DAY 35 WEDNESDAY 10th FEBRUARY 2010

Today is definitely a day to remember for many reasons...
I woke at 6.00 am as the barman had insisted that it got light at 6.30 am. I left Zebrabar at 6.45 am still in pitch darkness and it finally got light at 7.30 am. At 8.00 am I had reached the Diama bridge just as the customs and police were opening up. Both sets of officials were quick and efficient so it obviously paid to get there early. By 9.00 am I was into the National Park and was paying the €10 to the park police. By 10.00 am I was half way along the infamous Diama off-road piste and by 11.00 am onto the tarmac road to Noackchott. I lost a bit of time in the chaos of Noakchott but was still well ahead of schedule. My very ambitious plan for today was to get to Noakchott by lunchtime, the border by tea time and get to the hotel in Dakhla by 9.00 pm in order to do all of Mauritania in one day. I raced through the empty desert at 85mph as there is no traffic and little wildlife apart from the odd camel to worry about. I had marked the only petrol station in the middle of the Sahara into my satnav on the way down and I was confident of reaching it with fuel to spare. I had not bothered to refuel in Noakchott as I did not have any Mauri currency and thought it was easier to use Moroccan dirhams when I got further north. With my 41 litre capacity fuel tank, I should be able to cover about 400 miles on one tank full. Unfortunately, I was wrong and the bike spluttered to a halt after riding only 360 miles, still about 10 miles short of where the petrol station was. I don’t think the petrol attendant yesterday in Senegal had completely filled the tank, instead he had just stopped when it reached a convenient 20,000 CFA and there was probably still room for another litre or 2. Also I had used a tiny amount in my petrol stove last night to cook my dinner. Also my high speed riding had undoubtedly increased the fuel consumption. Without all these issues, I would have made it easily to the petrol station. Instead I was now stopped in the middle of the Sahara without fuel. The first vehicle that came towards me stopped and asked if he could help. I explained that if I could lean the bike over to the right hand side, the fuel might flow into the side of the tank where the fuel pick up pipe was and that might be enough to get me the last few miles. They helped me lean the bike over and my solution half worked, it got me another five miles down the road but still five from the garage. I waited for ages but ages but nobody came so I realised that I would have to sort this out by myself. I removed the entire luggage off the bike and laid the bike down completely on the right hand side. Once all the remaining fuel had drained into the right hand side, I used a small set of locking pliers to clamp off the balance pipe to prevent the fuel flowing back. I struggled to lift the bike up and reload it but my plan had worked and the bike fired up again. I crawled slowly towards the petrol station but got stopped in a police check half way there. I was massively relieved to finally coast into the petrol station and roll to a halt alongside the unleaded pump. I was slightly concerned about paying due to my lack of any Mauritanian ougiya but felt sure they would be happy to accept either Moroccan dirhams or good old Euros. I waited for someone to come out to serve me (as is normal in Africa) but nobody came so I walked in the cafe to confirm that they would accept dirhams. “No problem, Dirhams OK” they replied. “Great then can I get some petrol please”, I asked. “Ah, big problem. We have no fuel until tomorrow afternoon”. Oh dear! Things were starting to look bleak at this point; I explained that I was completely stranded as it was impossible for me to go any further. To make matters worse, I was right in the middle of the route that the Foreign Office had said to avoid at all times due to kidnap risk i.e. the coast road between Nouadibou and Noakchott. This is the area where a total of 7 Westerners have been kidnapped in recent years so I wasn’t too keen to be stuck here for a second longer than I needed and certainly not overnight! The station owner came over and personally apologised for having no fuel and said he would arrange for his brother to drive 240 kms from Nouadibou to bring me back 20 lts. I asked how long that would take and when his brother would get back and he told me 10.00 pm, “Then you can go”. The thought of riding on that road after 10.00 pm scared me to death so I made the excuse that my headlight was terrible and I could only ride in daylight. He immediately suggested that I could spend the night there as his guest and he offered me the full use of all the facilities including showers if I wanted them. He then ordered me coffee and food and could not have been more welcoming. I was still very worried about spending the night at this location but it appeared that I had little choice and just had to make the best of it. Moments later, an excellent meal of fish and chips arrived which was much appreciated as I had only eaten bananas and snack bars all day in my rush to clock up the miles. A glass of crushed ice came with a cold can of fanta so I was being extremely well looked after. An American writer called Elias started chatting to me, telling me how he was hitchhiking down to Cape Town and writing articles on each country. We both agreed that the Mauritanian people were amongst the nicest we had met so far and he reassured me that I would be safe in their hands.
After an hour I was getting hot in my bike boots so decided to take them off as I wasn’t going anywhere for a while. Suddenly, a local put his head around the door, stared at me and asked if I was the motorcyclist. For a second, I wandered if this was the start of something terrible and whether I should hit the emergency button on my Spot satellite transmission beacon. Instead he explained that he had run out of petrol in the morning and had now arranged for two 20 lts cans to be delivered for him. He said he only needed 10 lts to get him to the next station and I could have the rest! Wow, I didn’t need asking twice so I buckled up my boots and ran outside. First I checked with the station owner as I didn’t want to offend him as he had already made arrangements for me. He was happy for me to accept this other fuel as it meant it would get me on my way before dark. I quickly poured all 30 lts into my empty tank and turned to pay the owner whatever price he wanted as I was so grateful. He looked taken aback when I offered to pay him and told me that he would not take any money as it was a gift to get me out of trouble in the desert. He said something like “Thank Allah” and explained it was his duty to help me. I then went over to the station owner to thank him for all his help and also to pay for the food and drink but again he would not accept any money and said it was Islamic hospitality to someone who needed it. I don’t know very much about Islam but these two gentlemen were great ambassadors both for their religion and their country. Incidents like these really do a lot to restore your basic faith in the goodness of people to help each other and made me feel very humble.
By now it was nearly 5.00 pm and I was determined to make the border before nightfall. In little over one hour I added 100 miles to my daily total mileage despite 3 or 4 police checks that I had to stop for. The turn off to the border was shut with a barrier across the road but the soldier on duty let me ride around it and continue the last 5 miles to the frontier (well he sort of let me, I just waved at him and rode around the barrier). The customs official was the same friendly one that I had dealt with the last time although this time his face was unwrapped unlike last time. I told him and his colleagues about the petrol situation and how grateful I was for how friendly and helpful everyone in Mauritania had been to me on both visits to the country. I felt a bit guilty and embarrassed that my passport showed that I had entered his country at exactly 8.00 am that morning and was leaving it again later the very same day. They completed the paperwork without delay following which the police did likewise. I was just about to ride off when I got stopped at another office (not sure who or what) and they wanted to input all my details into a computer, I assume this is an attempt to automate the immigration process and might one day replace the manual writing of all details into the big books. Once completed, they told me to hurry as the border would be closing soon. I jumped back on the bike and roared off into the no-mans-land/minefield, feeling confident that I knew my way now on the rock path on the edge. Unfortunately, it rapidly got dark by the time I was about half way across so I got lost. What a perfect way to end an already eventful day, lost in a minefield in the dark! Just then a car came towards me flashing his lights and telling me that the Moroccan side was shut so I would have to turn around and head back into Mauri. I hoped the Mauri end wasn’t also closed or else I would be stuck in the minefield overnight (can it get any worse?). Luckily, the Mauri border was still open so I rode past the cars queuing up for entry and straight into the compound. Various police all started to shout at me for jumping the queue but I explained that I had already completed the paperwork. The problem for them was that my passport said I had left Mauri on the 10th Feb but here I was coming back in and wanting to stay until the 11th. I was too tired to discuss it then and agreed to sort it out in the morning. I managed to get one of the excellent border tents and was supplied with a cooked meal and drinks (coke and bottled water) brought to my tent. The sandy area that we had struggled with two weeks before had now been concreted and this made it simple to ride my bike in, turn it round and park it up securely in the locked compound.
Altogether a very memorable day but that’s what adventure motorcycling is meant to be all about. I can now add “running out of fuel in middle of Sahara” and “getting lost in minefield in dark” to my motorcycling CV.