For many, the Loufoulakari Falls are the prettiest waterfall around Brazzaville: a curtain of water more than 40 metres high that the Loufoulakari River drops through the greenery before handing its waters to the great Congo River. They are in the Pool department, about 75-80 kilometres south of the capital, in a landscape of wooded savannah and gallery forest that is wild and barely touched by tourism.
The spot is a classic weekend escape for Brazzaville locals and for the few travellers who make it to the Congo: a green, cool natural corner, ideal for picnics, walks, a careful swim in the pools and birdwatching. There are no big facilities or hotels: it is nature almost in its pure state, with the power of the water and the sound of the falls as the only stars.
This guide explains how to organise the trip from Brazzaville: how to get there along the track, what to expect on the way, what you can do at the falls and what precautions to take. Loufoulakari is one of the most rewarding nature trips in southern Congo, perfect for anyone who wants to escape the city and see a different side of the country.
The Loufoulakari Falls formed where the river of the same name drops over a rocky step before joining the Congo River, in the heart of the Pool department, historic land of the Teke people and the Kongo-Lari communities. The Pool region, crossed by the road south and by the Congo-Ocean railway, has been both a breadbasket close to the capital and the scene of political tensions and conflict in the country's recent history. Today its falls are a natural refuge and a symbol of the wild beauty of southern Congo. Its background is told on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The laid-back capital born of Brazza's treaty with the Makoko, on the banks of the world's deepest river: birthplace of rumba, the sapeurs and the Poto-Poto school, facing the lights of Kinshasa.
Read the history of Brazzaville and the Congo River →No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
The Loufoulakari Falls are the product of the particular geography of southern Congo. The Loufoulakari River drains the highlands of the Pool department and, on its way down to the great Congo River, meets a rocky step that resists erosion. Unable to wear it down as quickly as the softer ground around it, the river plunges over that edge in a drop of more than 40 metres, forming the waterfall that visitors admire today. The site lies at an altitude of around 290 metres.
This kind of waterfall is typical of areas where rivers drop from a plateau to a lower level, as happens throughout the Congo Basin when water from the interior descends towards the great central river. In fact, the Loufoulakari Falls lie very close to where the tributary joins the Congo River itself, on a stretch upstream of the Pool Malebo and Brazzaville. Two falls about 300 metres apart complete the scene.
The result is a spot of great natural beauty: water, rock and tropical vegetation set among wooded savannah and gallery forest. The force of the falls changes with the seasons (fuller at the end of the rains, calmer in the dry season), but they are beautiful all year round, which has made them one of the best-loved natural sites around the capital.
The falls are in the Pool department, one of the country's most important historical and cultural regions. Its name comes from the Pool Malebo, the wide stretch of the Congo River opposite Brazzaville. For centuries this region was a meeting ground for two great Bantu peoples. The Téké (Batéké) ruled the inland plateaus with their kingdom and their king, the Makoko. The Kongo, including the Lari and other branches, are the cultural heirs of the ancient and powerful Kingdom of Kongo, which flourished near the Atlantic coast from the 14th century.
These peoples lived from farming (cassava, yam, plantain), river fishing and trade along the routes linking the interior with the coast. The Congo River and its tributaries, such as the Loufoulakari, were sources of life and routes of communication, and they also carried spiritual meaning: in traditional beliefs many waterfalls, pools and confluences were sacred, linked to water spirits and to the ancestors.
When Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza signed his treaty with the Téké Makoko in 1880 and founded Brazzaville, it was this very Pool region that ended up at the heart of the new French colony. From then on, being close to the capital shaped the Pool's fate, for better and for worse.
During the French colonial period, the Pool department surrounded and supplied Brazzaville, the capital of the French Congo and of French Equatorial Africa. Being close to the capital made it an area for crops, for recruiting labour and for the routes of major infrastructure projects. The most important was the Congo-Ocean Railway (CFCO), built between 1921 and 1934 to link Brazzaville with the Atlantic port of Pointe-Noire and bypass the rapids that made the river impossible to navigate all the way to the sea.
The CFCO line crossed the Pool and then the Mayombe mountains, and building it with forced labour caused enormous loss of life among the Africans recruited from across the federation. The railway transformed the region by tying together its transport and economy, but it also left a legacy of suffering. Stations, villages and markets grew up along the line, drawing the Pool into the colonial economy.
In this context, natural sites such as the Loufoulakari Falls stayed largely untouched by development and kept their wild character. Close to the capital but off the main routes, they remained natural retreats visited mainly by local communities and, later, by people from Brazzaville looking for a break from the city.
The Pool department holds a special, and at times tragic, place in Congo's recent history. Home of the Lari people and a stronghold of opposition political figures, it saw some of the harshest episodes of the civil wars that shook the country between 1993 and 1999, and renewed tensions from 2016 onwards. The militia known as the 'Ninjas' was active in these conflicts. It was linked to the pastor and leader Frédéric Bintsamou, known as 'Pasteur Ntumi', who operated in the region.
The fighting hit the Pool hard. People were displaced, infrastructure was destroyed, and for years serious insecurity made much of the department hard to reach, including travel by road and on the CFCO railway. Later peace agreements, such as the one in 2017, allowed things to return gradually to normal and displaced people to go home, although the region still bore the scars of the conflict.
For today's traveller, this means it is wise to check the situation before setting out and to travel with local guides or agencies who know the area. In normal conditions, trips such as the one to the Loufoulakari Falls go smoothly, but the Pool's recent history is a reminder that this beautiful region has been through hard times and deserves to be explored with respect and up-to-date information.
Today, the Loufoulakari Falls are one of the favourite natural destinations for people from Brazzaville and for travellers visiting Congo. In a country where tourism is still in its early days and infrastructure is scarce, the site offers a fairly easy escape from the capital: wild nature, water, savannah and forest just a few hours away. It is a place for picnics, careful swimming, walks and rest, far from the noise of the city.
The site keeps its authentic, undeveloped character: there are no hotels or major facilities, and the dirt-track access keeps mass tourism away. That simplicity is part of its charm. Local guides accompany visitors, charge a modest informal admission fee and help them find their way along the trails to the best viewpoints over the two falls.
Visiting Loufoulakari is a chance to see the natural beauty of southern Congo and, along the way, to pass through the human landscape of the Pool department, with its villages and their stories. A waterfall in the savannah, on the doorstep of one of Africa's calmest capitals, it sums up the appeal of a country that most travellers have yet to discover.
