the search continues...

With typical luck, we have ended up in Togo just a few days after the President died. He had been in power for 39 years and the democratic status was fairly ambivalent, to put it mildly, but stable. His son has been put in power by the military and is promising elections soon, but neighbouring countries are really not happy, and a whole bunch of regional leaders are heading here to Lome today and tomorrow to hold a big meeting with the new leadership. Togo was the first African country to have a post-colonial coup and one of the few to have seen little political change in the last few decades, so it is quite significant for the whole continent.

Things seem pretty calm now, apart from most of the shops being closed as part of a general strike, but it is difficult to tell how it will turn out so we might split to Accra tonight.

It's a shame because Togolese people seem exceptionally friendly and we quite like Lome, even though it is supposedly unsafe at night and our hotel is possibly the filthiest we've stayed in so far (and that's up against some stiff competition). But the dude who runs the hotel is nice, there's lots of yummy street food stalls with yam and plantain and chilli nearby, and the kids are super cute (again, there's some tough competition from their peers in Benin).

In case you're wondering, DFAT doesn't even publish travel advisories for Togo although the UK advised against it when the border with Ghana was briefly closed on Sunday, but that will presumably be reviewed again if it stays quiet.