Driving down to Nouachkott

Leaving Chinguetti I was glad we were back on the road again.

The road after 'Atar' airport (which they used for the Paris-Dakar rally in 2006) is spectacular, driving down through the Adrar Highlands was magnificent and being in the back of a pick-up we had a wonderful view. Abdul was in the cab with the driver and very concerned about his guests in the open, every time we stopped he came to see if we were OK. Luckily I had bought a shiffa to tie around my head, I bought one for Julian too as a reciprocal Christmas present after the djellaba he had bought as an early present in Tan Tan after the cold of the bus.

It was a beautiful day and we had some wonderful scenery to look at. Arriving back in Atar with a radar going in case Karim had got there before we had, Abdul found a taxi wanting to go to Nouachkott and arranged a price of 5,500UM a head in a mercedes which was a great deal for the 3 of us, although we were warned that the driver might pick up one more.

However the Mercedes refused to start .. so Gianni & Abdul pushed it down the road and it roared into life, before we were ready to go I ran off to the shop to get our normal staple supplies of bread & 'la vache qui rit', bananas & water for the long journey south.

We picked up a teacher, he was the French teacher at Atar school and was heading in Nouachkott, I think he was originally from NBD but could only find work out in Atar! The journey was long, we stopped once in the only town that existed between Atar & Nouachkott for tea, which our driver paid for - probably because he needed to give us some strength to push start him again!