4-Day Djibouti Rift Expedition with Whale Sharks and Lake Abbe

Fly into Djibouti City and check into a comfortable harbour-front hotel with air-conditioning, a pool, and views over the Gulf of Tadjoura. The afternoon takes the measure of the capital: the whitewashed arcades and mosques of the European Quarter, the din and colour of the central market where Somali, Afar, Arab, and French threads knot together, and khat-hour people-watching from a café terrace. Dinner is Yemeni-style fish, split and grilled in a clay oven, eaten with the hands and without regret.

A boat day on one of the world's least-crowded whale-shark waters. In season, roughly from late October to February, plankton blooms hold juvenile whale sharks - six, seven, eight metres of unbothered grace - just off the gulf's shores. The crew reads the water, the spotter calls, and you slide in with mask and fins to swim beside the largest fish in the sea, often for minutes at a stretch.

Between encounters, enjoy coral-reef snorkelling, a grilled-fish lunch aboard or on a quiet beach, and the black lava coastline sliding past. Outside whale-shark season, the day becomes a full gulf snorkel-and-beach circuit, still one of the finest sea days in the Horn. Return to the hotel by evening.

Head west by 4x4 into the rift. The road skirts the Ghoubbet al-Kharab, the Devil's Cauldron, where the sea funnels between black volcanic walls, and crosses the young lava of the Ardoukoba fissure before dropping to Lake Assal: 155 metres below sea level, the lowest point in Africa, a turquoise lake rimmed in banks of blinding white salt.

Float in water ten times saltier than the ocean - not trying is mandatory - walk the crystal beach, and meet the salt caravans if the timing is kind. Then continue south and west across the Grand Bara desert plain and onto the volcanic piste, arriving at Lake Abbe as the light turns gold and the limestone chimneys begin to cast their long shadows. Dinner is served over the fire at a traditional Afar-style camp; the generator goes off, and the stars come on.

Rise before the sun for the reason the whole expedition bends toward this morning: hundreds of limestone towers steaming against the dawn, flamingos wading the mineral shallows, and Afar herders moving their goats between spires fifty metres tall. It is the closest thing to standing on another planet that a passport can buy.

After breakfast in camp, begin the long scenic run back across the Grand Bara, with a mirage or two and lunch en route, reaching Djibouti City in the afternoon with time to rinse off the salt before evening flights. Day rooms are arranged for late departures. Ethiopia, Somaliland, and the full Somalia & Djibouti expedition all connect naturally from here.