Sierra Leone emerging as tourist destination

Extreme vacation
Flights to Freetown are pricey (starting at $1,600 round trip from New York), but the trip is well worth it for the adventurous vacationer.

Once through customs — no need to bribe agents nor be alarmed if they chalk a large dollar sign on your suitcase, which seemed to mean nothing at all — the most harrowing part of the journey is the trip from Lungi to the mainland. Visitors must chose between a ferry ($5 each way, typically arrives late — or never), a rusty Soviet-era helicopter ($70, despite its dubious appearance and accompanying history of fatal crashes) and a hovercraft ($60, often arrives and departs on time). Take the hovercraft. Occasional accidents are inconvenient, but not fatal.

If you arrive at night, don't be alarmed by the fires that dot the landscape during the dingy shuttle-bus ride from the airport to the hovercraft terminal. These are the torches that light the unpaved streets; electricity is virtually nonexistent in most parts of the country. So are traffic lights, cash machines, indoor plumbing and a host of other things taken for granted in the West.

Flush toilets, clean water and other first-world comforts can be had for about $100 per night at a few hotels in Freetown's seaside Aberdeen section. Consider Hotel Bintumani, the country's largest, or the Cape Sierra, one of its most picturesque. Perched atop a rocky promontory at the edge of the Atlantic, the Cape Sierra offers clean rooms, a pool and a bar-restaurant with sweeping views of the ocean.

Lumley Beach is steps from both hotels. Flanked by blue-green sea on one side and cottage-dotted hills on the other, it's a pleasant place to relax, provided you don't mind the occasional panhandler or roving bootleg DVD salesman. Grab a Heineken for $1 at one of the thatched-roofed beach bars or stroll another half-mile along the water for a seafood meal at The Bunker, a shrimp dinner at Chez Nous or a cheese steak at Roy's. A delicious dinner for two, complete with cocktails, will set you back about $12.

Beyond the beach
For those willing to venture beyond the beach, there's plenty to do in downtown Freetown. A $2 taxi ride will get you to the city's center in 20 traffic-clogged minutes; hail a motorcycle and, for $1, you'll get a much quicker ride — and a delightfully harrowing experience weaving between smog-spewing jalopies.

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If you want to see the rest of the country, hire a driver ($150 per day, fuel included) to take you to the northern provinces. The countryside is still littered with burnt-out jeep carcasses and bullet-riddled buildings; as you pass through tiny villages, children emerge from huts to stare and point. Pack plenty of food to hand out — and for yourself to eat. There are not many places to stop for snack breaks, unless you want rural Sierra Leonean food like "crain-crain," a mix of fish, beef, spices, rice and cassava leaves.

The diamond-mining town of Koidu is about 200 miles from Freetown, a seven-hour trip on unpaved roads. There, you can peruse the wares of the diamond dealers sitting behind the barred windows of the shops that line the town's Wild West-looking main street. The doors and walls of the crumbling buildings still bear the bullet wounds of war.

Buy a diamond if you must, but make sure to declare it on your way out and pay the necessary 5 percent export fee. Conditions in Sierra Leone are improving, yes. But its prisons make American jails look like a vacation.

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