Thursday 2nd February –Ouagadougou – Koudougou (Burkina Faso)

• Arrival into Ouagadougou at your own convenience. Those joining from our earlier Mali tour arrive from Bamako. (Expected at 11:20
• Pre-tour meeting and get-together with YPT guide and fellow travellers in the lobby of the Auberge du Grand Calao hotel to go over our itinerary and any plans for the coming days.
• Head out for lunch at a local restaurant to explore a little of Ouagadougou and get to know each-other before starting off proper.
• Kick things off with a short road trip to Koudougou, Burkina Faso’s third most populous city.
• Check out the Rayimi Museum, home to many old artefacts and photos, including an old national flag that went on the moon!
• Visit a brass workshop to see how local Burkinabe people work and what kind of crafts they produce.
• As the sun sets, it’s time to head out and explore the local nightlife and find a nice place for dinner.
• Overnight in Koudougou at the Hotel Dima.

Friday 3rd February – Banfora

• Breakfast in town
• Morning departure to Banfora via Dedougou and Bobo Dioulasso, complete with some stops at local roadside villages. We’ll be checking out granaries, a village potter, the pottery market of Tcheriba and their beautiful adobe (mud-brick) mosque.
• Visit the Fabedougou Domes to watch the sunset. These stunning rock formations are over 2 billion years old, yet they’ve hardly weathered at all in millennia. Looking closely, one can see the signs of ancient ocean erosion, from eons ago when the land was covered in water. This area was historically used by locals to hide from neighbouring tribes.
• Dinner in town with plenty of options from local maquis to nice and cosy French restaurants.
• Overnight in Banfora at the Hotel Calypso

Saturday 4th February – Sindou – Bobo Dioulasso

• Early sunrise boat trip on the Tengrela Lake where we can watch hippos up close and personal! (But not too close and personal… Though according to local legend, the hippos are sacred and would never attack humans.)
• Lakeside breakfast
• Travel onwards to the village of Sindou.
• Hike 1.5km to the Karfiguela Falls, a series of waterfalls that marks one of Burkina Faso’s most popular tourist sites.
• Picnic lunch by the falls and a dip in the refreshing water to cool off from the hot Burkinabe sun.
• Explore the village and the impressive rock formations for which it is renowned for, the ‘Peaks of Sindou’. Reaching a grand 415 meters above sea level, it’s the highest point in Burkina Faso. Historically, the peaks were a popular place for many to live as it offered excellent natural defence against invaders. Each rock formation has a story and our local guides can tell us all about them while we enjoy the stunning views of Burkina Faso.
• Drive out of Sindou and visit Kawara – a village of potters known for performing a traditional pottery dance.
• Continue onwards to Bobo Dioulasso, the second largest city in the country and home to beautiful neo-Sudanic architecture for dinner.
• Visit the maquis, typical Burkinabe open-air bars which turn into nightclubs. A good opportunity to mingle with the locals and have a fun time!
• Overnight in Bobo Dioulasso at the Hotel Villa Rose annex

Sunday 5th February – Bobo Dioulasso – Ouagadougou

• Breakfast in town
• Explore the old neighbourhood and grasp the feeling of what life was like in old Burkina Faso, or as it was known during the colonial times – the Upper Volta. Burkina Faso, the name given by Thomas Sankara, can be translated as “The land of the upright men.”
• Visit the Grand Mosque, built in traditional Sudanic architecture from the late 1900s, when this area was part of the ‘Kingdom of Sia’.
• Time allowing, followed by a short drive and a 1km hike to Dafra – known for the famous pilgrimage site in Burkina Faso where people come from far to sacrifice animals to the local catfish. Things get very real as we get up close to those animist rituals. Please note that it is taboo to wear red clothes and take photos on this site.
• Road-trip to Ouagadougou. We’ll make scenic stops and have a lunch break along the way to stretch our legs including a last stop in Bazoule – a sacred crocodile pond. Much like with the hippos earlier, the locals respect and co-exist with the crocodiles. The crocodiles are never hunted, harmed or killed. In exchange, the crocs do not eat the locals. Believe it or not, it’s even possible to play with the crocodiles, some of which are believed to be over a hundred years old, with the oldest dubbed the ‘old man of the lake’.
• Arrival in Ouagadougou, where we’ll find a restaurant to eat at and then go enjoy some night-life!
• Overnight in Ouagadougou at the Auberge du Grand Calao hotel.

Monday 6th February  – Ouagadougou – Tiébélé – Ouagadougou

• Early breakfast and 7am pickup for another long road-trip to Tiébélé via the city of Pô. It’s in this city where the military first rebelled in 1983 to overthrow the president and bring pan-African revolutionary Captain Thomas Sankara to power.
• Arrival in Tiébélé, where every house is a work of art! The traditional Gourounsi architecture is met with elaborate decorations to the walls of home, turning what could have been simple brown mud-brick to vibrant, intricate exhibitions of the local artistry of the Kassena people. Sometimes the paintings are purely decorative, other times they are an expression of local religion or commentary on life, much like western graffiti art.
• After a long look around, including visiting the local Royal compound, we’ll have lunch in a local encampment or in Pô.
• If possible, we may get to attend a traditional Kassena dancing ceremony!
• At around 3pm, we’ll make our way back to Ouagadougou for dinner and more nightlife exploration.
• Overnight in Ouagadougou at the hotel.

Tuesday 7th February – Ouagadougou

• Morning breakfast and an early trip to Laongo granite park. Here, over 2000 sculptures carved into stone greet visitors, expressing the history, culture, spiritual practices or even just the basic raw creativity of local Burkinabe artists.
• Return to Ouagadougou in the early afternoon to take in its sights properly.
• Explore Ouaga 2000 – the futuristic city project where you’ll visit two monuments of great importance: the Monument to National Heroes and the Monument to the Martyrs. If you’ve visited North Korea, you’d feel that these monuments would fit right into Pyongyang.
• Visit the roundabout of the Second of October – commemorating the day Sankara announced the Burkinabe revolution.
• See the local railway station, a pride of Sankara’s revolution where the Burkinabe people built the rail with their own hands, without foreign aid.
• Visit the statue of Thomas Sankara, where we’ll learn about Sankara’s role as ‘Africa’s Che Guevara’, a socialist revolutionary who continues to enjoy immense popularity among the Burkinabe population.
• Check out local bronze workshops to see some of the artisanal crafts the capital has to offer, following up by buying some crafts ourselves at the village markets!
• One last ‘Farewell’ dinner at a lovely restaurant in Ouagadougou, serving some of the best meals Burkina Faso has to offer.
• Tour concludes with airport drop-off arranged according to your flight details – YPT is also able to arrange post-tour accommodation or advice for flights. For those departing later, YPT can arrange visits to the National Museum, Music Museum and handicraft market of Ouagadougou.
• Overnight in hotel for those continuing on to Togo and Benin.

Wednesday 8th February – Ouagadougou

• Group members apart of our Togo and Benin tour board flight to Lomé, the capital of Togo – flight not included in tour price

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