On Friday morning the 25th of March at 6.30 I left Ndongane to go back to Spain. I gave Deanne a lift into town. She wanted to go to Ziguinchor. In Carrefour we had to say good-bye. The stalls were already open, so I bought some bread and vegetables for the trip. The first 20km was one of this incredible bad pot hole road. Luckily I had to turn left towards Kolde. In Kolde I was gasing up. In Carrefour there was no fuel for the whole week. I managed to buy some fuel out of a can on the black market. But in Kolde it was easy, no problem to get fuel. In Kolde the pot hole road started again. It is so nerve recking to drive on these roads.
There is never a second of relaxing. Always looking out for the next hole. I was heading towards Tambacounda. 30km before Tambacounda they were redoing the road. About time I thought. I saw one of this totally overloaded lorries tipt over to the side. It would not have been a problem but there was a taxi just underneeth it. Bloody hell. The turn down to Kendougou was luckily before Tambacound. It saved me another checkpoint. The checkpoints were always before and after a bigger village or a town. I was familiar to this road. The surface was not too bad for the first time, but than again it turned into a pot hole track. My steering was doing really bad. Doing between 50 and 60 km/h the steering wheel went from one side to the other, very fast, and I couldn´t control it. To stop it I had to brake the car down to 30km/h. And it happened more and more often. I thought that maybe I should remove some of the shims in the swyvel housing. I stopped on the campsite de Mako again. But before I could relaxe I was taking the wheels off and checked for the shims. Even with all the shims removed the swyvel housing was moving without enough resistamce from one side to the other.
So this is something to think about in the future. Anyway, after some dinner I took a beer at the bar and went to bed early. I left very early the next morning. It was a three hours drive to the border. On the Senegal side of the border there was the same guy than last time, and again no problem at all. If Senegal would be like this guy it would be great to travell there. On the Mali side I asked a guy who was parked up in a 4x4 at the side of the road how to get to Keniéba. He just jumped in the car and led me all the way into town. Very nice. Though it was a company vehicle so it didn´t cost him any fuel. It is good to know where to go. I went to the police office to get my visa. For the laissez passer I had to go to customs. The laissez passer is 5000CFA. I didn´t take care, but normaly you get a receipt. The guy didn´t give me one, so I guess the money was just ending up in his pocket. Luckily nobody asked me for the receipt, no in fact they did when I left Mali later. The road to Bamako was still under construction. Some good paved bits mixed with same terrible dirt tracks. On half way towards Bamako I had to stop. The river Bafing was crossing my path. The bridge was not finished yet. Hmm, what to do. I saw a service bridge next to the one they were building. This one was used by delivery trucks etc. Ok, I thought, I need to ask. I walk into the building site asking my way through to an office, and voila two japanese guys were in the office. I asked them if I could pass the bridge and they said after 5.00pm I could do so. Cool I thought, cause if not it would have ment to go all the way back. I just sat in front of the car reading and waiting. I was just sitting there when a huge delivery truck arrived, and a guy with a key for the gate.
I told this guy about the agreement I had with his boss and he just told me to pass on. Great. On the other side of the bridge a brand new paved road was expecting me. I was driving until I passed Kita. By nightfall I was stopping in the woods for a bush camp. To Bamako the next day it was only a three hours drive. Exactly in the middle of town I had a puncture. It is not very funny to change a tyre on one of this busy roads in town, but I have to admit nobody was honking or getting close to the car. I just had some people watching me, waiting for a chance to nick some tools in a unwatched moment. I never let the tools out off my sight or my hands. It was only another 10min. to go to the sleeping camel. The rest of the day I was just doing nothing. And the heat. I thought it might be hot in Bamako, but not that hot, man, too much. Even at night it was not cooling down. I reckon I was never that hot before in my entire life. A spanish summer feels like a cool brise compared to this. Anyway I had things to do. The first day I went to the immigration for the Mali visa and the second day for the Mauritanian one. Mali as usual was easy. At the Mauritanian embassy they let me wait for 5 hours, and I was the only one sitting there. But hey, what the hack, I´ve got what I needed. To the Mauritanian embassy I had to take a Taxi. It was just too far to walk. I mean I walked half the distance and than hopped into a Taxi. It saved me half of the money. The third day in Bamako I was using to do some shopping, cleaning up the car etc. I could´t wait to leave this place. I was just constantly sweating. The nights were the worst. I always woke up after maybe 1 hour sleep. I took a shower twice a night. Terrible. I thought of taking a room with aircon, but at the end I didn´t. On Thursday morning I left arround 5.50am to avoid the traffic jams in Bamako. I found my way out of town very easy this time. In Kati I filled all my tanks and the jerry cans up. And than I went for it. At the toll station after Kati I went by accident on the lorry track what I thought is no problem. They could have charged me there as well but no. I had to go back to the right lane. But not without a police officer turning up asking me for my car papers. After I paid the toll I went for my documents, but no this guy was causing trouble. He wanted me to go back to the last police checkpoint, show them a peace of paper he just wrote, paying a fine and then come back for my documents. This was a typical situation only happening to people with white skin. Look, 80% of all vehicles in Mali are in a very poor condition. They would fail at any serious police check. But if a white guy is doing a mistake, even by accident voila, he has to pay a fine. Not nice but that´s the way it is. I managed to pass the border into Mauritania the same day. The border was easy. No problem at all. Sure I had to go for a laissez passer and insurance and I changed the rest of the CFA I had. The guy who changed my money made a mistake in my favour. He gave me too much. It was just the money I payed for the fine the same morning.Between the border and Ayoun el Atrous I was stopping for a bush camp. I thought maybe it will cool down at least a little bit but it didn´t. Since I entered Mauritania the landscpe was turning into a desert. Less and less trees and more and more sand. So I thought I might have this deserty cold nights but no, just a hot wind blowing during the whole night . I didn´t get much sleep and at the end I had some terrible nightmares and was waking up with a hard pounding heart. Good, next day. I left late, I felt exhausted. In Ayoue el Atrous I was gasing up and had a nice surprise. The fuel consumption went down to 10Liter a 100 km. First I took it easy and second I had the wind in my favour. Uff, and than the 200km to Kiffa. Pot holes...again. But very bad. I tell you pot holes are the worst. I prefere a bad dirt track than a paved road with pot holes. Just before Kiffa the road went back into normal condition. The passe de Djouk was a nice interuption of the monotony of the desert and the sand. Rocks, mountains and a very nice palm tree valley. Beautiful. I kept on driving until nightfall. Close to Sangrafa I had another bush camp. And again it was too hot to sleep. But I knew the next day I will make it to Nouakchott which is at the coast and therefor has cooler nights. Gasing up I had a even bigger surprise. Fuel consumtion went down to 8,92Liter. I still had the wind in my favour and all the pot holes where troubeling me to slow down. But the engine had some cut offs, so it might be time for a filter change. I arrived in Nouakchott in the afternoon which gave me plenty of time to find the lodge Menata. I stayed there the last time. I went into a fuel station, thinking I could gas up for the rest of the money I had. I told the guy to fill for 4000 Ouguiya. He tried to trick me. He just started filling and was waiting for a moment when I didn´t watch. He was putting the tab back and pulled it out again and kept filling. Not the first time they try this. He wanted 4000 and I new he didn´t fill more then 2200. I said this to him and I was just sick of him, I started to push him, telling him he is the one trying to trick me. At the end he gave in and took the 2200. Man, sometimes it is not easy. I found Menata quite easy. After three days driving and I don´t know how many nights without a good sleep and the tremendous heat I was at my limits. I was sitting down doing nothing. And oh wonder in the evening it started to cool down. I had to take a shirt and still it felt chilly, fantastic. And I slept like a baby. Still I stayed in bed quite long. Sure, it was not getting hot before 10am. What a relief. I decided to stay one day in Nouakchott. I met Cora the owner of Bab Sahara in Atar where I stayed for new years eve. The next day was service day for the car. I changed the fuel filter and cleaned the sediment filter and the air cleaner. The overdrive needed some oil and the vacuum pump some grease. The job done I washed some clothes and the rest of the day I took it easy. I took off early again the next morning. I was heading for Nouadibou in the north of Mali. The only interuption to the driving were the check points. The landscape was not changing much. Just sand and rocks. No city or village. Sometimes a few hatches on the side of the road. I arrived in Nouadibou at 4pm. And it was cold. Maybe it was just me not used to the cold anymore but I had to put a jumper and a jacket on. I was freezing. After one of my typical driving meals I went straight to bed. It was just too cold to sit outside. I couln´t remember Mauritania being that cold in December. Again I had an early start in the morning. I went for the border to Morocco.
The Mauritanien side was easy. Just the normal checks and stemps but than the Moroccans. They had some sort of huge scanner in one of their buildings. The normal procedure took already a long time but than the scanner. Every single car and lorry had to pass it. Luckily it was not very busy. I don´t know what they were looking for, cause on top of it I had the car searched twice. They are just overdoing it. And the best was this dump lorry driver. I was passing between two lorries to get to the scanner and he was reversing without checking his mirrors and guess what. He reversed into my car. Once again, the Landrover is a solid car. It took a few scraches but the lorry looked actually worse than the Landrover. Still it was not exactly making me happy. But what to do. The police asked me if I want to charge him, but than he was from Mauritania and than to wait for what. No I thought, this was bad luck but not really a big damage so what the hell. I was happy when finally after spending three hours at the border I could go on. I wanted to spend the next night in Dakhla. I arrived in the evening. I fixed the damage as good as I could. It looked already much better. The rest has to wait until I am back in Spain. Dakhla was somehow a very nice town. People were friendly and everything seemed to be very cheap. First I changed some money which got me a more than 10% better exchange rate than the guys at the border were offering me. The campsite was 2,70€ for the night. The only cheaper place was Casa Africa in Bobo Dioulasso. And the fruits and vegetables as well. I went in one shop where you chose whatever you like and put all together in one bowl. No matter if it´s oranges, tomatoes.....! At the end I just payed 36 cents a kilo. This is by far the cheapest shopping I had at the whole trip. And the fuel, 47 cents a liter. When I left Dakhla it was around 10am. The drive was rather boring. I still had the wind against me, but a strong wind. They do have checkpoints as well in Morocco but far less than in Mauretania, and the guys were all friendly, without any exception. I almost made it to La Ayoune. I wanted to sleep somewhere at the beach but all off a sudden there was no acces to the beach anymore. So by nightfall I saw a track leading to the inland, I just followed the track and after a few yards I stopped and stayed for the night. It was not the best place, still very windy, but it was good enough for one night. The next morning the wind had changed, and it was getting very warm. So maybe the cold I felt in Dakhla was not normal after all. Yesterday morning I felt very cold and I asked the guy if this temperature is normal and he ment yes, but who knows maybe it was not. La Ayoune was a very friendly looking big town. For me it seemed like the first outpost of Europe. La Ayoune looked definetly like an european town. Only the surroundings are different. It is a town built on sand and surrounded by sand. I was getting lost in town and was driving round in circles but at the end I found the right road. After La Ayoune it was the same scenario like before. Nothing else than rocks and sand. I filled up again, this time even cheaper. 45Cents a liter. I asked the guy were to find the last cheap petrol station. In the north of Morocco fuel is 50% more expensive so I wanted to fill up at the last possibility. I remembered a place close to Tan-Tan, El Quatia it was called. I stopped there on the way down. I was tired anyway and I decided to have a early stop today. The place is close to the beach. I took a walk down the beach and later I took a hot shower. They had brand new toilets and showers. The owner is from Mauritania and was quite happy when I told him some stories about his country. The next day I made it to Agadir. Tiznit which is 100km before Agadir is the point where Africa ends and Europe starts. The roads were getting busy, the stations looked like real stations and not just two pumps in the sand. I couldn´t deal with the traffic anymore. It was too much for me to have all this cars around me. Sure in the big towns there were always a lot of cars, but not on countrs roads. I felt quite insecure. Agadir was even worse. But I remembered a big supermarket in Agadir. I went inside and bought all sorts of useless stuff. The night I passed at the same campsite where I stopped on the way down. Again leaving early the next morning. I took the closest road towards Casablanca which was my desteny for the day. Casablanca is a boring place with only mad drivers. I didn´t like it at all. I just went on, it means I waited somewhere quiet until the traffic calmed down and than I went on to Rabat. I slep outside the mauritanian embassy. I knew this place and I knew when I get there at a Suterday night nobody will be there. And so it was. I was the only one. I had a fantastic sleep, but I have to admit I was getting to my limits. The next time I do this I will take much more time. Maybe three days driving and than maybe one or two days rest. But I had this job waiting for me in Belgium and I had many things to prepare. For this I just kept going. The next day was a Sunday and it looked like everybody wanted to spend it outside town in the greens. There were thousands of people in the forest around townI started on the country road towards Ceuta but after one hour I gave up. Too much traffic. I took the motorway until Larache. From Larache to Ceuta I took a very beautiful road to Ceuta. I didn´t know Morocco is that green and has got so much agriculture. Getting closer to Ceuta I was getting a little bit nervous. But the border was no problem at all.
There was a guy turning up who wanted to search my car, and he asked me where I come from and I said from Bamako and he stood there open mouthed and let me pass. Ceuta, still in Africa but already in Spain. I wanted to sleep at the coast. There is a nice parking place but it was Sunday evening and all the youngsters were out showing off with their music equipment in their cars. It was useless. Somewhen after midnight I left and looked for a different place to sleep. I found one not too far off and finally was undisturbed. The next morning I went into town to buy a ticket for the ferry. Before the next one was leaving I had three hours time. I took the time and had a long walk into town. Back at the port I was waiting in the queue to pass customs when this french guy turned up asking everybody for some jumpleads. I asked him where his cars was parked and he showed me a blue Audi A3. Ok I thought why not. I gave him a jump start and he went into the queue before me. Customs was controlling with a drug dog and guess what, this guy was a dealer.
He had drugs welded into the back of his car and the dog found it. They took the car directly into the garage and took it apart. The best part is still coming. They, the customs, said, now you, me, are in trouble because you are his friend. And all this cause I gave this guy a hand. At the end they came with the dog and let me pass, but I thought, I came that far and than almost at the end of the trip you give someone a hand and thanx for this you are into trouble. So, this was the last time I helped someone. This was actually the only serious situation I had on the whole trip. After one hour on the ferry I hit eurpean soil. After a couple of hours on this totally overfilled motorways I was back home.
Keine Kommentare:
Kommentar veröffentlichen
Comments welcome