Crossing the Congo River from Brazzaville to Kinshasa… without a visa!

Crossing the Congo River from Brazzaville to Kinshasa… without a visa!

The Congo River separates the two closest capital cities in the world: Brazzaville and Kinshasa, the capitals of the two Congo countries. In some places, there’s less than a kilometer between the cities.

The ferry is a popular means for residents of both cities to cross the river. They don’t even need a passport, an ID card is enough. I wish I could travel back and forth between the two cities that easily. Unfortunately, I need a visa for both countries.

I had one for the Republic of the Congo. For the other Congo country, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, I didn’t (yet). And my boat was already heading toward Kinshasa. I watched as the shore of Brazzaville slowly disappeared, while Kinshasa came ever closer.

A lot was at stake for me in those moments. Either I would be allowed to enter the country despite not yet having a visa in my passport – or I would be denied entry. And then what would happen? Since I didn’t have a multiple entry visa for the Republic of the Congo, theoretically I wouldn’t be able to re-enter either. Would I then be stuck in a no man’s land between the two countries?

Regardless of whether I’d be allowed back into the ROC or not, if they didn’t let me enter Kinshasa, it would be a huge setback on my road to 197. Just with seven countries left! I had never been this nervous before a border crossing. But how did it even get to this point?

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Let’s go back one or two months. After visiting Yemen in April 2025, my 187th of 197 countries, I knew that one final difficult country awaited me among the last ten: the Democratic Republic of the Congo, one of the most corrupt and unstable countries in the world.

Before 2025, however, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) was a country that did not pose much of a hurdle for country counters. Most travelers visited DRC’s east for gorilla tracking – despite occasional unrest. That changed when M23 rebels took the region’s largest city Goma, effectively closing the region to tourists.

I had serious concerns that the country would close its borders to all tourists and no longer issue visas. So close to the end of my journey to every country in the world, that would have been my nightmare.

Fortunately, the conflagration has not yet occurred, and it is still possible to obtain a visa for the DRC. While the east is off-limits these days, you can still go to the capital of Kinshasa. That was the good news. For me, however, it turned out to be the most difficult visa I have had to apply for in the 191 countries I have visited so far.

The whole story of how I got the visa is epic and deserves its own article. It can be divided into three chapters, as I needed three different attempts. Let’s start with the first…

The visa application at the embassy in Bern, Switzerland

The DRC embassy in Bern doesn’t have a website explaining the visa process in detail. Based on information from visa agencies, I thought I knew which documents to send. So I was surprised when the embassy replied to my email saying I needed a letter of invitation.

With only 2.5 weeks until my departure, time was tight. Where could I get such a letter on short notice? A friend had given me the contact of a tour operator in east-DRC. Fortunately, he said he could help – and within 24 hours! The first hurdle seemed cleared.

I gathered all the documents and transferred the visa fee. The application form said standard processing takes 10 business days, which would leave me with only two days before departure. Too risky. So I paid an extra 30 CHF for express service. With the invitation letter in hand, I sent off my passport and documents. I had 16 days left.

Then… nothing. For a week. On day 8 after the embassy had received everything, I wrote to ask for an update. Given the express fee, I had expected a response much sooner. That same day, the embassy replied: they had my passport and confirmed the express fee. But my invitation letter was missing an official stamp. They asked me to submit proper documents before they would issue the visa.

I contacted the tour operator again. He said he couldn’t get another stamp, but there was an alternative document the embassy might accept. The problem: it would take him several days to obtain it. This meant I might not get my passport back in time. Since it contained all the visas for the trip, I really needed the passport back asap.

I’d heard that it was also possible to get a DRC visa in Libreville, Gabon, where my trip was starting — so I changed plans. I asked the embassy to return my passport and go for the plan B. Then…

nothing happened!

They ignored my first two emails. After my third request, they just resent the same message about the missing stamp – without any comment. Four days before my departure, I was desperate. I wasn’t sure if this was incompetence or a power game. Either way, they simply wouldn’t return my passport.

Panicking, I contacted the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs. I hoped they could pressure the embassy to return a Swiss passport, technically the property of Switzerland. The phone call was sobering. They told me there was nothing they could do. And hinted that it was my own fault for planning travel to a country they advise against visiting.

As a last resort, I turned to a friend who is a diplomat and was stationed in the DRC a few years ago, and asked him if he had any contacts at the DRC embassy in Switzerland. One phone call from him was enough, and two hours later I received a tracking code from Swiss Post with the letter containing my passport. I received it the next day, three days before my departure.

Second attempt: the DRC embassy in Libreville

In Libreville, things got similarly bizarre… but first, some background information. About three weeks before my trip, I saw that someone I follow on Instagram was in the exact same countries: Gabon, Republic of the Congo, and Democratic Republic of the Congo. He was the one who told me that I could also get the visa in Libreville.

He gave me the Whatsapp of a lady called Madame Bijou, who works at the embassy and was said to be very helpful. I asked her in advance whether Libreville offers same-day visas, which she confirmed, and told her that I would come on my last day in Gabon. Now, I was getting a bit more optimistic.

I showed up at the embassy in the morning, shortly after it opened. At the entrance, I had to hand over my mobile phone and was told to go to the building at the back to apply for the visa. So I did.

I entered a fairly large room with several chairs in it. In the middle sat a man in a suit watching TV. I greeted him, he greeted me back, and I sat down on a chair at the edge of the room. After about a minute, he said to me, “What do you want?”

It was completely weird because he didn’t give the impression that he worked there. I told him that I was there to apply for a visa. “Do you have your resident card with you?” he asked me. I told him that I was not a resident of Gabon but a tourist. “We only issue visas to residents,” he said.

I referred him to my chat with Madame Bijou and said she had assured me that I would get a visa. The guy was incredibly arrogant to me. When my guide finally showed up and asked what exactly the problem was, the guy became even more uncomfortable and said I was accusing him of giving me false information.

Somehow, I had the feeling that this was about money. The DRC is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. If I have to pay an extra €50 here, then so be it. The main thing is that I get the visa. But the guy just kept me waiting, and after about half an hour, he told me to come with him to this madame Bijou.

This lady was nice, but she confirmed that visas are only available for people who live in Gabon. So my plan B hadn’t worked either.

But there was still a plan C. A plan I didn’t really want to try, but now I had no other choice. The guy from Instagram who gave me the tip about Libreville didn’t get his visa in Libreville at all, but a transit visa for $100 directly at the border. I had never heard of such a visa. Apparently it worked for him, but I had my doubts. In this corrupt country, I didn’t want to arrive at the border without a visa in my passport…

It seemed as if I had no other choice. If that hadn’t worked out, I would have flown from Brazzaville, the capital city of Republic of the Congo, via Addis to N’djamena. I would then have had to fly back to Africa again just for Kinshasa.

Crossing the Congo River from Brazzaville to Kinshasa

So, crossing the Congo River without a visa was my last option. After spending three days in Brazzaville, I was ready to find out if it would work.

Before I start with the Congo River crossing… let me explain to you what a transit visa is. This visa is for people who are spending time in Brazzaville or Kinshasa but departing from the other airport. It costs $100 and entitles you to a short stay (7 days ) in the other country. Even the website of Kinshasa’s airport mentions it.

Now, how can you get this visa? Theoretically, it could work if you show up at the beach in Brazza (or Kinshasa) – where the ferry leaves – in the morning and say that you want to apply for a transit visa on the other side. However, I would not rely on this and get some confirmations in advance.

In my case, a few days before the river crossing, I received two contacts from immigration at beach Ngobila (Kinshasa) and one from the beach in Brazzaville and asked the DRC side in advance whether I would receive a transit visa, to which they replied in the affirmative. If you wanna read the chat, check out my story highlights on Instagram… it’s hilarious!

At the same time I pointed out to the Brazzaville side that I had been promised a transit visa by Kinshasa and whether they could confirm that I would be allowed on the ship with it. Here, too, I received confirmation that this was okay with them. It didn’t look too bad.

On the day I wanted to go to the other side of the river, I showed up at Brazzaville beach and looked for the gentleman I was in touch with. The only document I needed next to my passport was a printout of my flight ticket out of Kinshasa. Then my documents were prepared and I was ready to go. The whole process took about 30-45 minutes.

After that, I was advised to take a private boat for $200 for the 5-minute crossing instead of taking the public ferry. As I’ve rarely been so nervous before a border crossing, I said “ok, whatever” and took the private boat, which was of course also a rip-off.

However, it would definitely have been possible to take the normal boat, but at this point I didn’t want to leave anything to chance. And since the passenger ferries between Brazzaville and Kinshasa sometimes sink, causing people to drown, it was perhaps not such a bad idea to take a private boat.

When the boat finally set off, I knew that the moment of truth had arrived. In a few minutes, I would find out whether this transit visa, which I had never heard of before, actually existed. But since I had already been allowed on the boat, my confidence grew with every meter we got closer to Kinshasa.

There were two other men on the boat besides me: the captain and his assistant. Both were very nice men. At first, I was told to wear a life jacket, but once we set off, it didn’t matter anymore. I took advantage of the trip to take some photos and videos, since I was paying about $25 per minute on the boat.

Perhaps a small side note. This river crossing from Brazzaville to Kinshasa or vice versa is notorious for bribes. As a tourist, you are a target here and will encounter several situations where you will be asked for a bribe. Thanks to the private boat, I was able to avoid this experience. Presumably, the private boat was *the* bribe.

We got closer and closer to the riverbank, and finally I saw Ngobila Beach. I read the words “bienvenue a Kinshasa,” the capital of my 190th country. Now the moment of truth had definitely arrived.

In Brazzaville, I was told that people from immigration will pick me up at the beach. They did and took me to an office, where I paid the $100 fee for the transit visa. On the way there, a lady wanted to check my luggage, to which one of the immigration guys replied in the negative with “he’s a diplomat!”.

As I said, the $200 for the boat was probably enough of a rip-off that you at least get diplomatic treatment for it. Fair enough. But what was much more important now was that I got the visa.

I stayed alone in this office for about 30 minutes. Nothing happened. Thank God I had an e-sim with data. So, I could surf a bit in the internet and kill time. But then, the time has come: someone came back, gave me my passport, and here it was: the transit visa!

The long search for the DRC visa ended after three attempts at Beach Ngobila in Kinshasa! For me, the Democratic Republic of the Congo will go down as the country with the most difficult visa to obtain. However, it is important that this article can help anyone who wants to travel from one country to another but does not yet have a visa.

Now the catch: I was asked not to give out the phone numbers of the immigration guys and I will respect that. But there are still ways to get in touch with them. The tour operators in Brazza and Shasa, at least some of them, know people from immigration. Ask them first. Another option is to turn up at one of the beaches 2-3 days before the trip and ask your way through – with a fixer if necessary. Ask for a Monsieur Tresor (Brazzaville) or Monsieur Rodrigue (Kinshasa).

For me, this marked the end of what was probably the wildest border crossing ever. I was in the country, but the adventure was just beginning. Now I was in Kinshasa, the crazy capital of the DRC… trip report follows soon.

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Click here to find the trip reports of all 197 countries I have visited!