Leave Nouakchott packed tightly in a classic bush taxi, an 20 year old Mercedes station wagon, four people to a row and two up front. Our rucksacks walled up at the back. The journey out of the capital takes us along mostly good roads that cut across the desert, and past the tents and enclosures of small semi-nomadic settlements, each clearly showing their electoral if not tribal allegiance. The desert is beautiful: fine pearl white sands break on terracotta red dunes; camels standing sentry by a richly embroidered tent. And then the landscape changes suddenly as we reach Rosso and the border with Senegal, and we cross the first significant river way so far on our journey. We make the crossing around 5pm on long wooden canoes. Our particular canoe is motorized, but others struggle through the fast currents powered only by the passengers themselves.
Upon reaching Senegal there is a real sense of having crossed a natural border. Green shoots rise through the desert sands; the stern pale faces of the Mahgrib are replaced by the easy smiles of dark West Africa. Everywhere now there are people, walking along side the road, working in fields, carrying stores. Catching a local bus at the border we travel through the night to Dakar.
We arrive in Dakar just past 2am and are met by Amadou, our local host. Dakar is on a different scale to every city we have visited so far. A bustling mass of people and cultures, set against the lazy air of a French colonial past. Mosques call the faithful to prayers as American hip-hop beats continually from a side stall. Foreign expatriates and tourists in loose khakis and thin cotton shirts walk by street sellers eyeing a potential sale.
We had planned to reach Mali on the Dakar-Bamako Express, once one of the great railway journeys of the world.
