Comoros: A (Very) Brief Visit

Friday, February 7, 2025

This morning I was able to sleep in quite a bit, which was wonderful after the early wake-up call the previous day. At 11:30 I checked out of the hotel and went off to the airport. Check-in for my flight was easy enough, but passport control proved to be a struggle. The woman at the control desk seemed suspicious of my entry and exit stamps, perhaps because I had only visited for a short time and also visited Eswatini as well. She told me to go talk to someone else at a different desk across the hall. This woman casually glanced at my passport and said it was ok. When I returned to the control desk, the woman was still suspicious and it took several more minutes before she finally stamped my passport and let me through. It was very strange!

The Maputo airport is small and there was no where for me to get something to eat, so I spent the time walking around until it was time to board. Closer to boarding time, one of the ground staff approached me and gave me a piece of paper, which turned out to be my hotel voucher for my overnight layover this evening. I was flying from Maputo to the island of Comoros, with a layover in Ethiopia, The airline, Ethiopian Airlines, provides free hotel accommodations for passengers with long layovers, which is a huge plus so I didn’t have to stay at the airport all night!

My flight departed at 14:30 and landed in Addis Ababa in Ethiopia six hours later. There was a separate passport line for passengers with the transit hotel lodgings, which accelerated the process of exiting the airport. Once I was outside the terminal, it was difficult to locate the shuttle that would take me to the hotel. I followed several other people over to a nearby parking lot where dozens of shuttle vans were parked. A member of staff eventually showed me where my shuttle was waiting, but we had to wait several minutes until the van was full of other passengers before we drove to the hotel.

The hotel was basic, but comfortable for a night and it included a free dinner. After dropping my backpack off in the room, I went down to the restaurant to see what the buffet had on offer. Since it was so late, there was not a ton of options, but I went with the spaghetti which was decent. I spent the rest of the evening in my hotel room. Unfortunately the hotel WiFi was very poor, so I wasn’t able to do much this evening before bed.

 
Saturday, February 8, 2025

Country 134: Comoros

I had to wake up at 07:00 this morning so I could have breakfast before returning to the hotel. The breakfast buffet was rather grim, so I ended up just having some juice. The shuttle departed from the hotel at 08:00 for the short ride over to the airport. Security and passport control was quick and easy, thankfully. The Addis Ababa airport has several places to eat, but everything was ridiculously expensive, even for an airport. For example, it cost $20 for a meal at Burger King! Obviously I wasn’t going to spend that amount of money on a meal, so I just hung out until it was time for my flight.

At 10:00 the flight departed for Comoros. It was a relatively short flight and, at 13:50, we landed on the tiny island. The airport was very tiny and we deplaned onto the tarmac, where we were escorted by the ground staff over to the old terminal building (I’m not sure why we didn’t go through the newer terminal). The arrival hall was just one tiny room where both passport control and luggage claim was located, and everything was a bit chaotic. When I go to passport control, I was sent to a small office nearby where they processed my visa on arrival and I had to pay the $50 fee. I gave them a $100 bill and I was given €30 in change – they shortchanged me and didn’t listen when I politely pointed it out to them.

My transfer driver was waiting for me in the hall, but we had to wait a considerable amount of time for my bag to arrive. Everyone was crowded around the lone luggage carousel and it took ages for the bags to finally arrive. After about 30 minutes, my bag came around and we were able to leave for the hotel. There was one other American in the car with me who had arrived on the same flight. We spoke for a bit during the ride to the hotel: he is in the Navy and was in Comoros as part of a regional training exercise.

The hotel was located about 20 minutes from the airport and situated right on the beach. The staff were welcoming and showed me around the grounds, which were extensive. My room for the night was on the first floor, with a patio overlooking the pool and the ocean. It was a hot and humid day, so I spent some time cooling down in the air-con before going out for a walk.

The hotel had a few bars and restaurants located throughout the grounds, though most of them were not open during my stay. There was a nice lawn area with walkways that allowed visitors to look out over the ocean. The views were breathtakingly beautiful and I spent a considerable amount of time wandering around the walkways. There were some stairs leading down to a small beach area, where quite a few guests were enjoying the afternoon. I went down there as well hoping to have a stroll along the beach, but it ended up being quite small with nowhere to truly walk. I snapped a few photos before climbing back up the stairs to the hotel.

Comoros doesn’t have as extensive a tourist industry as other islands, which is perfectly fine, but there wasn’t much to do on the island that appealed to me. My stopover was primarily so I could check the country off the list more than anything, which was perfectly fine for me. I know it seems silly to travel so far for a very brief visit, but it was worth it to me in the end.

I had dinner at the hotel restaurant this evening, where I enjoyed a very good pizza with a cold beer (perfect after the hot day!). When I walked back over to my room (which was located in a separate building from the main area), there were dozens of large bats flying around. I’ve never liked bats, so I hurriedly made my way back to my room so I didn’t have to be around them for very long.

The rest of the evening was spent chilling in the hotel room. Throughout the day (and now the evening), the power at the hotel kept going out, often for extended periods of time. I was able to amuse myself by watching movies on my phone, but the room became hot quite quickly without the air-con. After going through several power outages this evening, I went to bed and hoped that the air-con would be on long enough during the night so I could sleep well enough.

 
Sunday, February 9, 2025

Today was my departure from Comoros – yes, it had been the briefest of stays, but it was enough for me. Again, beaches and things like that are not my type of thing, but I had enjoyed my short stay on Comoros. I went to the hotel restaurant for breakfast, but the buffet was only so-so and I did not eat very much. I walked around a bit more after breakfast before it was time to check out.

My shuttle to the airport departed at 13:00 and I was soon back at the airport. The departures terminal was only slightly better than the one for arrivals. Both check-in and passport control were quick and easy this morning, with none of the chaos from the previous day’s arrival. The terminal itself is one large building with rows of seats for waiting passengers. It was very hot and stuffy inside the terminal and I couldn’t feel much air-con (if any). I couldn’t find anywhere to buy drinks or food that was open, so I spent the time watching movies on my phone.

The flight departed at 16:30 and we flew back to Addis Ababa, where I had a much shorter layover this time. My connecting flight departed on time and I was finally off to Doha in Qatar. I managed to get some sleep during both flights, which was a blessing because it was 02:00 by the time we landed in Doha. Thankfully this was the last day of long flights, layovers, etc that I would have for the next several weeks!