Thanks to the wetlands just north and the Sénégal River south, the route to Diama is well known amongst bird watchers. We meet a group of almost a dozen tourists from Germany and Switzerland, coming the other way in 4×4 cars. They show great enthusiasm about our trip; give us cookies and water. “May I take a photo? May I?” one of them asks. Seemingly deeply honored, she then snaps us with her small compact camera, strapped safely with a cord from her wrist.

We stay the night in Bohaira, a small village not far from our intended border crossing to Senegal.

Summary Mauritania

In the same way that Western Sahara resembled Morocco, Mauritania resembled Western Sahara. Again friendly, hospitable people, good food and straight roads through a flat landscape of sand, gravel and stones. And again even more sparsely populated; more desolate. Further distances between the villages. Cities like towns, towns like villages and villages just a few houses. Higher dunes. We experienced our very first sandstorm – although “not even half a real one” as a more experienced Dutchman we then traveled with told us.

In the southern half of the country, the gradual change from the dry Sahara to the bushy landscape of the south gave us a hint on the lush green that would meet us by the other side of the Sénégal River.

Anyway the desolate desert lands are so much more than the sandy, monotonous landscape one imagines. There is a wonderful calm and serenity. A physical simplicity that helps one find a certain peace of mind. The environment is the very opposite of our cluttered society where the materialism and the TV ends up being more important than our own thoughts.

It is a choking hot day once again. We stop to inquire for cold bottled water at most of the many small shops along the way, but without any luck. The least hot water we finally find, is in a shop where the fridge thermometer shows 27 degrees Celsius. But the water still feels cold compared to the heat in the sun outside, and our water on the bicycle frame that is by that time almost boiling hot after several hours in the sun.

Up to Rosso, the wind is against us. In Rosso is the main border to Senegal. Boats bring passengers across the mighty Sénégal River, which continuously constitutes the border between the two countries. We decide to cycle a detour – we take a small road west that follows the river on the Mauritanian side, until it meets the Atlantic Ocean. The small road – or rather roads – isn’t tarred, and follows a big dike. The surface of packed but soft mud is comfortable to ride. It is even fun, like in a video game, to cycle crisscross between the potholes; trying to find the best track.

About 15 km down the road, we start looking for a place to hatch. We depart from the road and moves into a small village. The sandy alleys are so deep that we get stuck when we try to pedal; we have to push the bicycle. At a small kiosk, we ask where we can camp. The man behind the desk refers us to the village chief. In front of the kiosk is an open ground, and on the other side is the chief’s house. We find the chief himself outside, sitting on a blanket in the shadow of a tree; resting. We repeat our enquiry for a place to camp, and get permission to pitch our tents on an inner yard of an adjacent house. The compound seems to be the usual place to stay for guests and travelers that pass by. It is enclosed by a high, concrete wall. Inside on the yard are three tall eucalyptus trees, reaching far higher than the wall, sending their fresh scent through the evening air. Beneath on the ground, they lay out a large mat for us to pitch our tents on.

“Rice with fish at eight o’clock,” says the elder man that has been chosen by the chief to be our host. And eight o’clock it is – one of the best meals I’ve ever had. Homegrown rice, fried crispy in a mix of tasty spices. On top of the bed of rice is a big piece of fresh fish from the nearby Sénégal River. The younger man that shares the food with us (possibly the son of the our elder host), tells us that his family harvests 1,200 kilos of rice each year. The food, the ethnicity (Wolof) and the climate already feels Senegalese – we just haven’t crossed the border yet. Watermelon for dessert.

After we’ve finished the food, we quickly get into our tents because of the many mosquitoes. We’ve now entered the malarial part of the continent, and have to stay a bit more careful. W won’t be able to relax fully again until northern Namibia.

As I turn my torch off, a thousand other lights emerge above me. The stars are so bright. I lie on my back in the tent and looking up at the eternity above. The stars almost fall down upon my face and my body; the ground lifts towards the sky. It feels as if I can stretch my hand out and touch them. So close. Beautiful!

After a rest day in the capital, during which we also apply for and receive our Mali visa without any problems, we make an early morning start on our continued journey southward. The Dutch group decided to stay another day in the capital. Not much further south we start seeing green grass and bushes. They cover much of the sand, and contributes to a cleaner air; it gets more easy to breath. The number of villages also grow as we move south. Soon, they are rarely more than five kilometers apart.

After some 90 km’s, we stop for lunch at a small roadside shop. Inside, three women cook a stew of camel meat and potatoes, but they let us use their gas kitchen for a while to boil pasta. An elder man stands behind the desk. Everyone is laughing a lot, there is joy and friendliness. The women go outside and hide around the corner of the shop to smoke cigarettes – at midday during Ramadan. The Mauritanians are definitely less strict than the Moroccans when it comes to religion. The owner of the camping in Nouakchott, who was born in Morocco, even complained about his local staff, “They drink alcohol, and eat pork!” It is a bit awkward since this country as opposed to Morocco is named an Islamic Republic, and to some extent even has implemented sharia (Islamic religious) laws.

We reach small village Elejama. Not that far from the road is a grand, square tent, placed on a sandy ground in-front of the actual village. Two of its four sides are open; the canvas rolled up towards the roof. Inside are a lot of people; the atmosphere is lively. We are invited to stay the night by the family that lives there. The evening goes by with a constant flow of friends and relatives coming and going. From the outside, it looks like a simple tent that most people would pass without noticing, but inside it is full of life. We are given tea; socialize.

Mamoune is our best friend in the tent. He is twenty-one years old and studies economics in the capital. We are served great food: first a meal of potatoes, onions and camel meat, and then an hour past midnight rice with mutton. Again tea. Like usual around here, we eat together from a big, common plate. A bowl with water and a soap is passed between us before each meal, and we wash our hands. A friend of Mamoune lights up the food with his cell phone’s weak, blueish screen light. “A white torchlight would attract too many bugs,” he explains. And even though there are a lot of bugs around, at least there are no sandflies or mosquitoes like in the capital. We sleep well on the carpets that cover the floor.

We decide to join the Dutch group further and further south in the good, north wind. During a large part of the day, the wind is so forceful, and contains so much sand, that it feels like half a sandstorm – for one that has never experienced a real one.

After 165 kilometers, we are forced to separate from the group. They have skipped lunch – just eaten sandwiches and energy bars – while we needed real food. We finally find a small wooden shack by the roadside twenty kilometers further up the road. We cook some spaghetti, take a well-deserved break, before we continue our bid for reaching the capital.

We arrive two hours after the group, just as dusk falls and the evening prayers ring out from the many mosques of sandy, dusty Nouakchott. The group applauds us as we enter the camping ground – maybe needed to regain some lost energy for the evening. They also treat us with a delicious dinner.

Today’s stretch became the longest that we’ve ever cycled during one day, although much thanks to the strong, north wind.

Midday, a Dutch group of cyclists catches up on us. Their two support trucks, with food and most of their luggage, pass by first. “Will you join us for coffee up the road,” asks a smiling lady, stretching out of the car window. “We’ll be waiting about twenty km further on,” she adds as we accept the invitation.

When we reach, the ‘crew’ has already parked the two trucks parallel to each other. Between them, they’ve tightened a big white canvas, and in the shade underneath a group of comfy camping chairs make a circle around a pile of drinks and snacks. Soon, the group of more than a dozen cyclists arrive. They begun cycling in the Netherlands, and hope to reach Ghana in a few months’ time. The project “Fietsen voor Onderwijs” (www.fietsenvooronderwijs.com) is a private initiative to raise money for various NGO projects in Africa, but particularly in Ghana.

It is a beautiful mix o people, between the ages of 35 and 69. After the break we join them a bit further, and camp together 20 kilometers further south. When we reach, the site is once again already set up. They camp just by the roadside, far from any village or house – making it a new experience for me and Lina.

We are served chili con carne for dinner, and the group has even bought some wine at the black market in Nouadhibou (alcohol is illegal to sell in this Islamic Republic). Come night, everyone has pitched their tents except me and one of the cyclist who have decided to sleep outside on mattresses – too lazy to put our tents up I guess. But the strong wind blows up a lot of sand into the air. The sand literally piles up by the side of my body, like small dunes, and my scarp isn’t much help in trying to keep it away from my eyes, nose and mouth. I don’t get much peace for sleep, but it’s cool to listen to the wind; the desert nightlife.

Before we leave, the customs officers give us six (!) large baguettes to bring with us. If you are for once invited by officials (police, customs, doctors, military) in Africa, it seems that they always turn out to be amongst the most generous of hosts. It is as if they feel an obligation, as the country’s officially employed, to show the good face of their country. Whatever the reason it is nice!

Shadow at noon

By noon, we halt by a group of houses that line the road. A row of several barracks stretch along the road. In each of them is one or a few rooms. One of them hosts a small shop, but the prices are close to double those of Nouadhibou. We wait to shop until the next petrol station or larger village, where prices are often better.

Attached to one of the barracks is a big canopy, and underneath it on the sand is a carpet. It is a place of shadow, perfect for a short rest and to wait at for the midday heat to pass. A weak breeze occasionally cools the skin. We boil some pasta for lunch. A bit later, some local men come to do their prayers at the same place. We move to one of the carpet’s corners, but are able to stay inside the shade. If we would have to enter the sun, we’d been better of to continue cycle. It is unbearably hot to stand still under the sun, but the breeze when cycling cools down a little.

The air is so hot and dry that my shorts rustle like paper when I move. A few meters away, on the straight, flat road, cars – mostly Mercedes – rush past fast. One every ten minutes maybe. Rarely enough to break a silence; often enough to create a kind of rhythm.

Desert rain

In Chelkha, we stop by the petrol station. The village is small – seemingly a quite new settlement – and the petrol station even so new that some people in Nouadhibou didn’t know about it yet. There are so few stations along the road, that if a new one comes it usually doesn’t take many days from that the first truck has passed until the rumor of the new station has spread to the cities.

The station is owned by a father and his son. As the sun sets, they walk out together to the roadside. There they turn towards Mecca and pray. Earlier, the son sang out a prayer over the small village; towards the dark sky above – grey-blue clouds closing in from the East.

We tell the owners that we intend to cook some spaghetti for dinner, and ask if they want some too. Instead they give us spaghetti from their shop, which they prepare in their own way. Cooked in small pieces and then fried together with dried camel meat, pieces of potatoes and some onion. They show a warm hospitality, and believe it or not but spaghetti with camel meat was delicious!

We sleep on our mattresses just outside the stations small shop, under the open sky. The father and his son also sleep outside, on beds which they’ve brought outside. There is a little rain during the evening and early night, but just a few drops – nicely cooling on the face. They evaporate from the day-heated ground almost as quickly as they fall. I lie down to rest; cover my face with a scarf against the wind and the sand that it carries. We are given tea. There is a beautiful mix of low, distinct sounds. The whining wind and some crickets’ assiduous chirping at distance. The crackling from the radio and the charcoal grill. And the tranquil sound as the father pours tea back and forth between the small glasses. A soft, quick gurgle – a sound like waves reaching land.

We return north against the strong wind, cycling up the 50 kilometer peninsula. Back at the intersection, we continue east and then south towards the capital Nouakchott. The wind now in our back.

The road is occasionally lined by large tents in shades of white, grey and beige, standing in clusters of maybe a dozen. At one time, a woman runs out towards me from one such tent. I halt, and she asks me for cigarettes. And even though I don’t smoke, I have (long story) four packages of Vegas. When Lina comes, we decide to join the woman to her family’s tent. They give us tea and a meal of rice with camel meat and I give her the cigarettes in return, in fact glad to lighten my luggage. We rest for a while, while the midday heat passes outside, before we continue.

Later in the afternoon, we reach a customs checkpoint where we decide to stay the night. Lina also gets her very first puncture during the trip, and is able to patch it just as the sun sets. Despite not much wind, there is a lot of sand in the air. The customs have a barrack and a tent, seemingly placed randomly in the sand at about 50 meters distance from each other, some ten meters from the road. To walk between the two with our bicycles takes an unexpected amount of time and energy because of the deep sand – it is almost as heavy to lift the 50-60 kilos, as pushing them.

The officer on duty sits by the tent with slimlined shades on and let most vehicles pass by. Only trucks with fruits and vegetables from Morocco are stopped. Chuck – another officer in civilian clothes – invites us to sleep in the barrack. He himself thinks it is too hot in there, and prefers to sleep together with the other officers in the large, open tent, which also functions as office. Inside it is a desk, a chair and a stainless steal bureau. It looks a bit absurd inside that simple tent; in the middle of the semi-desert. Bureaucracy in the middle of nowhere. The only thing missing is one of those desk lamps with a cased green glass shade.

Inside the barrack, the floor is covered with carpets. The wooden plank walls and the roof of corrugated iron sheets is covered on the inside with patterned oilcloth. Chuck’s military green uniform lies on a broken camp bed; his beret and shades hang from a hook on the wall. In a corner lies two French ladies’ magazines – maybe gifts from bypassing tourists? Chuck drives off to a nearby shop and comes back with mango juice and bottled water for us. Later in the evening, he brings a tray of food for us: a sweet flour soup with lentils, served in pink plastic cups, and a saucer with dates. Very kind, even though the soup was rather gluey, and we were happy to have had our usual spaghetti earlier. We sleep on our inflatable mattresses on the floor.

To pass the Moroccan border (Western Sahara is as previously mentioned still occupied and controlled by Morocco) is simple, although very time-consuming. We are set to wait for at least an hour to receive our exit stamp. Maybe they tried to see if we’d give them something to get through faster?

Between the two borders, there is still some three kilometers of no man’s land, and a road that is yet to be tarred. It is practically the only stretch between Sweden and Mali that is still not tarred. The road forks into a maze of various paths and roads, without signposts or other guides showing which one to travel. At times, the sand is so deep that the bicycle must be pushed forward. What further complicates our advance is the many mines that have still to be cleared out from the disputed borderland. By the logic that there shouldn’t be any left where others have already passed, we stay extra cautious not to cycle on untouched ground.

In Mauritania, the officials are, although not much more friendly, then at least way faster than its Moroccan counterpart. The customs just wave us through.

After another hour or so of biking, we reach a junction where east leads to the capital Nouakchott and west to Nouadhibou – a seaport at the very tip of a peninsula that stretches south along the coast. We eat lunch there by the intersection before we continue to Nouadhibou. There, we stay at Auberge Sahara with friendly staff from Senegal and Guinea-Conakry.