The Sahara – Laâyoune

What a tough day today has been. I rode about 550 km into a head & cross wind that lasted all day. Apparently the wind normally blows from the north but for the next few days (yes you’ve guessed it, until I’ve passed through) it’s coming up from the south. Great. And I mean a real wind, one that forced me to ride with my visor taped down or it just hurt. Apart from the first 100km or so it is now proper desert. The occasional lorry passes by and just in front of it is a giant wall of air that makes the bike even harder to keep on the road than it is already. Any sort of off or breakdown would be more than bad news. And then of course there’s the heat which is not too bad on the move but when stopped, me and the bike are all in black. Anyway, so the photos pretty much say it all really apart from a couple of meetings that are worth a mention. First up a old guy named Mohammed that got chatting to me as we were riding in Laayoune and being Mauritanian he offered me plenty of advice on the road ahead, the borders and even offered me a place to stay once there. What he did advise is picking up 400 cigarettes in order to make my passage more ‘smoother,’ which I did.* Sure enough within an hour a policeman tried to do me for 100 Dirams (£9) for passing a stop sign that was written in Arabic. Harsh! Twenty ‘Dunston’ (£1.50) later and I was off. I eventually got to Mick’s campsite he told me off which is miles off the main road and run by a Belgium couple(?!) Also here are three totally bonkers French couples, with three of them fully dressed in the ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ style! We all eat together and the Belgium lady cooked up camel and rice (shamel e ree, in French), which was very nice. And...I had a cold beer! I can’t tell you how good it tasted. He could’ve charged me 100 euros and I still would have paid. I’m still unsure of the situation with alcohol here but after a week without you really start to appreciate little treats like that or even running water. So here I am then bitten for the first 15 times tonight which will only get worse I’m sure but my belly is full, I’m clean, I’ve a full tank of fuel and I’m camped out in the desert with the most incredible view across the landscape and above all, I’m happy.
Tomorrow looks to be more of the same with a 500km ride through more bleakness to Dhakla, for the second leg of my trans Sahara ride.
Salude.
*It later transpired that ‘Dunstan’ cigarettes are unheard of, where of no use at the borders and the whole thing was a pretty standard scam on travellers, making them buy cheapo fags at a ‘friends’ shop for an inflated price!