Senegal to Mali Border

18.1.2010 – Day 30 – Near St Louis

I am in Senegal! The change in just one day is immense. Nouakchott is the sleepy capital of Mauritania with the sands of the desert threatening to engulf the city and nomadic tents on the outskirts. Within miles of heading south grasslands develop into landscapes covered in thorn trees and scrub. The faces became darker and the number of villages gradually increased. By the time I arrived at the Niger River on the Senegal border I saw my first wild boar and bird life was abundant. The energy of the people is different. Laughter, fighting kids, colour, vibrancy, sounds, smells and music all fill your senses.

In Mauritania I hooked up with a motley crew of travellers for a small convoy to get over the border. There is the French guy in an old Mercedes full of bric-a-brac that he is selling in Mali/Senegal, two French guys in an old Renault going to Mali, a car full of guys selling a car down here and a crazy back-packing Swiss girl. The first 100+kms was on good tarmac with plenty of suicidal goats and cows with long horns

.. it was about 100kms of dirt tracks, most of which were easy enough to navigate. I became the outrider checking the road ahead. The border was quiet but obviously the guards wanted a little money for their trouble. The first police/customs posts I came to on the Mauritanian side both had the guards asleep on beds in their offices. €10 is all each required to get me past. No-mans-land this time was a bridge of only about 8m (a little bit of an exaggeration). A guy wouldn’t open the barrier until I had paid €8. The Senegal side was particularly cheap at only €5 to get in and only €30 for the one-month insurance.

The level of corruption of the police here is almost laughable. I managed to get through three police checks in 50kms without a fine but the other cars in the convoy had to pay out hard cash for such things as: having no fire extinguisher, not putting the indicator on when pulling over, not wearing a seatbelt or not having a warning triangle or not having insurance. The locals of course don’t have most of the above but they don’t carry as much cash as us. It seems one trait so far throughout Africa is that everyone wants a bit of what you’ve got! Your jacket, sunglasses and money – particularly money. The police wave you over wearing their ‘Chips’ reflective sunglasses and try to be an intimidating presence with their large, athletic, stature. They’re just working out how to get some money out of the European ATM – no receipts, of course.

19.1.2010 – Day 31 – Near Saint Louis

A rest day! Well it was pretty chilled out. The Zebra Bar is by the sea in a nature reserve on the edge of St Louis. A mixture of campers and hutters relax all day in the open bar on the deck overlooking the sea lagoon. I hooked up with two more hippies – they are always such good company – both from Quebec. He juggles fire and drums African drums and she’s a herbalist. Beers in the afternoon was followed by an invite for dinner round the campfire. I also managed to do some washing, go to the ATM in St Louis and get some fuel. On the way to town I saw my first monkeys and was stopped by cops who weren’t interested on extracting cash from me, they were just interest in how fast my bike can go.

20.1.2010 - Day 32 - West of Mali

Today ended up being another big day. I started down the route I had planned but within a couple of miles there was more pothole than tarmac. Potholed dirt roads aren’t too bad but tarmac ones are a hard hit on the bike. I changed plans and headed for Dakla via the main road. The numerous road-kills – either dog, cow or goat – sometimes had vultures and dogs feeding on them. My view of the Senegalese police has improved – I wasn’t stopped once today.

The towns are the usual hustle and bustle but the countryside is filled with small villages made of several compounds fenced off from each other with several houses in each. The houses are about 10ft x 10ft, mud walled and thatch roofed.

The incessant request for cadeaux (gifts) or money has all but stopped also. In fact, I had my chain greased by a mechanic today who said his work was a cadeau for me!

When I stopped to look at an unusual village I met a nice guy who showed me round. It was completely made out of reeds. It looked like a mixture of one of Thor Heyerdahl’s boats (Kontiki), a castle and a Nordic church. The whole village was surrounded by high reed walls. Buildings had reed spires – all very beautiful and very unusual. 200 people live there communally. One section was for married families and the other was for singletons. The place is an Islamic cult started up by a Senegalese guy 20 years ago. All the men have to grow dreadlocks and the building can’t be made out of materials from the ground. Bizarre!

It’s funny that, when you are having a hard day you look forward to the evening when you might end up meeting some friendly locals and have a good place to get cleaned up in. But if it turns out to be crusty you look forward to heading off the next day and if, during the day, you feel things are mundane or difficult you invariably have a meeting which lifts your spirits. When all is said and done, travelling like this might not be easy but you feel you’re sure living your life!

21.1.2010 – Day 33 – Kayes, Mali

I motor-biked to Mali! I rode along a quiet stretch of road today through scrubland that is punctuated by huge baobab trees and thorn. Villages are fewer and the land is hot, flat and covered in dry grass. Occasionally I went through larger villages with bustling markets on either side of the road. Usually women run the stalls, often just sitting on the ground. Hundreds of people mingle wearing multi-coloured prints and flamboyant headscarves. A mixture of shared-taxis and donkey carts seem to get people here. The villages I passed looked timeless. They could have looked like this 100 years ago apart from the shining new orange mobile billboards – their vans are all over the place as well.

At the bottom of a small hill I passed a guy on a good-looking motorbike. To avoid the usual cat and mouse, back and forth overtaking, I accelerated hard and he disappeared from my mirrors. Later, when I had stopped under a tree for a break, the biker pulled over and said hello. He then proceeded to take his jacket off, under which he was wearing a gendarme’s uniform, combat boots, handcuffs and a gun. Luckily for me, he was more interested in my bike than giving me a fine. It turns out I had stopped at his official post. He then pulled an FM radio out from a nook in the tree as I readied to leave.

Although the road was quiet today there did seem to be a huge number of broken down trucks, always with greasy boys underneath trying to fix them. For sure there were more trucks broken than moving!

The Senegal border is on a bridge over a river. On both sides are strung-out settlements (shacks) and more greasy looking people. No buildings looked official so I overtook the long lines of parked and queuing trucks. Before I knew it I was crossing the middle of the bridge with the Senegal/Mali border sign! I had crossed into Mali without signing out of Senegal! Well, I thought I’d just carry on and see what happened. Over the bridge there was one building with an official in it and more greasy drivers’ helpers. The official moved me on. I trundled still further, past more shacks. I thought I’d stop at the petrol station to find out what was going on. I was concerned I was going to ride out of Senegal and into Mali without any stamps! The guy assured me I should carry on. I came to a barrier. I got off the bike. The official here was handing out visas – great! He asked for the Mali customs document. “Ah, what’s that?” I’d missed the building. With a little extra cash on the table he kindly gave me the visa if I promised to go back to customs. I did. All in all, a fairly average African border experience.