Hotel sector is decent, growing and expensive

Hotel is one of the things about DR Congo you should know. Kinshasa had just two international-standard hotels until ten years ago: the Memling and the Grand Hotel, which had formerly been an Intercontinental.

The SN Brussels Airlines Group owns the Memling, while the Congolese government owns a portion of the Grand Hotel. Following Mobutu's fall in 1997, and throughout the ensuing conflict between 1998 and 2002, the Grand Hotel housed government politicians as well as the higher echelons of the Angolan, Namibian, and Zimbabwean military dispatched to support Laurent Kabila's government. Antelopes were commonly seen running through hotel hallways at the time. The Grand Hotel is now undergoing a much-needed facelift, and its tenants are mostly from the business sector.

Meanwhile, as foreign businesses come to the country, at least six additional respectable hotels have been erected in the capital, and many more, ranging from magnificent to basic, are under construction. Travelers hoping for a good deal will most certainly be disappointed. The typical hotel room in Kinshasa costs between $150 and $200 per night, with higher-end hotels charging up to $300. The same is true for lodging in Lubumbashi, the copper-mining city. The eastern cities of Goma and Bukavu also have a good number of hotels, some of which are superb and most of which offer spectacular views of Lake Kivu. Prices begin at $100. The rest of the country's cities have few options for lodging.