Dogon Country

Dogon Country (French: Pays Dogon) is the name used for a region of south-central Mali renowned for its secluded villages embedded on cliffs and for the region's distinct culture. Most visitors to Dogon country will start and in one of the couple of major towns connected by roads and trek to smaller villages.

Understand

Dogon Country's villages lie among the plains, and especially the cliffs along the Bandiagara Escarpment. For obvious reasons, it's rather difficult to reach the steep cliffside villages, where the Dogons have lived to protect themselves from potentially hostile neighbors, as well as wild animals. Today, the vast majority of the population lives in the plains below the escarpment in more recently constructed villages, but the old homes remain, and are taken care of and in excellent shape.

It's wholly possible to travel to Dogon Country without a guide, especially considering that you can hire a (French-speaking) guide at any of the villages for a negligible sum.

Cities

• Bandiagara

• Sanga

Other destinations

• Djigibombo

• Kani Kombolé

• Teli

• Ende

Traveling around

There are almost no roads in the region, except those connecting a couple of towns used as base camps with the neighboring regions.

See

There are hundreds of unique towns scattered throughout the region and while all are unique and, while there is no "typical" Dogon village, most can be found built into the sides of hills and escarpments.

Things to do

Trek to the small villages.

Eat

Towns will generally sell small quantities of food to tourists, but there are no restaurants outside the couple of major base towns. You will likely be sharing a meal with a family. You should bring food with you to eat, although there is food to be had in the more recent small guest-houses, where they will feed you sauce (occasionally meat sauce) over rice, noodles, or couscous. It's simple, but quite tasty and cheap.

Water is a scarce commodity (do not expect to use water for bathing or hand washing) and you should bring some with you, especially to prevent dehydration while trekking between villages.

Drink

There is no alcohol to be found outside of the couple of base towns, where you'll find beer, coke, and bottled water for about 1000CFA (1.5 euros).

Buy

Sadly, many (but not all) of the villages have learned the value of tourism and while the culture remains strong and the villages remain spectacular, expect to pay for everything from entering each village to photographing anything inside villages to meeting certain people (i.e. chiefs). Most villages will sell arts and crafts to tourists.

Talk

The local Dogon language is spoken by everyone, but due to its popularity with tourists French remains the lingua franca. English is spoken by only a handful of tour guides in the entire region and practically no one outside the handful of cosmopolitan (relatively speaking) base camps/towns. A working knowledge of French is essential unless travelling with one of the few guides who speak English.

Etiquette

Dogons are very spiritual and visitors should be very keen to respect their beliefs. One should always ask if it is appropriate to photograph something. Altars may look like piles of dirt to the untrained eye and religious buildings may look like just a house, both of which (along with people, unless you ask permission) should not be photographed.

Safety

If trekking, you should be in good physical shape and carry and drink lots of water to prevent dehydration. Also, be careful of snakes in brush (although most are nocturnal).