Sahara 2023

For a long time now, I've been wanting to visit Morocco and Mauritania to ride around the Sahara. So for the last couple of months, I've been doing some planning. My work commitments will all be met by Christmas 2022, so I've decided to take three months off and finally go do the trip that's been in my head. I can feel the Desert calling to me!

The rough plan is; 
Ride down through Spain & Portugal on some of the Trans Euro Trail, (TET) and the Adventure Country Tracks, (ACT), then cross into Morocco, roughly follow the Algerian border down to the Anti Atlas on old Paris/Dakar routes and eventually enter into Mauritania via the disputed lands of Western Sahara. 

Once I've given the bike a clean up and fettle around there, I'll head east towards Atar and the Eye of Africa, then south to Nema and slowly make my way back north. This should take me some really remote parts of the Sahara and also get me to many of the off the beaten track villages and towns.

I really wanted to do a loop back up through Algeria, but I don't have enough time now to sort the visa and the necessary invitation letter, so I've shelved that section for another time. I may well go in a 4x4 for that too as its easier to travel and camp etc in these areas with one of those.

There are quite a few logistical challenges to sort out. Fuel and tyres are the main ones. Morocco is pretty well set up for travelling, but Mauritania is not. Diesel is the main fuel used in the country, so getting petrol presents an issue. There will be several sections of 4 - 500 mile distances, so alongside my current bike range of 250 miles, I'm taking a 20 litre fuel bladder, which will be strapped onto my bike alongside water bags. This is going to add a lot of weight to the bike!

There are no motorbike tyres available in Mauritania and the last place to get any tyres will be either Ourzazate or Zagora in southern Morocco. That means I need around 5000 miles minimum out of a set of tyres. The only options are the Desert race tyres from the likes of Mitas, Motoz and Dunlop. There are no tyres on the market that will do 10k miles on the terrain involved, but so long as I get back to Spain, I can sort that out later.

If the bike or myself have a significant issue or breakdown, it's not going to be easy to get it sorted, Morocco may be easier, but Mauritania will depend upon others passing and helping out.

Things like vehicle insurance, visas etc are dealt with at the border to both these countries. I'll need to get my International Driving License and some form of suitable travel insurance, although medical issues are the same as any other third world country, find a clinic if you can, if not, deal with it yourself. 

Both countries use Arabic, French and some English, alongside whatever local language, such as Berber etc. So communication for me will be English and French. 

After watching Austin Vince's film, Mondo Sahara, a few years ago, I was fascinated by the ride along the old 600 gauge railway coming down through Morocco. Since then, I've spent a lot of hours trying to find that route and convert it to a GPX file. Finally, as time is now coming to an end for the trip planning phase, I resorted to contacting Austin Vince direct and asking for his help. He pointed me at a bridge on the route and after that I spent a couple of hours on Google Maps following it and marking it with waypoints into Garmin's Basecamp. So I now have that route and will either ride it heading south or coming back north.

Lots of other parts of logistics are going to come into play. The weather heading south from the UK will be rubbish, cold, wet and maybe icy. I could get a ferry south from Portsmouth to Bilbao/Santander. Its really expensive at over £500 one way, but it will save 1000 miles on my tyres and my comfort, so that is looking likely. I'll need tyres for the return trip though for sure. 

Luggage wise, I'm taking my Kriega luggage set up a tent, the usual camping kit, a change of clothes etc, a range of bike spares, which will have to include wheel bearings and other wearable parts. A new DID chain and the Ironman sprockets should last well, although I'm taking a spare front sprocket to be on the safe side. Air filters are an issue in the desert, fine sand can easily knacker an engine, so apparently, fine mesh women's tights are cheap and easy to buy, they do a great job and take seconds to change each morning! That's a conversation to be had!! ;-)

For the navigation side of things, I'll have two systems. My Garmin Montana 600, which is my preferred GPS system and a Samsung phone with Maps.Me/Google Maps loaded onto it. Both have a 12v power set up, but both also have an internal rechargeable battery, just in case.

Mauritania has virtually no mobile phone signal outside of the coastal areas, Morocco is better set up, but in the southern Anti Atlas, there is little coverage. So  for the most part, its no comms, so no worries!

I can't decide whether to buy a separate film camera for the trip, or just not bother with any film etc and go with pics. Films show more, but its a lot of faff to keep the batteries charged and the equipment protected. That's both extra space and weight to be sorted out. 

That's about where I've got too at the moment. The routes are almost finalised, the kit is sorted, some spares on order. Next up is ferry booking and find some new tyres. The bike is about ready, so finish my work commitments and then get riding!