"Visa cost shock 2009" Top 5 Page for this destination Liberia Tourist Trap Tip by melosh

Perhaps it is not correct to call this a tourist trap, but they do call it a tourist visa. If I was only going for tourism to West Africa, I would just skip Liberia and its $180 + expenses visa. 3 to 4 million people in a civil war ravaged country of high poverty does not sound like a tourist destination. It is not.

Perhaps the fact that the latest "Rough Guide to West Africa" skips inclusion of a section on Liberia, and "The Lonely Planet" has the honesty to admit that they did not go and just reported what friends told them, tells us more than that it is a country coming out of a horrific recent past.

Unique Suggestions: If you are trapped by circumstances to have to go this way, you would do best to make a local contact and add a non-tourist purpose. There are missionary groups and organizations like the YMCA that could use a delivery of books, medicines or sports gear. (I might be able to help you make such a connection.)

And once you are there, you just have to try Chicken Palm Butter. Try to have it over the best rice in the world--Liberian country rice.

Fun Alternatives: Ghana.