15 January - Nema – Day 1

TYPICAL MAURITANIAN SCENERY
We’re here in Nema, another military airfield, for two days. Everyone is making themselves at home, becuse not having to move in the morning makes day 2 a little easier – we get a lie-in, waking when we want, instead of at 5.45 when the Hercules starts its ground-power engine.

As usual this morning, we were woken by the four-engined alarm clock and by Thierry May, the ASO logistics manager, shaking everyone’s tents, telling them to hurry up, because they wanted to start the Hercules’ engines.

In a bit of a panic, as – like everyone else - I had camped on the down-wind side of the Herc, I dragged some clothes on and hurriedly packed my ruck-sack, rolling up my sleeping mat and jamming my sleeping bag etc into it as fast as I could.

Outside it was not windy, so getting my tent in its bag was no drama and I hiked off to the plane we move in.

As we waited about, loading the plane, the Herc and the 5 Antonovs (2 jet and 3 turbo-prop jobs) all taxied past, turned and then sped past to take off, each time covering us in a thick cloud of fesh fesh. By the time we boarded the plane (not our normal one but a smiliar one with a German crew) we were all coughing and nicely dusted with a brown crust.

The flight from Tichit to Nema was just an hour and we bumped down with no great dramas.

As usual, pulled bags off the plane and went to the Herc and catering plane to help with the unloading.

SEBASTIAN FROM EUROSPORT - YES, HE ALWAYS LOOKS LIKE THIS

Pitched tent in a concrete base for an oil tank, which lay alongide and showed no signs of ever being fitted to the base. It was level and had a low wall, so I thought it would be ideal. However,as we sat having breakfast, some locals sat on the wall watching us and I realised how vulnerable my stuff would be out there.

So I picked up my tent and moved across the airfield to where a load of other guys had camped, to set up home.

After setting up, I grabbed my towel and wash things and made the 15-minute hike to the showers and loos. The showers were again wooden cubicles in a row on a concrete footing, with a door, a mirror and a tray. But no roof. It was already quite hot, so the cool water and refreshing breeze were very nice…

Noticed that a lot of people seemed to becoming down in dirty clothes, showering and dressing in clean gear, leaving their old clothes in a big bag. So, later in the evening, when I went down to dinner, I stopped off to use the loo and dropped a big pile of my old t-shirts, pants and socks there as well. Hopefully, they will be of some use to someone.

After a load of technical problems the night before, things seemed to be a little more straight-forward in the Herc today and the programme was ready, almost glitch-free, with few dramas.

Three or four days ago was our worst in terms of getting the scripts done in time but now we’re working much better and everyone seemed happy.

Sad to say, Nema isn’t very Dakar. It’s just another airfield with loads of fine dust in the air – and we’re all-but out of the desert as well. When we head to our next port of call, on the border with Mali, we’ll have left the dunes behind and be heading into Senegal, with savannahs, trees, red-brown mud and the rush to Dakar. The classic Sahara-ness will have gone.

Someone asked me today whether I was feeling home-sick. I have to say that I will be very glad to get home and see everyone. And wash. And sleep in a bed. Past 5.45am. But I am getting into the swing of things now, it’s not a total headless-chicken nightmare (well, not EVERY day) and I’m enjoying myself. So, I don’t actively want to leave but I’ll be glad to get home.

Not sure whether or not that’s a yes or a no. But there you go.

Dinner was enlivened last night by the presence of one of my rallying heroes, Ari Vatanen. I was sitting with Sebastian and he wandered over with his tray and asked if we’d mind if he sat down in a space on the rugs next to us.

Of course not! He was very chatty and as nice as I’ve found him to be, on previous occasions when I’ve met him. When we were chatting he noticed a bunch of lads nearby, with Bowler logos on their clothes.

Excuse my ignorance, he said to them, but what’s a Bowler? They told him all about the cars and, as they were rally Brits, obviously knew all about his exploits in the UK and abroad. He stayed and chatted with us for a good hour, got the coffees in and was generally very good company.

His car had been totally destroyed in a fire the night before, so what now, I asked. Stay with the team to Dakar? No, he said, I’ll go home and go to Strasbourg (where he’s an MEP) on Monday…

It certainly made for a good night for all of us and Ari seemed glad to have a chat and some good-natured banter about some of his better-known exploits (crashes.) Top stuff.
AMATEUR BIKERS WORKING OUT OF ONE TINY TRUNK