Police escorts and restricted motels: What’s it wish to journey in Libya for the time being?

In November 2025, James Willcox, founding father of journey journey firm Untamed Borders, led his first journey to the south of Libya in 14 years.

A devastating six-year civil battle and ongoing sporadic clashes because the 2020 ceasefire have rendered a lot of the north African nation out of bounds for travellers.

But attitudes are altering. The Libyan authorities is enacting measures to open the doorways to worldwide guests, whereas tour corporations are including itineraries to the nation.

Although Libya stays a difficult and doubtlessly dangerous vacation spot, tourism is rising.

How war-torn Libya is opening as much as worldwide tourism

Over the final two years, Libya has been making a deliberate push to draw worldwide tourism.

The nation launched an e-visa system in 2024, streamlining the as soon as prolonged and bureaucratic course of for guests. Where it as soon as required a visit to an embassy and months of ready, getting a visa is now an internet utility that’s normally accredited in a few weeks.

Renovation works have been accomplished at key customer websites and new points of interest are opening.

Last month, the revamped National Museum in Tripoli reopened after a 14-year closure, whereas intensive renovation work has been finished to Tripoli’s Old City of sand-hued buildings and souks, with assist from UNESCO.

Work can be resuming on key improvement websites, together with Tripoli’s Al-Andalus Tourist Complex with motels, a yacht marina and procuring malls, which had stalled for the previous 14 years.

Meanwhile, occasions are being held to draw extra guests, together with a desert rally in Wadi al-Hayat held at first of the yr.

A brand new nationwide airline can be being created to enhance connections to worldwide locations.

Tourists return to Libya after over a decade

These developments are already seeing a return. In the primary half of 2025, there was a 60 per cent improve within the variety of guests to the nation in comparison with the earlier yr, in accordance with Minister of Tourism and Handicrafts, Nasr El-Din Al-Fezzani.

The authorities says within the first half of 2025, 282,000 individuals visited Libya’s key archaeological websites, corresponding to Sabratha and Leptis Magna.

The uptick in guests can be as a result of the nation is present process a spell of relative stability, permitting entry to elements of Libya which were out of attain for over a decade, explains tour chief Willcox.

In November, Untamed Borders organised its first journey in 14 years to the Sahara Desert within the south of Libya, visiting areas together with the UNESCO World Heritage websites within the Jebel Acacsus, the Oases of the Ubari and the desert city of Ghat.

They additionally stopped in Gadamis, a whitewashed desert metropolis proper on the Tunisian border and a delegated UNESCO web site.

Untamed Borders has resumed non-public journeys to jap Libya, too, visiting Benghazi, the traditional stays of Apollonia and the UNESCO World Heritage websites at Cyrene.

Over the previous 12 months, the corporate has seen a 200 per cent improve in its bookings for the nation, in comparison with 2024. Initial bookings for 2026 are additionally already increased than the overall for 2 years in the past.

Tourists are given a police escort to journey in Libya

Despite the enhancements to providers and amenities for vacationers, travelling in Libya nonetheless comes with issues.

These embody getting permits and permissions required for a visa, coping with safety dangers, and logistical challenges in distant areas, explains Willcox.

One factor travellers want to arrange for is the requirement to be accompanied by authorities safety officers or a police escort.

“Generally, those guys are happy to travel around to the places listed, but the only real issue is that they have an agreement on where you’re going,” says Willcox.

“If you change that, you have to submit an application, so you can’t change things on the hoof very easily.”

Didier Goudant, a French lawyer residing in Portugal, joined Willcox on a tour to the south of Libya final yr.

He has visited loads of adventurous locations, together with Afghanistan and Iraq, but it surely was his first time in Libya.

“I really like Muslim countries, I always have a very good experience. People are really nice, welcoming and friendly,” he says. “I have a lot of colleagues who have been to Libya, including for work in the 80s and 90s. They always loved it and said it’s a great country.”

Although having a police escort may appear alarming, Goudant says their officer was unarmed and in plain garments, and primarily there to make issues go easily.

“There are checkpoints during the trip on the roads and so on, so the policemen can help if we’re asked too many questions, or it’s becoming difficult,” he says.

“The policeman in the north, in Tripoli, was a really nice guy. He had never been to some of the places we went to, so he was very pleased and was taking pictures with us.”

Libya stays on governments’ ‘do not travel’ lists

Another logistical problem when travelling to Libya is insurance coverage. The nation stays on many governments’ ‘do not travel’ lists. The UK’s FCDO advises in opposition to all journey to Libya aside from the cities of Benghazi and Misrata, for instance.

This means guests have to seek out particular journey insurance coverage corporations with insurance policies that can cowl these circumstances, as most traditional insurance coverage is invalidated if you happen to journey to an space with a authorities warning.

Goudant says this not often places him off a vacation spot, nevertheless.

“I follow the news and everything, and I talk to people. Obviously, with Untamed Borders, we don’t go into war areas,” he says.

“Basically, when you say Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, people think it’s still a war zone, still fighting, which is not the case. That’s the problem with how the news is managed and presented now.”

Beyond that, although, there are different dangers that may be tougher for ladies or LGBTQ+ travellers.

Homosexuality is illegitimate, so travellers ought to keep away from any public shows of affection. Willcox says gown codes for ladies are much less restrictive than in different conservative Muslim international locations, besides, they need to take care to keep away from revealing or figure-hugging garments.

The tourism companies betting on a journey resurgence

Despite a tourism hiatus of over a decade, customer infrastructure and hospitality choices are step by step being revived.

“While in Tripoli, I was surprised. It has a good hotel, a Radisson Blue, where all the UN people and the officials meet up,” says Goudant.

“We always go to a less flashy hotel because of the cost, and also you’re less of a target, but the one in Tripoli was still really nice and modern.”

In the south, funding can be rising, though at a slower tempo.

“Especially in the south near Jebel Aqaqus, there’s one area that we went to where there’s only one hotel that has sort of reopened,” says Willcox.

In the city of Ghat, on the Algerian border, there are a couple of motels at the moment being renovated, however which weren’t open for Goudant’s go to.

“We stayed in sort of a guest house. It used to be a school, I think, because there is no hotel fit for European standards,” he says.

Willcox says the desert was once a preferred location for tenting earlier than the battle. While the campsites nonetheless exist, they’re now “all disused”.

Goudant didn’t discover that an issue, although. “We freecamped in the dune. The guides know where to find a spot and set up camp. It’s just amazing and the landscape is ‘wow’.”

For Goudant, the expertise is one to repeat. “They’re not used to having tourists in Libya, especially in the provinces in the south, but people are really welcoming. The landscape is stunning and the dunes in the Sahara are incredible. I’d like to return.”