Yesterday on the way back from Beni Tajite our rather oversized group of seven cars split into two. There is no plan for this trip and different groups have different aspirations: some want desert and some want mountains; we have different end destinations; and the four wheel and two wheel drives have very different capabilities and want to do very different routes. So we are now with two other cars who like us are aiming to get to Dakhla and sell their cars. Two Mercedes and an Audi will today be heading west and then south towards the desert.
Last night we changed the spark plugs on the car in the hope that it might resolve our problem. It did not seem to do much then (which is what we might have expected) yet this morning our trusty steed was once again behaving herself. We do not understand but we are not complaining. Although we are beginning to get a dashboard lit up like a Christmas tree as different warning lights appear and fail to go out. We have also come up with a new game to play while driving instead of 'Eye Spy' (so limiting: sky, road, mountain). This game is 'What's that noise the car is making?' It has so much more scope...
We set off from El Rachidia after a trip to the souk for food supplies (we wanted to stock up for our planned night in the desert) and a trip to a cafe to hijack their wifi and update blogs and emails. Our route took us out of town onto a main road through the now familiar landscape of dry, flat valley bounded by deep red rock. We then headed south on a potholed road, up over a high pass, down into an obviously more fertile area of green, gently rolling landscape and then it was off road proper.
We took the turning off to head south to the delightful sounding village of Knob. It was a road that was like a farmer's track and compared with yesterday it was easy going and made us realise just how challenging yesterday had been for both cars and drivers. And unlike yesterday we also had an ever changing landscape as we threaded our way into the mountains through grassy valleys and craggy rock. You might think we were in a hot and sunny Snowdonia.
After two hours we reached the summit pass and looked south onto a stunning but vastly different landscape than that we had just driven through. To this southern side from horizon to horizon lay a stark, grey mountainous landscape and 7200 feet below and some ten miles off were two huge wide valleys, our route to the desert.
However, the route down was slow going. The road seemed more rutted, was very narrow and - unlike coming up - we scraped our sump guard continuously, although we are now of a view that this also had something to do with facing down the slope. You also got a great view over some rather precipitous edges. Between all these things it made for very slow progress, as did the very winding road, and it became clear that what looked like a ten mile journey on the map to the desert was going to be considerably further: we would not be there by sunset. The route would certainly not be safe to drive in the dark so we would need to camp before then.
So we are once again spending a night under the stars by a wadi surrounded by mountains and in total isolation. A dinner cooked on an open fire and an impromptu sing song led by our Irish contingent has rounded off another day to remember. Maybe the desert tomorrow?
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