Deep water connects with shallow sandy beaches, heavy shorebrakes, strong currents and fast waves – if you think we are talking about croissants and cafe-au-lait in the beach cafes of Les Landes you're wrong. This is the set-up you will find if you visit the wonderful and largely unknown coastlines of Togo and Benin.

The newest addition to our PTS-Destinations are located between Ghana and Nigeria and home to a stretch of 180 km of mainly sandy beaches. Though most of the waves break with a heavy shore dump, exploring this under-utilised coast when it comes to surfing will lead to unexpected discoveries. Beyond the endless beachbreaks of shifting cobra-head peaks, there are serious rumours of heavy, long, lined up point-break perfection in both of these countries… when it gets big!

Google Maps let's go, or even better, make an offering to Mami Wata, one of the key deities in the Vodun (also known as voodoo) pantheon of gods, of which Togo and Benin are the birthplace.

So far surfing is an almost unknown quantity in these two countries. There are just a handful of local chargers and some expats enjoying the swells that light up the beaches of Togo and Benin.

That's why we decided to partner up with local surfers Hugo, Sina and Samuel to plant the seed of growing and strengthening the surfing communities in Togo and Benin, with the long term intention of creating a positive social and economic impact.  

Early 2024 we sent the first load of 50 surfboards to Aného in Togo. After the arrival of these boards our partner and swiss-army-knife of surfing stoke, Mr Brights from Ghana, came over to host a workshop in Aného with the local surfers regarding water-safety, surf-coaching for beginners, ding repair and the basics of surf-etiquette. First distributions of surfboards followed the workshops to make sure a growing surfing community will now tackle the waves frequently.

We can’t wait to follow the evolution of these exciting new destinations and will keep on supporting these fledgling African surf communities in any possible way. If you are in the area and want to visit these destinations or just want to help out, please let us know.

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