Flying again (Stage 19)

I managed to sleep through 6 min of my alarm going off at 0600 this morning – and that was after being in bed by not much after 2030.

By the time I went to bed it was almost completely calm, and it was also super dark with very little light pollution around, so I spent a little time lying half-in half-out of my tent looking at the stars.

I’d ended up camped closer to Rob than ideal, particularly as he hadn’t pegged out his tent fly properly and so it was flapping rather noisily through the night.

Thankfully I’d been properly prepared when I went to sleep so my late awakening didn’t cause an issue and I was drinking my coffee by the time porridge was ready.

The wind had built again over night and as I came back across the road from using the shovel the flagging tape from last night was heading straight down the road, so that should make for a good day!

Australian Kevin had decided he was going to have a day on his own, so Mateo, Canadian Kevin and I set off together.

Conditions on the road were as good as we’d hoped with the wind pretty much right behind us which meant we were sailing along quite happily.

We paused a couple of times as we passed through the town of Chamie, which as Sophie had said last night is by far the largest Mauritanian town we’ve passed through.

As we were coming out of town there were a number of places where the sand was beginning to encroach on the road.

The 40km coke stop provided the usual drinks, plus a range we’d not seen before, including a pineapple drink which we all opted for – you’ve got to try everything once! It had a pineapply kind of taste to begin with, but then a really odd after-taste. Most of it went in the bin, and Kevin went back for a coke!

We took a couple of other photo-oriented stops along the way before rolling in to lunch. One stop was a whodunit, with a very obvious conclusion to draw.

Lezinda was a much happier camper today – there was far less dust blowing into her lunch stop so she was able to have everything set out as she wished.

On the good news front there was left-over lasagne from last night, on the bad – the bloody watermelons have started, and we know what happened with those on the Silk Route – by this time next week I wager that’s all the fruit we get!

Back on the road and the wind was still in the right place, so we were cruising pretty comfortably – unfortunately there were no coke stops this afternoon so we stopped here and there when we wanted a break.

In the end we rolled into camp shortly before 1230 – one of the earliest days we’ve had. At camp we heard that both Peter and Dominic had decided to keep riding into Nouakchott – that’s going to make a 270km day for them, which on one hand with the wind behind them seems feasible, but with the increasing heat seems somewhat foolish!

A number of others are also heading in to town this afternoon but they’re taking a more relaxed approach and flagging down a passing mini-van.

One of the most common side effects of the anti-malarial medication I’m taking is an increased sensitivity to the sun – I thought that I had probably built up a good-enough base tan after almost three weeks that it wasn’t going to be an issue, but this afternoon my left leg particularly is feeling pretty tender in the sun – more sunblock will be needed tomorrow I think.

Henry returned from a walk up the hill across the road to report great desert views, so I’m going to go and investigate.

Later: Somewhat frustratingly the wind has swung almost 90 degrees and is now blowing side-on into my tent which as we all know is no fun – the roof sags, but worst of all the dust just pours in!

Braised beef for dinner tonight, with spuds, carrots and the regular salad of tomatoes, onions and devil spawn (a.k.a. cucumber).

Right now I’m procrastinating about going to my tent to deal with the wind and the dust – I’m a little over it tonight and though I do like the desert environment I’m looking forward to being somewhere with less dust!