Asmara

Capital of Eritrea, a highland city of 600,000 to a million people (from video – unverified) that Harry describes as frozen in time: Italian art deco architecture (the Fiat Tagliero petrol station is the signature landmark), vintage Fiats, grand cinema-cafés, gelato shops, and pizzerias on every corner. Remarkably quiet, clean, and calm — locals call it the safest city in Africa, and Harry, on his fifteenth African country, agrees it feels like nowhere else on the continent.

What Harry did

Stayed at the Crystal Hotel ($60 a night, one of the country’s rare wi-fi spots), rented bikes from a former Olympic-family cyclist, left them barely locked outside the Medebar market and found them untouched, wandered the market’s chili stalls and from-scratch metal workshops, talked with schoolkids and an eloquent shoe cleaner, toured the permit-only tank graveyard of Soviet tanks from the Ethiopian war, ate a mediocre “ziggney” pizza while a wedding band played, bought the national football shirt from a five-language shopkeeper, fought the internet café and lost, and finished with $1 draft beers among peaceful Premier League fans.

Practical facts

• Airport taxi into town: $20 (from video – unverified); immigration can take a couple of hours.
• Crystal Hotel: $60 a night, clean, no air-con, working wi-fi — a rarity.
• Bike rental: 200 nakfa per day.
• Internet café: 15 nakfa an hour, but speeds are near-unusable and most services need a VPN; expect to go offline for your stay.
• Large pizza: 160 nakfa, around $8–10 (from video – unverified); draft beer about $1 a pint; football shirt 200 nakfa.
• Only carbonated water is sold — no still bottled water in the country.
• The tank graveyard requires a permit, arranged through a tour guide.
• Filming is restricted in some venues (a sports hall turned Harry away) — government rules apply even where the street feels relaxed.
• Bars don’t serve beer before 7pm in some establishments.

Harry’s tips

• Do the tank graveyard — one of the top sights, but sort the permit via a guide in advance (see travel with a local guide).
• Rent a bike; it’s the national sport’s home turf and the streets are calm.
• Come mentally prepared for no internet — treat it as a digital detox.
• Eat the pizza and coffee, but ask locals for the best pizzeria rather than picking at random.
• Visit Medebar market on a weekday morning when the workshops are in full swing.

Source

• Tourists Don’t Visit this Secretive African Dictatorship 🇪🇷 — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7uIyBvDGAI