The unexpected benefits of solo female travelling in Africa​

Africa is a continent often overlooked as a travel destination, especially for solo female travellers.

But as cliche, as it may sounds, I found myself in Africa and honestly think it’s the perfect place for solo female travellers.

Now safety is a big scare factor which many people have about Africa, which I talk about here.

I won’t pretend and want to start off this blog by fully acknowledging that it is easier for me, as a black woman to travel across Africa because it is. I like to wear my native clothing, walk, speak and behave like locals and I’m great at becoming a chameleon.  I know that I can easily walk around the streets without people begging, trying to sell me something, or just hassle me in general.

Even though this is the case, I do urge other races of women to also give African history, cultures and countries ago!

So a little brag time

The African countries I’ve been to are; Cape Verde, Egypt, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Morocco, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, The Gambia and Tunisia.

Solo travelling to these countries and living in some of them, there were a lot of things I expected to happen to me such as getting mosquito bites, being stuck waiting in traffic for ages, always being sandy etc. But there were also quite a lot of other things I didn’t expect about solo female travelling in Africa which I want to talk about below.

People want to help

Now I’m from London, the ice city.

People who are overly friendly or seem to want to help you, are often given a suspicious look as it’s not common in the city for strangers to interact like that.

Now I don’t know if their eagerness to help me was actually a sexist mentality, where it’s seen that women are incapable of doing their own thing or not but I’ll take it as a benefit.

Both men and women went out of their way to talk to me, help and guide me and with no monetary intention either!

They were just interested to meet a foreigner and wanted to know more about me, simple as that.

You’ll experience new opportunities

Well, this one is no surprise, you’re more likely to be approached if you are alone rather than with a group of friends.

Especially if you stay in hostels/hotels, as people often are solo travelling as well. You’re more likely to get invited to events.

Speaking from multiple experiences, I have been able to experience so many different things all across the world, whether it be road-tripping across an island, climbing an active volcano or partying it up in the favelas.

I’ve done it all! And I can definitely say part of the reasons I got these experiences was because I solo travelled and was open to meeting new people.

You can find a wealthy man

Now this one is for all women looking to practice hypergamy. As many African countries don’t get a lot of tourism, hotels can be really expensive.

This is as the people who use them mainly tend to be government officials, soldiers, diplomats etc.

As I mentioned before people are intrigued by foreigners travelling in their countries and often want to talk and get to know why you are there. Including these high-profile men.

It wasn’t hard meeting these men as all I had to do was step outside. This could be a great opportunity for those wanting to, to date higher calibre men as African men do like to spoil their women, which I can confirm!

But having said this, I’d advise a thorough background check on the men you choose to date.

Safe travels!