I spent a week in Burkina Faso by myself after a birding trip to Ghana. Burkina Faso, the former French colony of Upper Volta, sandwiched mainly between Ghana and Mali, is a very poor country. I had wanted to explore Mali but as it was deemed to be too dangerous, I chose BF and visited the capital Ougadougou, Bobo-Dioulasso in the SW and Kaya in the north on the edge of the Sahel, travelling by bus or motorbike. I concentrated on the people, their way of life and a few towns, with some birding in the arid savanna and open woodland.