Talk:Angola Voyage Tips and guide

In this section appears this strange sentence: "From my experiences I believe that the most important thing to watch out for are the flyting hippopatamus's that can drop man eating porcupines that WILL NOT STOP for anything including americans!!!!!!!!!!!! "

what's that, a joke? {unsigned|89.96.237.130}

Some general silliness that was added a few hours ago. I've reverted it. If you see other nonsense like that, please don't hesitate to delete it yourself! - (WT-en) Dguillaime 13:07, 15 July 2009 (EDT)

Help!

Regionalising a number of the large African countries has proved to be a little easier than I thought it would. Not the case with the vast spaces of Angola. I am really struggling here. Maps:

• Topography
• Administrative regions
• Sat Image
• Ethnic Geography

My conclusions so far:

• The Cabinda exclave obviously needs to be its own region.
• There is a large area of savanna, tending towards desert, in the south (quite clear on the sat map). This includes much of Cunene and Cuando Cubango provinces.
• Most of the rest of the country is scarp woodlands, tropical forest or rainforest, at various elevations.
• The coastal plain is narrow and does not seem to make much sense as a travel region.--(WT-en) Burmesedays 22:25, 25 January 2010 (EST)

I tried working on this a few days ago, but gave up. Now I think I have a decent idea of what the country should look like. Here's an idea:

• Cabinda-obvious, not only is is an exclave but culturally & linguistically different from the rest of the country, has plenty of oil facilities and a secessionist movement.
• Northern Angola-along the DRC border and (I think) similar to Western DRC (Zaire, Uige, Malanje, Lunda Norte, Lunda Sul)
• Luanda-populous areas around Luanda (Luanda, Bengo, Cuanza Norte)
• Central Angola-highlands (white on topo map), Huambo was the last hold-out of opposition until 2002 in the Angolan Civil War, Benguela seems to be a popular destination (Cuanza Sul, Benguela, Huambo, Bie)
• Namibe-desert on coast (Namibe)
• Southeast Angola- rural, mostly open savanna with forest near Namibia's Caprivi Strip (Huila, Cunene, Cuand Cubango, Moxico)

As always, this is not precise and boundaries can be smoothed out. One thing I thought about is whether to merge Huila & Cunene with Namibe into a "Southwest Angola" region, as these are visited by overlanders as they lie along the main north-south road in the country and anyone coming from Namibia (or Southern Africa in general) will pass through them. A second change would be to move Lunda Sul with Southeast Angola and call the region East Angola. (WT-en) AHeneen 00:13, 26 January 2010 (EST)

I haven't done a lot of research, but the above looks pretty reasonable. My biggest concern would be whether Namibe could stand alone as a region, so I think the "Southwest Angola" and "East Angola" options provide a better balance. They seem OK based on the roads, topography and tribal breakdowns too. I thought maybe Namibe and Benguela could be combined into a coastal region, but I'm not sure it makes sense - Benguela seems to be much more tied to Huambo and Cuanza Sul than Namibe. (WT-en) Shaund 00:58, 26 January 2010 (EST)

Done. I went for the Southwest/Southeast option. As much I liked the idea of a separate desert region as it is so different to the rest of the country, it did not really make sense from a travel viewpoint. till open for comment of course. Very little re-organisation to do as we rather tragically have one city article only :( --(WT-en) Burmesedays 04:50, 27 January 2010 (EST)

I realize it has been a long time since this region discussion happened. But here are several suggested changes:

1. The "Central Highlands" region is fine geographically, but the name should be changed to something like "Central Angola" or just "Central". Benguela is definitively not in the highlands.
2. Lunda Norte and Lunda Sul are out of place in the "Northern" region. They have little to do with Zaire and Uige - different landscape, natural resources, flora, languages, cultures, history... They are much more closely related to Moxico and the Eastern Region. For example, Cokwe is perhaps the most widely spoken Bantu language in the Lundas, and it is also widely spoken throughout Moxico, parts of Bie, and a large part of Cuando Cubango, including Menongue. But you won't find any Cokwe speakers in Uige. Uige and Zaire are populated by the Bakongo people, somewhat mixed into the Kimbundu people in Malange - but you won't find any Bakongo and very few Kimbundu people in the Lundas. So I propose limiting the "Northern" region to Zaire, Uige, and Malange provinces, and either:
   1. making Lunda Norte and Lunda Sul their own region (Northeast), or
   2. joining Lunda Norte and Lunda Sul to Moxico and Cuando Cubango as the "Eastern" region.

Danny Reese (talk) 21:31, 18 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

Your proposal sounds reasonable. Part of the problems with creating the regions (as you may be able to discern from discussion above) is that no Wikivoyage volunteers involved in the creation of the regions had been to Angola, so the regions were based on deciphering content on the web. My proposal actually called the region "Central Angola" not "Central Angola Highlands"...but I can see from the use of the short dash (before I learned to use the em-dash) how "Central Angola-highlands (white on topo map)..." got turned into "Central Angola Highlands". The page can't be called "Central", because there are probably 500 Wikivoyage pages that can be called "Central" and they have to be differentiated...the only alternative would be "Central (Angola)" which doesn't look as nice or make much sense unless the region is actually referred to as "central".

Regarding the second point, again, none of us creating the regions had been to Angola. Dividing every country into regions was an important task, which sometimes (as in this case) got done by people who aren't familiar with the region...especially the case for most off-the-beaten-track nations in Africa. Until there's more content for the country, it probably makes more sense to join the Lundas with "Southeast Angola" and call the page "Eastern Angola" rather than create another region with no content.

By the way, do you know anything about the state of the railways in Angola? I had worked on the Angola & Luanda pages a few years ago and the railways were supposedly being rehabilitated by the Chinese...are either of the two southern lines open yet? AHeneen (talk) 03:42, 19 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

Thanks AHeneen. Who is capable of changing the regions now? For example, it means the map needs to be redrawn, even for a minor name change. Railway notes in the next section. Danny Reese (talk) 08:44, 19 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

I've gone ahead and moved the page to Central Angola & fixed reference on Angola page. I've also add a request to fix the map at Wikivoyage:Regions_map_Expedition#Country_maps & Wikivoyage:Requests for maps, although it's hard to say how long it will be until the map gets fixed.AHeneen (talk)

Thanks, good work. Danny Reese (talk) 17:48, 19 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

I'm feeling mappy—I'll do it. --Peter ^Talk 19:20, 19 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

Thanks Peter. Did you catch that there are two proposed changes to the map? 1) Change the region name from "Central Angola Highlands" to "Central Angola". 2) Limit the "Northern Angola" region to the provinces of Zaire, Uige, and Malange, moving the provinces of Lunda Norte and Lunda Sul to join the provinces of Moxico and Cuando Cubango as the new "Eastern Angola" region (which replaces the Southeast" Region). For this, you'll need to have a province map handy. Let me know if you have questions. Danny Reese (talk) 20:43, 19 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

I have now updated the map—let me know if I got anything wrong. The articles will need updating now, though, both to change the names on this page, but to also update everything that links to the outdated names, as well as the breadcrumbs in the articles contained by the old/new regions. --Peter ^Talk 01:36, 20 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

I think everything is in order now:

• Region names changed on Angola#Regions
• Region pages moved
• Links & breadcrumb links to Central Angola Highlands & Southeast Angola fixed
• No articles in Northern Angola were in region moved to Eastern Angola
• Region categories for Central Angola & Eastern Angola created, with old named categories redirected

AHeneen (talk) 03:24, 21 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

I've heard from BBC News that the Caminho de Ferro de Luanda (CFL; Luanda Railway) is rehabilitated by the Chinese Railway Construction Company. For more information, see the article "Angola's railways back on track" on the BBC News web site. (WT-en) CurvyEthyl 22:45, 16 September 2010

I typed the info from the BBC News article into the train section, just in case any reader wants to know.

(WT-en) CurvyEthyl 17:57, 17 September 2010

The 3 railways are all functional to some degree now. I don't have exact info. Cargo trains travel regularly on many sections of all three rails. The Northern rail has passenger trains on a regular (daily) basis in the Luanda area, and I think carries passengers all the way to Malange. The Central rail carries passengers twice a week from Huambo to Kuito and Luena (Moxico), and vice versa. I am not certain about the passenger lines between Benguela and Huambo, I'll try to check on that. The Southern rail is functional in some areas but I'm not sure which. That's all I know right now.

By the way, my editing time is very limited, so I won't be able to do much on the main Angola page. As I have time, I'll fill in the city sections, starting with Huambo, where I live. But it'll be slow. Danny Reese (talk) 08:51, 19 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

I've been adding some information about railways too. As I understand it the Luanda Railway between Luanda and Malanje is fully operational with passenger trains. The same for the southern line, the Moçâmedes Railway, between Namibe and Menongue. Traffic is however still quite sparse. There's a few branches to mining communites that are not yet operational - but they're of quite limited use to most travellers. As for the central Benguela Railway traffic is open between Lobito and Kuito. The stretch between Kuito and the DRC border is still beeing upgraded. --Jonte-- (talk) 16:16, 16 February 2013 (UTC)Reply

The Angola travel guide isn't an outline anymore. --(WT-en) CurvyEthyl 22:10, 27 September 2010 (EDT)

Per Project:Article status, please update it as appropriate. Only star nominations need to go through any formal process to have their status changed. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 23:44, 27 September 2010 (EDT)

This one still is an outline per Project:Country guide status, though. I'd say at the very least Luanda, Lubango, and Kissama would need to be usable, and the latter two are not. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 18:50, 28 September 2010 (EDT)

In the "stay safe" section, it begins by saying "you shouldn't travel within Angola without the assistance of qualified personnel", but it never really explains why this is the case. Most governments do not advise against travel to Angola, and I'm struggling to find much evidence for it being any more dangerous than, say, South Africa. If someone who has experience of Angola could either remove the statement or provide some more reasoning for it, I think it would improve the article. Unnachamois (talk) 00:25, 14 October 2013 (UTC)Reply

I just saw this and was going to ask the same. What is qualified? I guess they just mean a guide with local knowledge (which is actually a good thing to have). I'm also not convinced it is a requirement though. Does anyone else have experience of this? Andrewssi2 (talk) 15:37, 29 October 2013 (UTC)Reply

I don't, but just a quick google search does show several governments warning against travel in parts of the country (Cabinda, North Lunda and South Lunda) and advising high caution for the rest, not only for potential civil unrest or crime but also for landmines. [1], [2]. That's mentioned in the rest of the section, but I imagine it might be one of the ideas behind the "qualified guide" notion. JuliasTravels (talk) 16:19, 29 October 2013 (UTC)Reply

Perhaps qualified guides know how to avoid the "flyting hippopatamus's that can drop man eating porcupines" referred to in the first discussion above. Texugo (talk) 16:44, 29 October 2013 (UTC)Reply

Such a qualification would be valuable given those specific circumstances. I have however taken the liberty to rephrase until such time that we are confident that the man eating porcupines shall pose an appropriate hazard. Andrewssi2 (talk) 06:52, 31 October 2013 (UTC)Reply

Below is a proposed infobox to let readers know which formatting conventions to use in Wikivoyage articles. Do you agree with these proposals? If you have direct knowledge of what is most commonly used in the country, please let us know. Ground Zero (talk) 12:38, 4 December 2019 (UTC)Reply

Moved to the top of this page. Ground Zero (talk) 04:07, 28 December 2019 (UTC)Reply