Tanouchert Oasis, Day 235

While Sheldon boldy goes where no nerd has gone before, Christi and I elect to surf the dunes in the Toyota Hilux with Ahmed and Mahmoud. We will all meet tomorrow at the remote (how much more remote can we get?) oasis of Tanouchert. The good news from my perspective is that the one ciprofloxicin tablet I have taken to date has brought immediate benefit. My stomach is no longer churning, while the contents of my bowels are solidifying nicely. And all of this is just as well since Mahmoud has chosen to approach our Saharan safari as a part of the Paris-Dakar rally. Thus my stomach finds another reason to churn; good old-fashioned travel sickness. The absence of Sheldon also has the added benefit of giving Christi and I more room in which to bounce around as Mahmoud crests another dune and plummets down the other side. During the whole 40 km journey to Tanourchert we see one lone camel herder, but plenty of camels and goats. There are scribbles of dry brush plus a few surprisingly large thorn trees en route, but mostly its soaring sand dunes. Remember that scene in the movie The Perfect Storm – yeah, it’s a bit like that. There’s definitely a feeling of solitude and vast emptiness. Without Ahmed we would die in the Sahara, which gives the whole experience a frisson of excitement.

I think it’s time to explain the correlation between Ahmed and his finger. Quite how he knows where to go is unclear, but I think he uses the same magnetoception as birds to perceive direction. This sixth sense if you will is based on the ability of the individual to use the earth’s magnetic filed to determine where they are and hence where they are going. Perhaps its a Tuareg thing (they are a nomadic people). If so, Mahmoud does not have this sixth sense and he merely plows through one sand dune after another. Occasionally, Ahmed raise the index finger of his left hand and moves it an infinitesimal amount to the left or right and Mahmoud alters direction accordingly. Hence Ahmed the Finger. The Finger brings us safely into Tanouchert 2-hours after leaving Chinguetti (it will take Sheldon 2 days. So who’s the brainiac now?).

We check-in at a mirage called Chez Chigaly, which in my mind at least has sit-down toilets and a hot shower. Chez Chigaly has neither. Instead we enter a scene from the Arabian Nights: a large communal tent at one end of which is the owner of Chez Chigaly and his family. Ahmed and the owner go into a huddle and after a muted conversation hot black tea is brewed and we are invited to sit on a collection of cushions and join in. While we drink our own tent is prepared. It is filled with colorful carpet, pillows, and mattresses. We add our own finishing touch: a mosquito net.

Later, when the temperature have cooled a little, we explore, well, the middle of nowhere. There is no obvious water source; mostly the water appears to be pumped up from below ground. We come upon one such water hole near our camp called The Camel’s Head (actually I just made that name up, but it sounds suitably atmospheric don’t you think?). Apparently camels come here to socialize and down a few pints. The human inhabitants of Tanouchert are no less interesting: they flatten empty oil drums to use as sidings on their homes (which I suppose makes them more permamnet than those made of palm leaves); they also go to the bother of fencing off their properties (from who?) and they have vegetable gardens. It’s an odd sight to see carrots and lettuce growing in the middle of the Sahara Desert. Further out is a grove of palm trees and beyond that the sand sea. If I was to keep walking without adequate water and supplies I would be dead in a day, two at the most. Instead I return to my tent, collapse into the cushions, drink copious quantities of water and day-dream about ice-cold sodas and air-conditioning.