TOURING

Since the recent attack on French tourists in Mauritania, we decided it was best to drive straight through the country and come back another time to explore it properly.

We left Agadir heading down south along the coast with 1.5 hour driving sessions each so that we could cover as much road as possible each day without becoming too tired or bored as there is nothing but sand, dromedares and lorries. We stopped just after Tan-Tan Plage and bush camped somewhere hidden between the cliffs by the beach. Next day we drove down to Boujdour and the following day to a motel 60 km’s before the border to Mauritania. It’s quite a strange place for a motel as its in the middle of nowhere with a gas station, restaurant and a little shop. Anyway we got some rest and headed early the next morning for the Moroccan/Mauritanian border crossing. On the Moroccan side we waited for about 3 hours until they had stamped our passports and called out our names to pick them up. So off we went to the Mauritanian side which is about 3km of unsealed track where there are landmines around so you’ve got to follow the track which is actually very clear and no problems to follow, though it is in shocking condition with burnt out vehicles scattered about.

Once we got into Mauritania Erik had the bright idea of heading towards the Parc National Du Banc D’Arguin and camp in Arkeiss. That sounded like a good idea as it was heading south down the coast where we had to go anyway, plus lots of migrating birds (not that we saw any). We left the main road and headed towards the coast driving through sand dunes. Of course we got stuck a few times but got help from a French man travelling alone with his dog which was very nice! We found the camp site on the beach as it was getting dark only to notice that the wind had picked up which made it impossible to put the tent up, so we had quite a gloomy night eating our dinner and trying to sleep in the car – not a great success. Deciding we had had enough of sand and wind we headed back to the main road the next morning to Nouakchott, Mauritania’s capital, and found a good camp site to stay in.

The next morning we headed to Diama, which is the recommended border crossing into Senegal as Rosso is terrible and takes forever. The last 100 km’s of piste to the border was not as bad as we had expected and arrived at the border mid afternoon, only to be turned away at the Senegalese side because Milan did not have a visa (contrary to what we had read in books and what previous travellers had written). So we sped back to Nouakchott avoiding the random donkeys and goats on the road and arrived just as it was getting dark. Thankfully we managed to get a visa the next morning and drove down to Diama again. This time it was no problem to get through and we arrived at the Zebrabar just after St. Louis in Senegal late afternoon and were welcomed with some cold beers!

(Milan has written a long version of the border crossing as while I was watching the car and getting gifts from the very nice Senegalese people and chatting with them in my limited French, he had the difficult task of dealing with the ‘not so nice’ police man.)

Bushcamp after Tan Tan Plage, N28°27.092, W011°22.018.

Boujdour, Camping Sahara. New since November 2007 so very clean with great showers and toilets

Motel 60 km’s before the Mauritanian border. Basic but ok. N22°03.283, W016°44.848

Arkeiss camp in Banc D’Arguin N20°07.362, W016°15.346

Nouakchott: Camping at Auberge du Sahara, N18°06.161, W015°59.838. 1700 pp / night for camping