What to Prepare for a Two-Month Stay in Senegal

Embarking on a two-month journey to Senegal with your family? Congratulations on the exciting adventure ahead! At MammaGloby.com, we understand the importance of thorough preparation, especially when traveling with little ones. In this guide, we’ll walk you through everything you need to know to ensure a smooth and enjoyable stay in Senegal.

Preparation of Your Home

Before you jet off to Senegal, it’s essential to take care of matters back home to ensure peace of mind during your travels. Here are some key steps to consider:

1. Manage Your Mail and Bills: Ensure you have a plan in place to handle incoming mail and bills during your absence. Who can pick up, store and later deliver your mail? Are you paying all your bills automatically? Are you expecting any irregular invoices to come during your absence? In Japan, managing bills and mail may differ from other countries. Japan Post allows you to hold mail for up to 30 days (see Q4 here). You have to fill in a form at the post office with the start and end date. First day after the end date, they will deliver all mail from the 30 days to your home. Some invoices cannot be automated so we asked a friend to take of them for us as well as pick up the mail for the time not covered by Japan Post’s service.
2. Home Care: Arrange for someone to water your plants and keep an eye on your house while you’re away. Additionally, decide whether to switch off utilities like electricity, water, and gas for safety and cost-saving reasons.
3. Rental Options: If comfortable, consider renting out your home through platforms like Airbnb to offset expenses during your absence.

Preparation of Travel Documents

To avoid any hiccups during your trip, ensure you have the following documents in order:

1. Valid Passports: Check that every family member’s passport is valid for the duration of your stay in Senegal.
2. International Driving License: If you plan to drive in Senegal, obtain an international driving license before traveling. In Japan, you can get them at local police offices or driving license centers.
3. Internationally working money card: Make sure that whatever kind of money card you are using, it is working internationally and also in the country you are traveling to. My bank once stopped my card from working when I was traveling in Morocco because they thought it was suspicious activity.
4. Additional Documents: Bring essential documents such as marriage certificates, birth certificates, health records, and vaccination proofs, especially when traveling with children.

Living Arrangements

Choosing suitable accommodation is crucial for a comfortable stay in Senegal. Consider factors like location, amenities, and accessibility. Price is of course another factor. Family expectations might be another. For accommodations there are of course a variety of hotels, apartments you can find on airbnb or villas you can find on sites like booking.com if you were to stay in e.g. Saly/Somone area.

Even though it’s often customary to stay with the family, we decided to stay in a seperate apartment. We simply booked an apartment through Airbnb. We found a decent size apartment that was just a 10 minute walk away from my husband’s family’s house. The apartment was well equipped with what we needed for the limited time we spent there and it worked out well.

However, there were four challenges with the apartment to which I recommend to pay attention to and get prepared for when looking to stay in an apartment in Senegal.

1. First of all, the apartment was right next to a mosque. The first few days we woke up with the first prayer around 5am due to jet lag and due to not being used to the noise. Friday evenings were also a little taxing with the 30-45 minute long prayer that’s being held around 6pm.
2. Another downside were the cockroaches. Small, yet re-occuring many many times until someone like a fumigator came by. He sprayed the apartment with something strong (make sure to leave for the day) and solved the problem. As there seems to be an easy fix, don’t waste your time with products bought in a supermarket but see to it that you have a professional fumigator come by and take care of it.
3. Third, the appliances in the apartment were functioning. Coming from Japan where everything and especially hygiene has a very high and modern standard, it felt difficult to get used to the standard of items. They were all working, yet all a little broken. The elevator broke 2-3 times. It’s wonderful to have to walk up to the 6th floor with 3 under 4 of which two can’t climb stairs yet while you’re also carrying groceries. Just for myself I wouldn’t have minded any of it. Being there with a baby for a longer period of time made me appreciate the comfort of my life in Japan.
4. Lastly, pay attention to the location in terms of ease of locating it, i.e. for an Uber Driver or a food delivery. Our location was very confusing to most and required extensive explanations each time. This often left us being even more late because a driver couldn’t find us for pick up.

What to bring

For packing, consider the time of year your are traveling, how long you will be staying for, how much little children might grow and therefore need a new size, as well as events and activities your are planning to attend.

Clothes

November is still very hot so bring summer, beach clothes and things to go for a swim. December however gets cooler so you might need a jumper and long pants, socks and closed shoes. 

In Senegal, people like to dress up, both for the daily out and about as well as for their occasions. We had a wedding, a birthday, a baptism and Christmas come up during the time we were there. It seemed as if more than half of our clothes were for a special occasion and the other days were kept fairly simple. 

Toys and Books

The point of travel is to experience new things. There will be plenty to discover for your kids so that you don’t have to bring too much. If you’re staying with family where there are kids, the likelihood is high that they can share toys with you. Also, you can find just the same kind of toys or at least similar ones to buy there, too.

On the one hand, I didn’t want to bring a lot of toys. It seemed silly to ship them half around the world. Moreover, I knew that we would spend with my husband’s family where there are plenty of kids and therefore, toys. On the other hand, I wanted to make sure, that my kids would feel comfortable in the new apartment and environment especially during the first days. I figured toys, books and dolls would give them a sense of security and comfort by seeing things that they know. 

Therefore, I tried to make a selection based on what they usually played with and what would be easy to pack. 

Duplo stones were surprisingly easy to stack. I squeezed their soft dolls between other items. For books, I focused on German books as I knew we would have plenty of French books available in Dakar, learning cards (we hung them up in their room on one of the first days which was a great activity and made their room feel a lot more homey right away), puzzles ( I threw the pieces in zip loc backs, so much easier than in their original boxes) were also easy to pack.

Baby Items

We were traveling with 3 under 4. Our youngest was 10 months at the start of the trip. We took a stroller, a baby carrier, her baby cot. Even though we never really used the stroller in Dakar, it came in handy in the apartment that didn’t have a high chair.

We had a supply of diapers and wet wipes on us to get through the first few days. You can find i.e. pampers diapers and wipes in supermarkets and pharmacies. From our previous experiences I had a pretty good idea of what we’d be able to get locally so that I did not worry too much about this aspect. You can read more about it in my post Traveling to Senegal with a baby. Going shopping, especially when you don’t have your own car can become a little bit tricky in terms of when someone will go with your request, with you, etc. to get what you need. 

What to do

Since we were going for two months and my kids have a fairly regular schedule due to their kindergarten, I wanted to make sure that we would also have some activities lined up in Dakar. Vacation and some idle time is of course great but I did want to have something to give them some structure at the same time. 

What I noticed during my search is what a great resource Facebook groups are. There is a general expats in Dakar group and a Parents in Dakar group who gave me many good ideas. From the parents in Dakar group, I got invited to a WhatsApp group with different channels for different ages of children to organize playdates. I found a swimming school via the Parents in Dakar group, got many great ideas of what to do but unfortunately never actually managed to go to any of the meet ups. 

After a few weeks of vacation, we signed the two older ones up for Kindergarten. We were lucky that my husband’s cousin runs her own kindergarten with several different classes and age groups. It allowed us some flexibility in terms of how often we sent them, from when to when etc. Going around Dakar I saw a lot of Kindergarten (creches).

Besides that, our oldest attended a weekly tennis lesson with her similar aged cousin at ‘L’institut’. This was organized through my brother-in-laws contacts to the tennis teachers there. If your family is interested in sports, the Olympic Club at La Corniche seems to be a great space for sports with offers for different ages.

One week, we took them out to do a little safari. We stayed in Saly over night and went to Band Reserve. This felt like the perfect safari with little kids. We could book our own guide and car when we spontaneously showed up on a Tuesday at 9am. After leaving in the four wheel drive it took just 5-10 minutes and we already saw the first animals. The drive was around 1.5 hours long and we saw many varied animals. 

You can find more of the things we did in my post Things to do in Dakar with a toddler. 

Getting Around

Your own car with/without driver: We all know the benefits of having your own car. It is just convenient to be able to leave at any time you want. At the same time, finding parking can be just as annoying in Dakar as anywhere else. Driving in Dakar might seem a little crazy at first. Once you get behind the wheel and start, you will realize it is not that bad. If you are not a confident driver, consider having a driver if your budget allows.

You can hail a taxi from the street. Even with 3 under 4 in tow. Most taxis will certainly not pass any TUV standards but I have always arrived safely at my destination. I am terrible at it and therefore don’t enjoy that you have to haggle the price for each taxi ride.

The ‘Local Ubers’ are Yango and Hitch. If you can get the apps working on your phone, this was a quite convenient way to get around. With these two price and directions are set and might made the journey a little more hassle free (others might say boring but with 3 under 4 there is enough excitement and I didn’t need to add more). Unfortunately, for me it didn’t work out on my phone though. While I could download the app, it wouldn’t work to receive the registration code so that I could never use it from my own phone. It worked out for my husband and I used quite a few Yangos organized through him. 

Connectivity

Every time I am in Senegal I am surprised again by how well the network is working. It is easy to arrange a SIM card from e.g. Orange. There is a e.g. a store at Sea Plaza where you can buy a SIM card just like anywhere else. Make sure to bring your passport as they have to register the SIM card to your passport. Consider returning the SIM card and de-registering it from your passport as you can only have 3 cards registered to your passport (in Senegal). If you are a frequent visitor this might be important to remember.

At the end

If you are traveling with small kids, especially toddlers who still put a lot of things in their mouth, consider taking a deparasite supplement to avoid getting worms at the end of your trip. Like everywhere there is a chance to pick up some little eggs who then develop into worms or other parasites. This makes for an unpleasant surprise ca. 2-3 months after you return home…