This is not a holiday………..

 

……………. but if it were it would be the holiday of a lifetime.
So here we are in the Tibesti mountains that we had first seen from an Air France flight to Ndjamena in 2009 with a spectacular sunset. Could we ever make a visit we wondered, as we looked at the beautiful sunset with long shadows from the mountains in the midst of the desert. Eight years later, having been invited to in the hospital, we are making the journey to our new home at Bardai and on the way passing by the spectacular Trou de Natron. We are stood on the rim of an old volcano, at about 2500m (8000 ft.), it is chilly despite the cloudless sky and eerily quiet. It is 700m to the base of the crater where there are scattered trees, large white mineral deposits and just above Andrea’s head in the picture a volcanic cinder cone that is actually 200m high. The entire crater is 7 km across, so about 22km to walk around or perhaps take the track to the base and greet the hermit that lives there? But not today, this isn’t a tourist trip after all.  It is midday and were are still 4 hours from Bardai so after a 15-minute break we set off again on a rocky track travelling at 20km an hour, having to walk at times to ease the load on the vehicle. And just in case you wonder about visiting we have been on the road for two and a half long days from Ndjamena heading north, setting off before dawn and stopping after sunset sleeping rough.

In Ndjamena a few people asked me how I was going to drive to Bardai, try getting a route on Google maps, it will tell you that there isn’t a route, and it’s quite right or at least not one that you can take by yourself. Thankfully we travelled with 2 very experienced colleagues, and another chadian who would do the cooking. They made all the preparations, the necessary paperwork, a barrel of petrol, a barrel of water, food for the trip, our trunks, other project materials and other necessities such as material for an upcoming wedding plus my guitar were all loaded onto the Hilux 4X4 the night before. (Yes it is petrol driven, the Teda apparently prefer that as they get more power and acceleration) We set off early next day heading North passing villages on hills with walled fortress type houses.

 After  midday we stopped at Mao, used the facilities of the small town-  the last petrol pump and eating place. Women don’t eat in restaurants so a back room was found so Andrea could eat as well. Then we set off into the wastelands thankful to have a sat nav, and sat phone with us. There is a track but it is not always easy to follow, I guess this is desert, but it is not sandy yet, scrubby hills with occasional nomad settlements, a few camels and goats.

By nightfall we arrived at the edge of the sandy desert, where the north south track meets and east west track and there are a few small shelters and a handful of trucks parked for the night. In the dark our guides cooked a lamb stew with macaroni, it smelt and tasted very high and gamey, having travelled with us from Ndjamena in a plastic bag. They saved the rest of the raw meat for the next day.           

Usually everyone sleeps outside, it can be cold and is often very windy and dusty, but we were fortunate with clear skies and Andrea and I were offered a hut made of matting to sleep in as again Andrea was the only woman around.

Setting off the next day was quite different, the track disappeared in the soft sands and we stopped and let some air out of the tyres to help with spreading the load. Every few hundred metres large tyres had been left to show the way. This is a truck route from Libya and we saw a few, often undergoing repairs or stopped to cool down an overheated engine. The soft sandy desert with dunes gave way to a vast flat featureless landscape.

We stopped to refuel at a service station  (spot the yellow hose in the picture syphoning the fuel), stretch our legs and find a bush (quite a difficult task).

Early afternoon we stopped at this small oasis, at the most amazing picnic spot ever, nearly everyone (4/5)  agreed the lamb was too far gone and so it was tuna and spaghetti, Andrea eating apart from the men as is traditional.

A few more hours and we approached Zohar Ke on the edge of the Tibesti mountains, a small trucker’s town and having found a small hut/restaurant serving roast chicken with coca cola this time 2 men in a back room were asked to move to make way for our strange party with a woman. We again camped out on the edge of town, this time in the open air. With our two fourteen hour days we had made good time so we slept in and had breakfast, bread brought with us  from Ndjamena and some dried salted beef, as the sun rose. Our colleagues warmed their hands and feet by a fire before tying the ropes over the load on the vehicle.

 Once out of the town at the foot of the first mountains we again stopped and reinflated the tyres and then it was the long hard climb through the mountains, walking from time to time so as not to damage the vehicle. Here in this barren landscape we saw wild donkeys, camels and even deer in the distance.

 Our highest point was rewarded with one of the most spectacular views in the world and then we began the slow descent to Bardai. The trip had only taken 3 days, we had planned for 4, but we had not even had a puncture.

The sign in the road outside our home shows where we are, 1734 km from Ndjamena. We slept well inside and woke to a cold sunny morning, 10C inside 3C outside, welcome to Bardai (which means cold in Arabic). The holiday is over, now it’s time to get ready for work.
PS: Don’t be fooled by this blog into thinking that the internet functions well here, this has been sent from a smart phone as several attachments to an email and then posted by Rebecca in the UK.

Moon rise from our yard, first night at Bardai.