Playing in the dunes
We had some tea with a friendly berber who was responsible for a group of construction workers. We were offered a smoke as well but kindly refused because we still had to ride our bikes and wanted to make it back home in one piece. As we left the dunes and rejoined the sandy track around them, a sandstorm came on resulting in almost no visibility in the end. In Rissani we found one single petrol station that still had petrol albeit leaded. Plenty of pumps were offering diesel, but petrol seemed to be scarce these days. This time however we paid correct prices.
As we entered Merzouga via the main road, we met two other British riders on a DRZ and even Mark started to socialize a bit. It was nice to meet some other people, have a chat and exchange some experiences. I managed to find a lamp switch in town to make switching the engine on and off a little easier as now I needed a little screwdriver for that.
In the evening I went down to the lobby of the hotel that got transformed into the local hash bar by a group of crazy Spanish hippies. After a while everyone lay down as stoned as a shrimp and even the hotel manager could barely stand up. As we had a long stretch ahead of us tomorrow, I kept it safe and only had a couple of puffs, which was enough to make me feel a bit relaxed without being totally wrecked like the rest of the gang. It was a bit weird to see even the elderly almost take off while a common beer was simply not available…
Along the Algerian border
The road along the Algerian border, straight through the Sahara. It has something mythical and without really saying it literally, this was the major aim of the trip for both of us. The level of expectations was high and we were advised by some locals not to do this section on our own because our bikes would have been too heavy and the place was too remote. They advised us the parallel, more northern route via Fezzou that was easier but also less scenic. ‘On ne peut faire cette route qu’avec un vehicule de support monsieur je vous assure’. We assumed they just sold us the story because they wanted us to hire a 4×4 support vehicle so we opted for the very southern route anyway. The first stretches were easy gravel piste with the occasional serious pothole every now and then and a bit of rough terrain but nothing too serious. We took these stretches at high speed and enjoyed the magnificent scenery that would keep on coming during the whole track. In the beginning of the track we saw a couple of locals, mainly kids, begging for the usual stuff: ‘donnez-moi un bic m’sieur, donnez-moi un bonbon’. I had already given away all my pens and cookies so this time I had to disappoint them.
Fesfes
I suggested to get out of the fesfes ASAP and ride on the firmer riverbank which Mark finally accepted to do, although it wasn’t according to his GPS track. He got out pretty easily but my rear wheel got dug in just before the top of the slope and no way to ride it out. I almost overheat my engine and as I pushed the start button, there was a mere ‘tick tick’ but no response of the engine. Of all places!!! Why now, why here! I thought it was just a flat battery but marked scared the shit out of me saying I could as well have seized up the engine. No way of pushing the bike to start in this loose stuff and what if the engine really was fucked up? There goes my holiday…At that time another pushy local came offering to pull us out and to guide us which I almost accepted if he weren’t too stubborn in the beginning to lessen the price to a reasonable level and not to profit from our misery. We finally pulled the bike up with our hands. I crossed fingers when hitting the start button and after some unhealthy staggering of the starter motor, I got the engine spinning at last. Impossible to describe the feeling of relief I lived at that moment. ‘The highs and lows of adventure biking…’ We managed to ride the bike out of the Oued with the necessary cooling down breaks and without too many horizontal encounters with the surface.
Speed at last
After having my obligatory spliff in the Sahara and enjoying the magnificent sunset over Agoult, Lehsen went to sleep with his wife and I went to the tent where Mark already slept since a couple of hours.
The second section to Tagounite started with some longer lightly sandy stretches where I got trapped in a rut at speed. The bike started to bounce up and down and from the left to the right like a rodeo bull. Finally I was thrown over the handlebars and landed about 10 meters further in the sand, surrounded by little rocks. I was lucky this time and for sure I was going through that stuff either too fast or just not fast enough.
As we made more speed the risk of dropping the bike got less but the risk of hitting stones underneath the sand got higher. As a result Mark had some serious dents in his front wheel and I had a puncture and a dented front rim that leaked air off my tubeless tyres.
We were stopped by a military post that said the road to Tagounite was closed for tourists and that we had to take the northern route to Zagora. To be honest we didn’t really pay attention to it but kept on heading for Tagounite without major problems.
I carefully made it to Tagounite where I tested the tyre in a petrol station and apparently no air escaped anymore. All fixed?