The mosquitoes had a feast on Trevor in the Bedouin tent largely because we had misplaced our bug spray in the car !

Charlotte seemed to escape them after she got up very early for a nature call she decided it was then easier to sit in the car rather than become a contortionist to get back into the tent. The mattresses were hard but comfortable for most of the night. 

Today, 28 November, is Mauritania’s 63rd Independence Day celebrations and the flag and banners were everywhere to be seen. We left the place where we were staying and decided to buy some baguettes at the store across the road and then stopped around the corner and made sandwiches with butter, cheese and salami before heading north for the 4 or so hours drive to Nouadhibou.

Again the dreaded warning light came on and the car did its exhaust cleaning routine with lots of white smoke pouring out of the exhaust for a few minutes. This is normal especially with the poor quality fuel and town driving of the previous evening. 

The road north was quite busy with lots of taxi buses and cars but we could travel at a good speed as the road was very good for most of the way and made up some time. The road is strewn with wrecked tyres and some vehicle wrecks too.

Charlotte took over the driving for the last hour and a half or so until we reached Victor’s Villa Maguella which had 3 or 4 German and Swiss and 2 French overland vehicles. The Germans are on their way to South Africa over the next year, then up the east coast to Mombassa from where they plan to ship the vehicles to Oman and continue through Saudi Arabia, Iran, and so on back to Germany.

This time we decided to stay in one of the rooms rather than use our tent (we are a bit fed-up with the routine of putting it up and taking it down). We also have our own bathroom but with cold showers, but we can also use the camping area showers which are hot. 

Victor made some tuna salad for a late lunch with bread which was excellent. We then had an afternoon nap, the first in a long time. The tide was already low so swimming was passed over until tomorrow. 

A delicious late dinner of chicken a la something and rice was rounded off with coffee and chocolate and coffee cake, very tasty indeed. We then hit the sack and were in dreamland in no time at all.