07. Senegal
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Updates En-route: 14th February 2008
Posted on February 14th, 2008 by 2muppets.
Categories: 08. Mali, 07. Senegal
Post Location: GPS Map
Date: 14 th February 2008
Location: Kayes – Mali.
Distance travelled since last update: 416 kms.
Muppets say: Crossed into Mali – first border crossing with no hassles from the authorities!
Updates En-route: 13th February 2008
Posted on February 13th, 2008 by 2muppets.
Categories: 07. Senegal
Post Location: GPS Map
Date: 13th February 2008
Location: Koungheul - Senegal.
Distance travelled since last update: 356 kms.
Muppets say: Got visa’s for Mali, Nigeria and Cameroon so back on the road again! On our way to Timbuktou.
Cooling our jets in Dakar!
Posted on February 8th, 2008 by 2muppets.
Categories: 07. Senegal
Post Location: GPS Map
We have noticed on the guestbook that our fans are getting restless – fear not, we are alive and well. Dakar has been the carrot for so many of those tough days described in previous posts. My sister Carey, who is a pilot for SAA, arranged that she drop off my folks en route to the US and collect them on her return leg 5 days later. The bonus of getting to see loved ones is that they would also be bringing much needed bikes spares, tyres, sweets, hugs etc.
It is a great pity that Catherine could not join us after all the effort that she made to surprise her man Dan. Flights and a conference in Germany meant that she could not make it. Cape Town will be all the more sweeter!
Besides soaking up the sun next to the pool / beachside we have performed the well overdue 5000km service interval on our bikes – we are glad to report that no major issues exist and every thing is in fine working order on Bert & Ernie. We have also taken the opportunity of using a very helpful SA embassy here to push for as many visa’s as possible. We have collected the Mali visa (after buying the admin clerk breakfast so as to ‘speed up’ the process), and our passports are currently sitting at the Nigerian embassy for collection on Monday. We expect to have our Cameroon visas by Wednesday, then its farewell to the Atlantic as we head due East to Mali to take in the sites of Djenne and Timbuctou.
See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Mosque_of_Djenn%C3%A9
A full post will follow in a week or so summing up Senegal after we have travelled through more of the interior. A HUGE thanks to my folks and sister who have put us weary travellers up for the week and ran around like mad sourcing all our much needed bits and pieces.
If Senegal so far is anything to go by, we really are looking forward to the next leg of our journey.
Check out the kiff view boet !! (movie clip)
Cheers
Jody
Western Sahara & Mauritania. Down like a homesick mole!
Posted on January 31st, 2008 by 2muppets.
Categories: 07. Senegal, 06. Mauritania
Post Location: GPS Map
I’d love to be able to say that we’ve had a fantastically exciting time since our last update, but the honest truth is it’s been a pretty hard slog down through Western Sahara and Mauritania, two countries that definitely won’t be on any of my future travel itineries!
Western Sahara is a disputed territory, that in effect is now part of Morocco, with no border controls. The fact that the map on our panniers depicts a border at this point actually upset some of the locals, one policeman in particular decided to take exception to it, though with hasty apologies we were able to calm him down enough to wave us through the checkpoint!
Why anyone would want to fight over this land is beyond the both of us. Mile after mile of windswept sandy desert have resulted in the left side of our tyres being much more worn than the right, as we fought to keep our bikes on the road during exhausting days of riding. Rivers of sand swept over the road, deep drifts were common, and full attention was critical to safety, a fact brought home when we met two Hungarian bikers, one of whom had recently crashed into the back of his friend’s panniers, resulting in a cartwheeling crash for rider and bike. Luckily for Marton, the rider, his injuries were relatively minor, with the exception of a broken nose. The bike was totally trashed by any standard other than African, but within a couple of days everything had been “bent back together” and he very bravely was carrying on on their trip down to Ghana. Goodluck boys!
The standout impressions of Western Sahara were few and far between, but two things that did stand out were the camels and Laayoune. Exceptional rains late last year meant that the nomad herders had brought literally thousands of camels to the coastal areas to graze. There is something timeless about seeing a train of camels (including many calves) walking the desert against a backdrop of dunes, that made the hair on my arms stand out.
Laayoune was the biggest surprise of all. The return to the coast after our desert sojourns was a welcome relief, but inevitably the towns were a bit run down and shabby, and decent camping facilities were nonexistant. Don’t get me wrong, not every day was bad, but there isn’t much of an infrastructure for “tourists” in this part of the world - unless you drive a campervan, but that’s another story. Anyway, Laayoune was fantastic - Morocco is trying to lure settlers to Western Sahara for a referendum on whether it should become part of Morocco. We think that Laayoune, with its cheap fuel, cheap food, new roads, parks, and lovely people, is the bait!
The most exciting thing that we’ve been doing is our border crossings. The only way to put it is that we totally cocked up the Western Sahara to Mauritania border, and that was to haunt us for the next couple of days through Mauritania, and into Senegal.
We decided to cross into Mauritania on a Sunday, and since we’d heard that Mauritania has no ATMs we went via the bank in the morning. Dammit! Turns out that banks in Western Sahara operate the same hours as Western banks! No Fridays off for them, and no money for us! A quick add up and we thought that we had enough money to get us to our overnight location in Nouadhibou, and that we’d go into a bank to draw money the next day.
We set off for the border, into a driving headwind, and when our reserve lights came on 100kms earlier than expected, we had the sudden realisation that maybe things weren’t going to be such smooth sailing… Surely there’d be fuel near the border? Surely if there wasn’t, some enterprising local would have had a huge billboard proudly stating “Last fuel before the border!”. Surely if there wasn’t fuel on the WS side there’d be fuel close by on the Mauritanian side? Yeah right! Turns out all of this information is in the Lonely Planet, so I guess we should have read it!
We limped through to the border, made it across the 2km “No Mans Land” between the two countries, then dared go no further. What to do?! How could we make it the 50kms to the nearest fuel station? The decision was made for us by the money changers. We had no Euros to swap for the Mauritanian currency, and had to settle for an astronomically bad rate to convert our Moroccan Dirhams. Left with a paltry sum, we couldn’t afford to pay anyone to run us to town and back for fuel, and could pretty much only just afford the fuel itself! We were busy unloading fuel from my bike into Jody’s, when our saviours arrived - a trailer load of broken bikes from one of Nick Saunder’s trips up to Timbouctu. A lovely Ozzy chap named Danny let us drain the fuel from his bike, and we were on our way again, albeit at a greatly reduced speed. We made the fuel station, and my 25.5ltr tank took 25ltrs! Too close!
All previously planned piste excursions in Mauritania where hastily scrapped in Nouadhibou, when we discovered that only locals were allowed to draw money from banks, except in a couple of banks in the capital Nouakchott. Holy crap, a whole country to cross, with bugger all money! This is what it’s all about! A country with only a handful of places to buy fuel, and even fewer places to get money!
The last of our emergency funds were exchanged for Mauritanian Ouguiyas, and we made a bolt to the capital, crossing our fingers that we’d be able to sucessfully draw money. This is where the gods of travel decided to start taking it a bit easier on us for a while. While at a fuel stop we met Peter and Marton, the Hungarian bikers “competing” in the Budapest to Bamako rally (an orienteering type rally they were happy to point out had already finished!), and were invited to join them for a spot of beach camping. Peter bought fish from the locals and I made cous cous, and we had a right royal party on the beach, unfortunately sans alcohol!
With our sprits lifted by one of the best nights of the trip so far, our good luck continued when while stopped to talk to Norman (an Irish biker heading in the opposite direction), Hans and Nancy, a lovely Dutch couple driving a huge Dakar support truck type camper, stopped to chat with us.
Very cheakily I nerved to ask if they might be able to loan us money for the next crossing, and in proper traveller style the immediate answer was “Of course! No problem!” Norman gave us the details of a very good “fixer” at the Mauritania to Senegal border, and we continued on the bolt south. Mohammed turned out to be worth every cent - he greased all the right palms for us, and in short order we were on the ferry from Rosso across to Senegal, and into what for me is “real Africa”, and there’s beer!!!! This country is amazing after the desert, but more on that in the next post from Jody!
We’re now taking 5 days of much needed R ‘n R at the Zebrabar campsite in Saint Louis, before we head down to Dakar for another 5 more with Jody’s parents. Senegal has been the carrot for so long, and boy was it worth the wait! Tonight we’re hoping to come into town with Hans and Nancy to watch South Africa verses Senegal in the African football cup. Can’t bloody wait!