Mauritania

We are in Nouakchott. It’s pronounced “Noo-aaaa, aaa, aaaa, SHOT” like you’re sneezing. Staying in Auberge Sahara at the moment, we crossed the border, stayed in Nouadhibou for one night and then rode the 297 miles here in one sitting, stopping only for fuel, checkpoints and water. I shit you not, I drank three litres and didn’t need to take a piss. That’s what happens when you’re riding through the desert and it’s 43 degrees.

The checkpoints are becoming increasingly hostile and there are lots of men asking me for fish. Some just shout at you, others won’t get off their mattresses on the floors of their huts, and some just look intimidating but let you go through. Must’ve been 20+ stops between Nouadhibou and Nouakchott.

Which means we have come from here:

To here:

That's quite far. 

The border crossing itself took about five hours and wasn’t too bad. Those of you that are unfortunate enough to know me will be aware that busy places aren’t really my cup of tea unless I’m drunk, and this is a dry country – So I’m pretty pleased we made it out only having paid one bribe of 5E each to get the bikes in.

The driving here is beyond belief, god help you if you break down. The cars by the side of the roads are shells, everything – and I mean everything – is stripped. Driveshafts, brakes, engines, doors, interiors, even the roof panels tin-snipped out. Once moving you’re doing well if nobody hits you. Cars here don’t have lights, every one, all smashed. We also witnessed a man change a car tyre with his bare hands – no levers, just some engine oil as lube.

Now here’s where things have gone a little bit pear-shaped. No banks will change our small denomination US dollars (‘MERICA!) and the sole purpose of coming to Nouakchott was to get our Senegal Visas, which we’ve already paid for. Guess what? Despite selecting ‘collect from our Embassy in Nouakchott, pass go, collect £200’ you can’t.

“Machine is off”

“When’s it on?”

“Never. Go Rosso.”

“Fuuuuuuuuuuuu….”

Rosso is widely known as the most corrupt border crossing in Africa. We planned to avoid it, going to Diama, which is 60km away down a dirt piste, through a national park. As we won’t have our Visas, we can’t do that. Someone here, Ba-Ba (I never did ask if he had any wool), said he was a fixer there and the [Diama] border is closed now anyway, so Rosso it is. I might pre-lube so I’m prepared for the inevitable. (We’ve read of people having to ram the gates down to escape, money beaten out of them for getting passports back, and even people face down dead in the sand in the customs area…)

Oh yeah, also, our Visas are supposed to take 48h to process and aren’t valid until the 10^th. Our bikes aren’t allowed in the country after the 9^th. Super. We’ve tried to buy Carte Brun insurance here, but everyone looks at us like we’ve just taken a shit in their shoes, so we’ll do that in Senegal too.

Hopefully we can get the Visas at Rosso without getting killed, mugged, raped or relieved of our bikes, and hopefully we can change the date they commence.

We will leave tomorrow at sunrise. I've made a cover for my shopping basket out of pizza boxes and tape so the numerous thieves can't just take stuff from the top at will.