Angola: Ten Attractions and Natural Wonders

A big country still finding its feet as a destination

Angola is huge — twice the size of France — and it spent 27 years, from independence in 1975 to 2002, at civil war. Tourism is still small and travel is not always easy: distances are long, some roads are rough, and until recently visas were a struggle (an e-visa has made it much simpler). What you get in return is genuine scale and near-total absence of crowds.

The ten places below spread from the lush north around Malanje to the desert south around Namibe, with the ocean city of Luanda in the middle. A hired vehicle with a driver, or an organised tour, is the usual way to link them. The dry season, May to October, is the time to go.

1. Kalandula Falls

In the northern province of Malanje, the Lucala River pours over a wide curved escarpment in one of the biggest waterfalls in Africa — around 400 metres across and 100 metres high when the river is full. There is no fence, no ticket office, and often no one else there; a path leads down to the base for the full roar and spray.

They were called the Duque de Bragança Falls in Portuguese times. A simple government resthouse on the rim lets you stay the night and have the falls to yourself at dawn.

2. Pungo Andongo (the Black Rocks)

Also in Malanje, a cluster of vast dark monoliths erupts straight out of otherwise flat grassland — the Pedras Negras, the "Black Rocks." They were the natural fortress of the Ndongo kingdom, whose queen, Njinga Mbande, used them as a base in her long 17th-century war against the Portuguese.

You can drive in among them and scramble up the lower slabs. Local guides point out the "footprints of Queen Njinga," marks in the rock that tradition attributes to her. The rocks are on Angola's tentative list for UNESCO World Heritage status.

3. The Miradouro da Lua

About 40 kilometres south of Luanda, the coastal highway runs along the top of a stretch of dramatically eroded cliffs — knife-edged ridges and gullies in cream, grey, and rust, sculpted by wind and rain out of old marine sediments. The name means "Moon Viewpoint," and the light is best in the late afternoon.

It is an easy half-day trip from the capital, often combined with the beaches at Cabo Ledo further south. There are no facilities, just a pull-off and the view.

4. The Serra da Leba Pass

The southern highlands around Lubango end in a sudden 1,000-metre drop to the coastal desert, and the road down — the Serra da Leba — handles it with a series of tight hairpin bends stacked below a viewpoint at the top. It is the image on one of Angola's banknotes and the classic road-trip photo.

Come early: by mid-morning cloud often rolls up the escarpment and swallows the view. The pass links the cool, green plateau with the hot, dry Namibe region in under an hour of driving.

5. Cristo Rei, Lubango

Lubango, the main city of the southern highlands, has a 30-metre statue of Christ the King standing on the ridge above town, arms spread over the valley. It was put up in 1957, modelled on the older statues at Lisbon and Rio, and the terrace around its feet is the best viewpoint over the city and the surrounding mountains.

Lubango itself is one of Angola's more pleasant cities — mild climate, wide avenues, a base for the Serra da Leba, the Tundavala gap, and the highland scenery around it.

6. The Fortress of São Miguel, Luanda

The oldest building in the Angolan capital, the Fortaleza de São Miguel was founded in 1576 and for centuries was the centre of Luanda — first as a Portuguese stronghold, then, grimly, as a holding point in the transatlantic slave trade that passed millions of people through this coast.

Today it holds the Armed Forces Museum, with a courtyard of old cannon and large tiled panels telling the Portuguese version of Angolan history. It stands on a rise with a wide view over the bay and the city.

7. Kissama (Quiçama) National Park

Kissama, a two-hour drive south of Luanda between the Kwanza River and the sea, is the country's most accessible wildlife park. Its animals were nearly wiped out in the war; in the early 2000s the "Operation Noah's Ark" project trucked in elephants and other game from Botswana and South Africa, and populations are slowly recovering.

Expect wilderness and space rather than the dense game of East Africa — baobab savannah, birdlife, and the chance of elephant, antelope, and manatee near the river mouth. There is a lodge, and community-run camps on the Kwanza.

8. Luanda and the Marginal

Luanda is one of Africa's biggest and most expensive cities, a boomtown of oil money and hard contrasts. Its showpiece is the Marginal, a sweeping bayfront avenue rebuilt in the 2010s with a wide palm-lined promenade, popular for an evening walk with the skyline on one side and the Ilha peninsula's beaches and bars across the water.

Add the pink-and-white colonial churches of the old town, the National Museum of Slavery on the coast south of the city, and the hilltop Fortress, and the capital is worth a day or two before you head into the country.

9. The Namibe Desert and the Arco

The far southwest is true desert — the northern end of the Namib — running down to a wild Atlantic coast. Near the town of Namibe, the Arco is a surprise: a permanent green lagoon, fed by groundwater, sitting against a wall of red rock in otherwise bone-dry country, with a natural stone arch nearby.

Deeper into the desert, beyond Namibe, lies Iona National Park, Angola's largest, where the welwitschia plant — a living fossil that can survive for a thousand years — grows on the gravel plains. This is expedition territory: 4x4, fuel, and water.

10. Cabo Ledo and the coast

Cabo Ledo, about two hours south of Luanda, is the capital's favourite escape: a long sheltered bay with a reliable left-hand surf break, a few beach camps and bars, and warm water. Weekends bring a crowd from the city; midweek it is quiet.

The wider Angolan coast is over 1,600 kilometres long and barely developed — Benguela and the Baía Azul further south have calm, clean beaches and far fewer people, and the whole shore is a work in progress for anyone willing to travel it.

Angola rewards patience. The infrastructure is thin and prices in Luanda are high, but the sites are uncrowded to a degree that is hard to find anywhere else, and the country is a good deal easier to enter than it was a few years ago.