Benin

Vodun did not begin in Haiti or New Orleans. It began here, in the former Kingdom of Dahomey, and in Benin it remains a living religion rather than an exported curiosity - practised, celebrated, central. Ouidah's Temple of Pythons is exactly what it sounds like. The Route des Esclaves ends at the Door of No Return, a monument to the millions who left through Dahomey's ports and never came back. Abomey's royal palaces are UNESCO-listed and genuinely astonishing, decorated with bas-reliefs that record a kingdom's entire history in clay.

Our guide is being written from the ground up, with the time this place deserves.

We are still gathering the notes that make a guide worth keeping: Ouidah's vodun ceremonies, Abomey palace routes, Ganvie lake village and the coastal cooking that carries the flavours of a kingdom that no longer exists on any map.