1.04 till 3.04.07, 2 days, currency rate 1 € = 650 F (CFA, Western Africa Franc)

highlights – a powerful wind, storm, panic on the streets, in the air piece of metal roof - Togo welcomed us to hurricane. It was the last destructive force that tried to hit us in Togo. Very nice and smiling people were around us. Even in the capital, Lome, was nice and the city center lie close to long, wide, sandy beach with palm trees.

In Togo, as well as in neighboring Benin, the most used beliefs is voodoo (in Benin exist even as official religion). Voodoo is something more than just black magic (although Hollywood shown just its dark sides) – it is animist believe in their Goodness and the spiritual world, in good faith and morality. We visited several fetish markets that for voodoo believers are for the same what for us pharmacy drugstore. Shaman, depending on the problem being diagnosed (e.g. disease), sends the patients to the bazaar with a list of shopping, that is, with the fetish “prescription”, which has an effective potential spiritual power. The range of choice is impressive: scary skulls and rats, monkeys, leopards and crocodiles head, stink dried chameleon, snakes, owls, bats and parrots wings, antelopes skin, vulture claws, scorpion tail, elephant bones and other animal parts in the form of teeth, hair, nails, feathers, scales, spines, etc. There are also voodoo dolls, nails, roots, plants, fruit and other unknown to me prepared mixture and magic items. Therefore, I recommend visiting one of these markets; there are a lot of them. A very popular one is in Lome, "Marche des Feticheurs". We arrived when there were no other tourists. There was no hassle and photos could be done in peace. However, I wouldn’t visit the shaman over there; it is look like pure commercial not much connected with real beliefs. In other parts of the country, in normal daily markets, fetish sellers also have its own stands, but rather they try to avoid the tourists, because for them their "cure" should not be the subject for the camera. In addition, in other more popular places they require payment for each photo.

We visited as well village Togoville on the shore of Lake Togo and our positive impression of this country has been strengthened. Help of locals, pleasant surroundings, the location of pub called "Happy Day" just opposite the cemetery. But I do not recommend visiting Maison de Royal; there are not much to see.

accommodation – hotel Lilly in Lome is a few hundred meters behind the border point, along the sandy roads near the beach. This is a brothel, so we had to wait until they clean the room and we have bargained the good price, but we could not use air conditioning. In the contrast with the public house in Togoville we stayed in Catholic Mission, each of us got a separate clean room with one bed. Chalets supervisor made a delicious meal at low cost.

transport – there is no charge for luggage, you need to bargain a bit, but it is not too hard.

visa – we entered Togo on Entante tourist visa (described in the "visa" Burkina Faso), valid for five countries. Cost us 20% of 25.000, which is 8 €.

Togo has embassies in Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana, Nigeria, Gabon, Libya and the Democratic Republic of Congo.