice: keep away from the west bank in Congo! There has been recent massacres, and civilians slaughtered (Bunia/Bunja area). Several countries from both Europe and Africa are involved/have interests.. and that area will be very unsafe, as I read in the newspapers last weekend. Also is Uganda to be avoided just now, as "Lords Liberation Army" are really freaking out these days, in certain areas.

Good luck!

There are near daily flights from Dar es Salaam to Kigoma by Air Tanzania and Precision Air. Roundtrip cost is Tanzanian shillings 313,000, which is about US$300. There are several hotels in Kigoma, the best of which is the Hilltop Hotel. Security and safety is not an issue.

Dinyar
from the computer of a travel agent in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania