15916-57-13-26-01 and one engine... Desertcruiser goes africa

Hi DesertCruiser

Very good report of your last trip. I very much appreciate the little details in your story... Make it taste quite real :wink:

Can you imagine, you people from fare down south, that in a country that is 187 x smaller than Australia, in Switzerland, we speak 4 different languages ?! Can you imagine that even in this so little peace of Europe, I don't know DesertCruiser, who is certainly living about 30-50 km from me, maybe less (??). And while I'm spending some time in french, us or (fortunnately) oz forums, he is following another german one... This is a part of the incredible diversity of our "little" world. funny !

If you want to see a few pictures of my new rig on a french forum ( what an exotic post ), click HERE

DC: PM for you. Please keep on posting for our pleasure. Thanks

Cheers

Nico GEKO

so, opened a drink from africa, a little bit of ice throw in the glass and it can start...

***

5km later i see a stucked truck. military.
deep sands and a truck, full of stones is a bad combination.

front right, the tire is deflated. it's forbidden to take a photo of a military object and uniformes, so i must hide the cam.


renault. not enoght power to get himself free.
the crew takes a wooden board, begins to get the wheel free, for fill the air.

the strong wind full of sand gies a verry bad view.
no sand sheets, no strap. really no equippement.

the driver explains me, the detour in the botanic was studied.
i think he was asleep by driving.

i take my shovel and i help as good as i can. when a little hole was dug, new sands fall in.
the wind takes the rest of work against salvage.

a second, veeeery nice truck stops at the road. also military..


not well equipped. as the HZJ landcruiser arrives, i think, perhaps he has anything...
dead loss. nothing. niente, gar nichts!

i do not scrifire my beloved 9t kinetic strap.
no words... he gives me back my shovel and waits for better times.

with his radio, they calles help.
i can't help them exept giving them any oranges. so they are happy and the day is saved. almost.

go on, cook anything and carry on driving...

driving, driving, driving...
it's boring to go strait, all the day long.

but...
what's there?

Is it really a W160 Patrolwreck?
away from the road. yes, it is!

my heart beats faster.


the mileage presents itself quietly. no sensation. only between 799'000 an 900'000kms.
i would say: congratulations.


first i open the hood.
controlling the oil is important. the oilfiller cap is lost
the oil level is ok, but it's black like coal.

it's the legendary SD33 non turbo. line injection pump. unbrokable.

only two wheels. stones under the brake discs.
obviously the car was given up.
nearly of this poor object is a relais station of maroc telecom. barbed wire on the walls.
a few of solarpanels give the energy.
behind the building is an Y60 Patrol. corner lights! yes!


i can see no one.

study the W160. i can see the same pump as i use for my patrol for more diesel.
any tubes and rings, a little diesel pre-filter. and last but not least an old hardcore NISSAN emblem.
i take this and that out of the ruin as spare part for the long trip in the dangerous desert of mauritania.


i look for peoples. no one.
i go to the Y60 nearly the building and look for the mileage.
touch the side window - and she falls down in the door. ****...
what did i doo?

so i want to lift it up, but she falls down again.

go on by road direction south. think i have all i need.

the road, like this:

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

no curves.

i have a lot of time and i drive slowly


suddenly i brood.

what did i doo? am i now one of this spare vultures?

is i possible, that the old wreck was part of the relay station?

no.
yet.
hmmmmm

so i stop. no way, this doesn't work like this.
i can't break down a car of a indigenous. no. really no. idiot.

go back the 5kms
the parts i wrap up in a cloth and return the parts in the footwell of the wreck.

i know, the thing had pursued me.
but now it's ok.

start the engine and go back to south. i let the wreck allone in the desert...

allone?

about 5kms later the Y60 catch me up.

fright!

time to continue...

***

first i think, he wants to overtake me.
he ignorates my signal for overtaking. he remains behind me and want thet go right at the border.

i know my patrol will be faster than his one. Mine is a turbocharged and a bit blowed TD42 and his must be a non turbo. all the same i stop now.

a really big man gets out of his Y60.
he has a beard and a yellow cape as usual here...

What's going on now?
uncomfortable moment i think... what can i do now?

With great steps he comes up to me.
and...
keeps open arms! He says me welcome and takes me in his arms.

i'm completely irritated.
He don't know about the happened last minutes, he don't know what's going on inside me now.

he says to me: "I saw you when you went away (my second time) from the station.
Then i went to my Patrol (Y60) and i saw the opened Window."

yeah this shows like thefts, right.

now i must explain me. it's not difficult because he believes me immediately. then i show him the parts i returned.

He is verry verry happy
he invites me to his family for a tea.
(in sahara when you are invited for a tea you don't say no. You go in and drink 3 of them and you change every time the glass. this is a symbol of togetherness. all the same procedere...)

so we goes in. his wife and son are inside the station.
the son goes out for cooking the tea. while this the man gives me milk for drinking.
we make a little deal. he gives me milk from maroc and i take any from switzerland and give it to him. then i give him 2 eggs and explain him how to make pancakes

a long time we sit here and speek about this and that. the thing was happened we forget...

i promise him to come for a visit on the way back and then i cook any pancakes for all the family.
he gives me the parts i returned for the long travel to mauritania. i can give them back after.

Verry happy i go on.
what would be when he catches me up with the stolen parts?
i don't like to lie. declarations-emergency... yah...

here i learned to listen better for my heart.

drive away a bit.
for seeing better the beautifull sunset i drive it direct at the beach.
to chill is announced.



not possible to drive a lot of kilometers now. because the view ist verry bad. the marocans drive with a minimum or no lights in the night. not that they do not want, but the can't due to lack of lights. :mrgreen:

daytime i could see any rusty panels. i couldn't see any inscription or directon, so i ignorate them completely.

so i find a place for the night.
a bit away from the street behind a little hill. just a view to the road is possible. so i can see the old NISSAN Fighters and nevertheless i'm hided a bit. so i have no visits this night.
this area is known as dangerous because robbers.

short view on my GPS for planing the next day.

Fright! Bigger than the last..........

my place is direct before a minefield! yes i have noted this in my GPS, but plasticmines can swimm when it rains strong.
hmmm this i don't need. really no...

drive back now? in the night? but where sleeping?
but, can i see the tracks tomorrow? it's windy...
f***!!!

i look better on the GPS and must see a "Waypoint". 12km south from here was a deatly mine accident. suboptimal.
this completes the day as better as i had the hope...

after a verry restless night in the minefield.

luckily i can find the same tracks as i made last night.
back on the street it's like a cold shower flows down my back

a few kilometers go on direction south.
and what must see my eyes?
lovely Landy. a series III Diesel.

obliqueli in the ditch he waits for better times.
thereunder is a man repairing anything.

i drive past it.

but then i turn around and go back to him. in the desert you stop for one who has a problem, i think you know it good enough... (okaaay, now it's only on a main route, but nevertheless...)

conversation by hands and feets is possible but no words. he can't speek a word in french, english, german.


the language difference ist not a problem. because i see the lack of technical.
i take my own tools for removing the rear shaft.

i don't know the english word for this. but i think you can see the problem too.
he want continue with front wheel drive.


first he must change a front wheel hub.
immediately i can see that the splines of the spare part are not the same as the drive shaft.
he screwed it nonetheless on - finish.
he starts the old motor. the starter sounds bad. not a lot of rpm's he can do with the weak battery.
the motor runns. but not the car.

the man's hands are full of greas and he wants to clean them with simple water :mrgreen:
i give him soap and must show him how to clean the hands with water, soap and a little bit of desert sand.
bewildered he looks at my hands

aaahw, i think we can eat an orange. and then we look how to continue. ok?

he asks me somehow with hands and feets for take him with me to the next gas station.
20km i take the man with me.

funny is one fact. when he says anything on arab i don't understand. so i twitch with my shouldes. he says ist again but louder, much louder! he means i understand now...
my answer is in dialect of swiss-german. no way...

but one thing he can press out! Radar!!!

arriving at the gas station. oh this genious truck here! the turbo sounds like a jet...

on the station i see the police (indeed) i come from noth so they go to south. :twisted:

this time i take for buying any two-stroke oil, for add the diesel because they mix petroleum in. While this the police can go for installing the radar.

continue, driving in the heat of desert.
100km/h is allowed, 60km/h i drive.

yeeah, here we are. the police is waiting for me. down in a hollow the have installed the radar pistol correctly in my direction where i come from.

not yet i'm toooo slow. really they can not punish me for this!

i smile out of the window and shows them the "reminding-finger"!
what a fat fish goes them out of the net!!!

now i can read the panels. the most are unreadable rusty.
dangerous for life! they're crazy!


warn for this. Icecold shower down the back... you know what i mean?


why exactly am i doing this? why??

Border station maroc to mauritania.
it's the 19. Decembre. my visum starts the 20. dec.

i go to an marocan officials and ask him how to proceed now.
"you can not pass the border, you're too early and your visum..........."

"but there is a possibility to go on my friend, if you don't agree, you can sleep here on the station" he says...
(yesss, sleeping here with all the smugglers and car-thefts. no)

i have no choice. because when i drive back for one night i must sleep near the wall full of mines and soldiers with theyr AK47. Sleeping on the border of the street anywhere is also a bad idea.
Ok i must choose the Possibility one. Paying any bribe like he calls.

i have understood the system. with money you can arround the law.

Much interessts for my patrol ask my for buying it. ohers wants to change money.

an officials ask me for a present
an other don't want let me go out of maroc with my 310l Diesel.

Officials: So, how we can find a solution for this? To much Diesel you want to take out!
Me: i have a lot of time for waiting for a solution man!
Officials: faster as i think he gives up and must see that here ist nothing to take...


Nomansland
Much of mines here. a lot of mine warning panels too. there are crashed and exploded cars round here. a bat piste completes the death-area

Mauritanian border station


here i must buy a assurance.
no one interessts that my visum begins tomorrow. never wake up sleeping dogs. so i will bi quiet.

an mauritanian official asks me for diesel. "Do you have any diesel for our generator of the station?
because he sees my reserve.
he is happy with a bit swiss-chocolate and i can importe the cheap Diesel.

after total 4h border-procedere they let me go.

Free of bureaucrazy arrived on my destination. here is the way my target in this country.

i search the train line and drive on the railway track. after a while driving in the sand next to it.


mine warnig. nothin new for me.


the first evening in mauritania i can see the longest trin in the world.
filled up with 22'000tonns of iron ore he drives many hundred kilometers trough the rough desert.