Equatorial Guinea

Equatorial Guinea is Africa's great enigma. It's the only Spanish-speaking country on the continent, one of the smallest by population, and - thanks to offshore oil discovered in the 1990s - briefly had one of the highest GDP per capita figures in the world. The wealth, however, is distributed in ways that would make a medieval king blush. The Obiang family has ruled since 1979, making President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo the longest-serving head of state in the world.

The country itself is split in two: the mainland chunk called Rio Muni, covered in dense equatorial rainforest, and the island of Bioko in the Gulf of Guinea, where the capital Malabo sits beneath the cloud-shrouded peak of Pico Basile. In a move that baffled diplomats, the government built an entirely new capital city called Oyala (now Ciudad de la Paz) in the middle of the mainland jungle - complete with a golf course, luxury hotels, and conference centers in a forest clearing. Despite all the oil money and marble government buildings, most of the population still lives on less than two dollars a day. It's a country of staggering contrasts where you can find a Lamborghini dealership and a village without running water within the same hour's drive.