Thirsty Thursdays: My Top 10 And Bottom 2 Bars In Central African Republic 🇨🇫

“Love’s a hide and hate display” – Nicky Wire.

I never expected to visit 5 bars in the CAR, nevermind double figure it, but here we are, there we were. In my previous few countries – Niger I drinkpacked only 5 bars and in Burkina Faso just the 9, with Mauritania limited to 5 non-alcoholic ones. But here in Central African Republic, it was the drinking dozen, well 11 we drank in, and one we declined as they had no alcohol. Two of these are on the shitlist! All this after a completely mental four country, four attempt visa struggle. I already covered the Central African Republic visa situation in our top sights of Bangui post.

We stayed in the excellent Gust Hotel in Bangui (which will feature on this list) and it was thanks to Tognama there we got our visa 7 minutes before boarding the flight. Tognama also drove all the way to Boali Falls with us.

1.Village Samba Bar, Boali Falls

To be overlooking these beautiful waterfalls in the heart of Africa enjoying a beer listening to the water was a pure travel delight. It was a moment to cherish as we walked into Village Samba, the waterfall local! It felt lika a textbook African Pub we dream of and reminded me of Botswana Away in 2011 and 2019!

In here I chose the Mocaf Citron, which is a Central African Republic beer with lemon added. Surprisingly this one is only 2% but it did the job whilst enjoying one of the most remote waterfalls in the world.

2.Fuchsia Bar, Bangui

On our second day here, but the first morning we had our driver looking for a bar to relax with a beer. After a wild goose chase (the driver had no clue – a cheat scammer asshole called Michal / Mikhal) he took us to a cafe that was shut but was also a money changer. Then he took us to a shit hotel and got us scammed. Then he took us to a trendy looking “international” restaurant which didn’t sell beer! Finally we spied some bars ourselves with bar signs outside them and he stopped at Fuchsia Bar, which had a car park and was open, well we were the only customers…

Here in Fuchsia, we sipped two cold Mocafs each while our asshole driver decided to go on the drink and sipped a brace of 33 Export Cameroonian beer. Marek and I were more CAR nationalistic than him! The waitress was cool and the bar pumped a decent beat even though nobody else was here. I guess it gets more lively at night eh?

We saw the sign entrance reads FUCHSIA but instead of being pronounced FUCKSIA, it is pronounced FOOSHA!

3.Gust Hotel Bar, Bangui

Of course I gave to mention the excellent Gust Hotel Bar, our home for three nights. We actually drank here 4 days in a row as we had one last beer just before heading to the airport. It also holds the accolade of the bar where I had my first ever Central African Republic beer – a Mocaf! Thanks to Tognama, Desire, Bruno, Constantine and Alicia for excellent hospitality here.

We also tried the local drink Bilibili here for the first time. We also enjoyed Cameroonian red wine here and of course the daily breakfasts, football on the TV and ice cold Mocaf beers.

4.Four Saisons Hotel Bar

The swankiest bar on the list and actually one to dodgeball – the fucking Four Saisons Hotel and Bar. Skip it. Ripoff pricing and we were taken here as a scam by our asshole taxi driver Mickal who blagged the most expensive chicken dinner on the menu with us paying for it. This was not on our list of places to go – I hated it. Our friend and guide and visa hero Tognama had told our driver to take us to a trendy bar and restaurant, but he ignored that to take us here.

Still, the coconut balls and spring rolls were decent and the chef is a Chinese lad so they even had Chinese beer in cans. We drank the local Mocaf though.

5.Gust Hotel Balcony Bar – A Wedding Party!

Even more than just drinking in the hotel’s downstairs bar, and in our rooms, we managed to get an invite to a wedding in the swanky, trendy upstairs balcony bar. We didn’t gatecrash the wedding party, we were invited!

This was so spontaneous and organised by Daniel Yadin, on Marek’s right in the photo below. It was incredible to be attending a wedding party as the only foreigners – the local people were so friendly and welcoming. I was overwhelmed by it all.

6.Pierre D’Onx Restaurant, Boali

After backpacking the magnificent Boali Falls, a mini zoo, some local beers in Village Samba and crossing the Liane Rope Bridge, it was time for a lunch. We wanted to get away from Boali Falls themselves and settled for the Pierr D’Onyx Restaurant near the junction entrance to Boali Village, at Pierre D’Onyx, they even have a hotel…

Bar Pierre D’Onyx is in front of the gates to the hotel. This is a trendy wee restaurant, fairly upmarket I’d say and it’s on the periphery of a hotel here. We didn’t go into the hotel, which is Motel La Pierre D’Onyx. The Bar has seats with Onyx written on them but seems to also be called Chez Papa Elie. That said, their Facebook Page is Pierre D’Onyx and that’s what people know it by.

We ordered up the textbook local Mocaf Beers – standard for Marek and I. We ordered up a whole roasted chicken which came with sides of salad, dried then fried apples, dried then fried plantains plus spicy sauce. Tognama has a juice and we start chatting about life and travels!

In Central African Republic, food always takes at least an hour to arrive (except for breakfast at our hotel, which was basically ready for us at 7.30 a.m. everyday). After 2 hours, the chicken still hadn’t arrived and just before this, a chicken walked past us.

We joked that this was our chicken. It might well have been our chicken because about 10 minutes later, our feast arrived!

7.Orient Boutique, Bangui

Due to the security and police presence in Central African Republic, we got to the airport at 9 a.m. for a 13.40 p.m. flight. Yes, I know this is 4 hours 40 minutes early, but we were happy to just chill at the airport, maybe have a last drink and bite, grab some souvenirs and secure a safe and smooth passage out of Bangui and back to Addis Ababa in Ethiopia.

A shock was in store when we realised that at 9.00 a.m. not just one bar, or two bars, but three bars at the airport were open before even going through to departures. The boarding didn’t open until 10.40 a.m. anyway. We actually had time for a beer in 4 different airport bars as nuts as it nuts.

It’s got to the point where on Thirsty Thursdays I am even backpacking airport bars now on “Airport Pub Crawls” – we did the same in Burkina Faso if you read my Thirsty Thursdays on Ouagadougou! The first bar at the airport was called Orient Boutique! After two cold beers there, they suddenly had no more COLD beer in the fridge, so we looked around and…

8.Francia Boutique, Bangui

Opposite Orient Boutique we spotted another bar, called Francia Boutique. An irony here as it was originally the French Embassy in Warszawa that first refused to grant us a visa for the Central African Republic. In other irony, here we drank an Isenbeck beer which was “made in Cameroon, based on a German recipe”. Nice! We didn’t take any photos in this bar! It was opposite Orient Boutique, had a quick one and then were ushered to check-in to our direct flight to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

9.Airport Departures Downstairs Bar, Bangui

Once we had left our luggage in and got our boarding passes to WARSZAWA! Yes – Bangui to Warsaw (okay – via Addis Ababa and Vienna!), we felt more comfortable. We knew we were on our way home to Europe and that we would get into Poland with no more visa stress and problems.

We got our exit stamp and suddenly were in a relaxed going away lounge, where we spied two bars and four souvenir shops. We flew the Central African Republic flag while sipping what we thought would be our last Mocaf before boarding our flight. But the flight was delayed.

10.Voyageurs Airport Upstairs Bar, Bangui

The flight delayed gave us time to explore and I was surprised to find yet another bar upstairs in the airport. The two ladies working here were surprised to see two foreign white tourists and invited us in. I actually bought souvenir fridge magnets in here for Mum’s ever-growing collection. I think it was called Voyageurs Bar, which means Travellers in English, a reminder of the famous Traveller’s Tavern Bar at Vicky C which of course features in most of my books, specifically the Backpacking Centurion series.

We ended up drinking two more Mocaf in the delay and hanging out with the staff including bargirl Nicole and one of the customers joined Marek and I for farewell to Central African Republic.

And as we sipped the last sip of that Mocaf, it was suddenly time to board our flight direct to Addis Ababa. We met another backpacker here just before boarding – Laleena!

Now that’s my top 10 bars from our quick 4 day jaunt to  CAR, so now it’s time for the shitlist so here are the two to avoid!!

The Shitlist!

11.La Terrasse International Restaurant

Despite being called “International Restaurant”, this one let us down! It looked like it was open at noon on a Saturday for lunch and beers. When we got inside, we were the first customers, the only customers and they didn’t serve alcohol. As Marek professed, even in a 70% Christian country, “that’s not very international then is it?”

We gazed at the menu, decided not to order the “Zero Percent Beer” and left promptly!

12.Scammer Shit Hotel – Kitika Hotel

One hotel to definitely avoid is the Scammer Shit Hotel where Tunisians who acted like Jews co-operated with our asshole driver and the army to take our passports and scam money from us. Assholes. I left a massive shit in the toilet and didn’t clean it. I wish I had done it on the floor. I took 2 fast photos here as they banned us. Avoid it and do shits on their faces.

Here are some videos from my time drinkpacking the bars of Central African Republic: