Chinguetti

Falling in love with the Sahara

"Ma, I want to be a ho-bo someday."

"In my earlier days I'd been to sea with a tall rawboned fellow from Louisiana called Big Slim Hazard, William Holmes Hazard, who was hobo by choice. As a little boy he'd seen a hobo come up to ask his mother for a piece of pie, and she had given it to him, and when the hobo went off down the road the little boy had said, "Ma, what is that fellow?" "Why. that's a ho-bo." "Ma, I want to be a ho-bo someday." "Shet your mouth, that's not for the like of the Hazards." But he never forgot that day, and when he grew up, after a shortspell playing football at LSU, he did become a hobo." - Jack Kerouac "On The Road"


I read a lot of Kerouac when I was in high school and I always wanted to hop a freight train somewhere. Here in Mauritania you can hop an empty iron ore train straight out into the Sahara. Reunited with the Watkins I loaded Oscar into the ore car and made the long, cold, dusty, bumpy journey to Choum.

Mauritania!

Enter Oscar

This is Oscar. He's from China. I picked him up in Laâyoune. He has lots of funny things to say, but some dubious taste in music. We are heading into the Sahara together.















So I've finally done it, bought a bike and started cycling. I no longer have to look at every other bike I see with envy. I no longer have to wonder what it's like to travel long distances at a more human pace. It wasn't easy at first but the distance I can cover makes it more practical than walking, even though walking to me would be preferable.



This may be a cute picture but it was one of the most annoying days of my life. The little guys just wouldn't leave me alone!


This is what the bike of a serious cyclist looks like. A Japanese guy I met in Laâyoune

One last Moroccan pastry

In Boujdour, Western Sahara.