After breakfast on the 6th floor of our hotel, we left towards Chinguetti. This is the longest ride of the trip. Close to 600km towards the center of the country and away from the coast.
The traffic in Nouakchott at 8am was crazy ... a good way to wake up quickly ... cars, carts, tuk-tuks, people, buses, taxis, trucks, dogs, donkeys ... all trying to get through intersections with no rules ... just good old organic feel and flow.
Before leaving Nouakchott, we had to look for gas. The first gas station was out ... gas was going to be a problem today. After finding some, we were not sure were we the next station would be and we did not have enough to make it all the way ... so we hoped for the best.
We made it to Akjooujt, a very small settlement half way to Atar and learned that there was no gas in town at the 2 or 3 gas stations there so we found somebody to sell us some from a 5 gallon container from his house ... crossed our fingers and luckily the bikes did not stop running in the middle of the desert.
We made it to Atar, a relatively large town that serves as the hub for this area. We did find gas there to top off before the final leg to Chinguetti ... 80km of dirt ... hoping for no sand.
The last leg was so remote that a feeling of awe was creeping in ... a feeling of being lucky to be able to be here in the least visited country in the world seeing what I was seeing ... a feeling of how different it was to be so far from people and towns, with only some water, a motorcycle, and a satellite tracker ... and nothing else. What if this motorcycle broke down?
We finally made it to Chinguetti, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, although it does not look like they have done much since earning its designation. Chinguetti sits at the very edge were the dunes of the Sahara actually start and go on for 800km East ,,, not a soul for 800 kms!
Our place in Chinguetti (La Gueila) is a great 7-room small home-fort-lodge which was a joint project by Sylvette (French) and Sid (Moor from Chinguetti). They built it from scratch over a period of 3 years all with local stone and local people.
Chris was feeling queasy and decided to lay down and skip dinner. I went for a walk to the edge of town where the dunes start to see the sunset. Sunsets in the desert are always very special and spectacular.
Chinguetti is a town that is definitely fighting against being swallowed by the encroaching sands ... most house/huts are half buried in sand, the streets are rivers of sand.
Tomorrow is a rest no-ride day ... we will visit the ancient family libraries in town and walk the dunes.
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