BUDAPEST BAMAKO CAR RALLY 2007

TEAM CRAZY AUTORICKSHAWS

Two Indians from Tamilnadu, Aravind B. Kumar and Ejji K. Umamahesh are participating in the second annual BUDAPEST-BAMAKO CAR RALLY. It is an "international adventure car rally" starting from Budapest, (Hungary) and runs through Austria, Italy, Spain, France, Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania, ending in Bamako (Mali). The rally starts on January 13th 2007 and ended on Januray 28th 2007. See www.budapestbamako.org for more details. The two person team, a young entrepreneur and a non-professional rally driver who has participated in the India-Asean Car Rally 2004, have joined together for the purpose of adventure and fun, and to show the world that India does not lag behind in being part of such big international rallies. They will be driving a Nissan Patrol, diesel, 4 wheel drive vehicle. They are doing it on their own cost, without any sponsorship or affiliation to any motor sports organization.They are very happy to represent India in a rally, not meant for the faint hearted, and being run through the most unimaginable yet exotic, inhospitable, politically volatile and challenging areas on the face of the earth. The rally is being covered by nearly all the top global print and television media from start to finish.The name of this only Indian team in a rally of more than 100 vehicles, is "CRAZY AUTORICKSHAWS". The name has been carefully chosen to popularize autorickshaws around the world, considering the unprecedented interest the international print and visual media coverage of "The Indian Autorickshaw Challenge 2006" has generated.The reason is that Aravind and Ejji are the organizers of INDIANARC, "The Indian Autorickshaw Challenge“, a rally by autorickshaws in India, 'An Amazing Race for the Clinically Insane', which proved a huge success with the inaugural run in August 2006. INDIANARC has already scheduled two exciting runs in 2007. See www.indianarc.com for more details.

THE RALLY IN DETAIL

HISTORY: The event is the brainchild of Hungarian Internet entrepreneur and former radio “shock jock” Geza Villam, who wanted to give rally fans an option to the more expensive and stricter Paris Dakar rally. He found no cheaper and more comfortable alternative to the Paris-Dakar, so he created his own. After first envisioning a direct drive through the Sahara in Tunisia, Libya, Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali, he opted for a safer and more scenic route around the Western rim of Africa. On January 13th 2007, 105 teams lined up in Budapest’s Heroes Square for the second run of the Budapest Bamako. The Budapest Bamako or the Great African Run is a rally organized by a group of Hungarians. The B2 is a low budget version of the Paris-Dakar Rally that goes from Budapest to Bamako through the Sahara. It passes through Hungary, Croatia or Austria, Italy, France, Spain, Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania and Mali. The Paris-Dakar Rally inspired the Budapest Bamako. CANNON BALL MEETS PARIS DAKAR: If you’ve got a lot of money and want to race through the desert, the Paris-Dakar is for you. But if your pockets are not bottomless, but would like a genuine road adventure, then this is your race. Driving from Budapest, Hungary to Bamako, Mali on a variety of roads with only limited or no assistance. The Budapest-Bamako (B2) race will take place entirely on roads indicated on maps. Each participant is obliged to follow local laws and regulations. Most of the participants in Budapest-Bamako 2007 have never even taken part of a race event like Budapest-Bamako before but their enthusiasm for adventure tourism and adrenaline gave each participant the courage to persevere through 9 countries (7632 Km) of unpredictable temperature, unexpected variables and the volatile temperament of nature within 16 days! This is the low cost Paris-Dakar for the modest in pocket and immodest will power. “Budapest – Bamako” is for those who enjoy the thrill of the race at a low cost. Racing is no longer for the upper crust! The rich and the pauper alike will hit the road and rock across the dusty lands of the “Cradle of Civilization” in a heated race to the finish! This is race is a test of endurance, will power, agility, tolerance, adaptation, and navigational skill while being under extreme pressure and intense conditions. This rough and dangerous ride is not for the faint hearted or the weak of character, this race is for the absolute unstoppable winner, the dreamer with ambition for fuel! This year's rally included a special category for those who think that driving from Hungary into the heart of Africa isn't enough of a challenge: hitchhiking. "They can travel with anyone except a Budapest-Bamako vehicle. It promised and delivered a sense of adventure and the romance of Africa, much like the Paris-Dakar did in its early days. Driving nearly 8000 kilometers on uncertain African roads, being locked up with another person in a car for two weeks and traveling through four seasons is no small accomplishment. If that's not enough of a challenge for you, there is a racing category. Competitors will have to complete daily stages and perform geo-caching exercises (look for treasure). The B2 also raises money for local charities in Mali. PHILOSOPHY & RULES: The guiding principle of the Budapest-Bamako is: Anyone, By Anything, In Any Way. There are no restrictions on the vehicles or individuals that can enter. There are no road restrictions either. Participants have to complete daily stages between Budapest and Bamako. There are no set routes. Racers can plan and optimize their own route. It is not a timed event. Points are awarded for completing daily stages in certain time periods. In addition there are geo-caching challenges along the way for additional points. If a team doesn't complete a stage they are still in the race. Cars don't have to arrive at the finish line, just participants. ROUTE: The race goes from Budapest through Austria or Croatia, Italy, France, Spain, Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania to Mali. Nearly 8000 kilometers are covered within 16 days. The race ends in the capital of Mali, Bamako. CHARITY: Each year the Budapest-Bamako has a charity goal. In 2005 money was raised for a Bamako orphanage. In 2007 participants have adopted villages on route and deliver supplies to that community. The team that performs the most outstanding charity work receives the Mother Teresa Charity Award. Budapest-Bamako's II, fondly and popularly named B2, is a race for a good cause and one of the charity objectives of the rally is to donate money to Adopt-A-Village. Every team will be assigned an African village. Each team will have to visit that village and bring medicine, toys, school supplies, children’s' clothing and other items of importance to their village. The team must meet the village headman or elders before distributing the gifts. Each village will be notified in advance about the team’s arrival. ENTRANCE FEE & WHAT YOU GET: There are no entry restrictions. As long as a vehicle is street legal, it can join the event. With paying the entry fee of 2000 Euros, you get the right to participate on the 2nd. Budapest-Bamako Car Rally, The Great African Run. The participants get ONLY the followings for free: Participation in the official parties Accommodation in a five star hotel in Bamako for one night only. Fixing up the visas Maps Numbers Sponsor supply Licenses NOT INCLUDED IN ENTRANCE FEE: The participant must have his own vehicle and must be present in Budapest with the vehicle by the 6 January 2007 with an International Driving Permit from his country of origin. The participant also has to pay for: Fuel for the entire route, repairs and service of vehicle, fees for special papers to drive in countries on the route, hotel rooms, all food, alcohol, tobacco and “other forbidden luxuries”, up-gradation of vehicle to the tough rally standards, visa fees for all countries, regular insurance for the vehicle, special rally insurance, country specific insurance for Mauritania (as Mauritania insists on a specific insurance to drive on its roads), border crossing fees, ferry charges, entry fees to parks and special areas the rally passes through, medical insurance, camping material like tents, stoves, etc, special tools and equipment for desert travel, ready to eat food supplies, Global Positioning System, CB Radio, recovery charges for stranded vehicle, medical/accident evacuation, special winter, summer and sand tyres, satellite telephone and mobile phone including talk time, special clothing, and everything else needed on the treacherous and dangerous rally. In short you do not get anything from the organizers. RALLY EXPERIENCE: Budapest to Velence (Venice): This year’s rally started off in Budapest on a cold early morning of around 5 degrees C. The route through Austria (that’s the route we took, though you can go through Croatia as well), and on to the expressways through Austria was breathtaking and with the snow on the Alps provided a lovely background. Small villages made driving on restricted speed a tame affair. Once you leave Austria and enter Italy, speed, the highways and the latest cars on the roads change. We entered Velence when it was dark, freezing and clouded in mist. The camp was on the outskirts of Velence and we had to just check in, eat some tinned food and sadly miss out on going into Venice. Velence (Venice) to Meyreuil: Next morning was severely cold and we were off towards France on the expressway, the sun not coming out till around 9am and the mist restricting visibility to a few feet. The road is burrowed through the mountain range in a series of tunnels. Beautifully lit and road surface perfect, the Italian drivers on these expressways do not know the meaning of “speed”. “Speed” to them is as fast as you can drive and stay alive. The tolls were all electronic and you had to pay up at innumerable tollbooths. Once you exit Italy and enter France, the expressway goes along the Mediterranean Cost, past Nice, Cannes, Monte Carlo on to Meyreuil, as small village on the outskirts of Marseille. One of the challenges was to find the door number of Tina Turner’s house in Monte Carlo and to visit a casino at Monaco near the F1 track. (We did not take up challenges as we were participating in the non-challenge category. One enterprising rally participant we found out later on, had not only located Tina Turner’s house and noted her door number, he even opened her mail box on the gate and brought a letter addressed to her as proof!!). Meyreuil, though called a village, is rather a big town and we stay at a very aptly named hotel, “Formula 1”. Meyreuil to Murcia: The road still goes along the Mediterranean and you see some of the most beautiful sceneries and enter Spain. With the entry into Spain, the tolled expressway ends. We have paid tolls of nearly 300 Euros between Budapest and here! The movement of goods by road on this stretch is phenomenal. The multi lane expressway ends some distance inside Spain, but the roads are still excellent, at least 2 up and 2 down. It is night by the time we land in Murcia. Freezing again and a lovely campsite, more a huge hotel with prefab bungalows and dormitories. Everyone is too tired to party and after beer and canned food off to sleep uncomfortably as the biting wind blows in through the gaps in the bungalow structures. Murcia to Almeria: A very wonderful coastline road and orange orchards all the way to Almeria. The coast is dotted with popular towns with bungalows of the rich and famous. Almeria is a port town with huge Moorish Forts on the hills, the ferry ticketing is fast and expensive too. 275 Euros for the car and 2 persons. All cars line up here at the port. We catch up with friends on the pier while we wait for the vehicles to be loaded, and meet other participants in the rally for the first time. The teams from UK have joined us here and we make new friends, notes and experiences are exchanged and beer flows freely. The vehicles are driven into the hold of the ferry and we retire to our well-appointed cabins for a five-hour cross of the Mediterranean. Good-bye Europe. Africa, here we come. Almeria to Nador: The ferry is actually a luxury ship with cargo. Movie theatres, club lounges, bars, gymnasium, the works. We take a tour of the ferry or ship and after some time, retire to our cabins for a well-earned rest. We dock at Nador in five hours and reset our watch forward by 1 hour for Moroccan time. This is where we see corruption, inefficiency and time delay for the first time. Vehicle permits and licenses are checked. The wait is nearly 4 hours. But the port town of Nador is small and we are at the hotel soon. A walk around town and we find that there are lovely eating-places but no beer! First taste of a Muslim country. Though we know that alcohol can be purchased, we decide to be clean and have our liquid fills at the hotel bar where we are staying. A typical Moroccan dinner ends the day or rather nite. Nador to Merzouga: Here end the expressways, tolled drives, major GPS satellite links and most of civilization’s pleasures. We changed the winter tires to summer tires for the drive ahead. Crossing the Atlas Mountains and the Sahara Desert does the Nador to Merzouga route. It is incredible that world-class roads, (not expressways, and much better than the best of Indian Golden Quadrilateral Highways!) have been built literally up the mountains and across the deserts, though they pale before the expressways in Europe. Merzouga is a touristy oasis in the Sahara. The night was spent in a Bedouin tent at freezing temperatures again. The camp ran short of blankets and we used floor carpets to cover ourselves. The next morning we had a photo-op of driving to the Sahara dunes. Merzouga to Tata: From Merzouga you drive to Tata on wonderful roads till Zagora. Though there is a good road from Zagora to Tata, we took the off-road through the desert from Zagora to Tata via Foum Zguid. This is where we had the only problem with the car. The rear right wheel blew into shreds in the middle of the desert at around 11 pm. It was a great experience replacing the tire in the desert by means of emergency and headlamps, (not the ones in the vehicle- these are lamps you wear around your head, fixed by an elastic band!). It is then that we found that the hydraulic jacks we were using were of no use in the desert sands. It was getting buried into the sand. With a bit of luck and some brainstorming we managed to ultimately change the tire. Much luck here; as in the middle of the desert, mobile phones do not work! The CB radio is practically no use as cars are not traveling in bunches. Moreover, since you can take any route to reach your day’s destination, there is no way you can know who is traveling within radio reachable distance in such vast expanse of nothingness. On the sands, at night it is very difficult to see the tracks that we have to take. Sometimes, we drive for hours and find we are off track and have to re-orient our course to get to the right track. We reached Tata around 4 am. There are only 2 hotels and a few camping sites in Tata. The temperature was around 4 degrees C. We tried the two hotels and were told they were full of other rally participants who had got to Tata before us. One hotel asked us to sleep for sometime in the car and promised us a room as soon as the first participant left. It was 7 am when we got the room and though we were late for the day’s start, we decided to sleep for 4 hours as we had driven from Merzouga to Tata in an incredible non-stop drive of 17 hours through the desert, mostly by night! Tata to Laayonne: The drive from Morocco to Western Sahara is a wonderful drive on excellent roads. Where the Sahara Desert meets the Atlantic Ocean, the sight is incredible. Shipwrecks in all states of disintegration line the coast. You cannot get off the vehicle even to pee on the roadside as the entire stretch other than the tarred road is still filled with landmines. We reached Laayonne way past nightfall. It is a big town, well laid out and filled with cars bearing UN number boards. An unexplainable experience – while driving in the dark with head lights on this road with a vast expanse of water on your right and a vast expanse of desert sand on your left, with no structures or vegetation in the vast nothingness on both sides, you tend to get a most exotic hallucination. As you drive through this emptiness and can see as far as the head light beam reaches, you start seeing trees on both sides of the road. But where are the trees? They are not there. This does not happen on desert sands. It happens only on tarred roads, only at night, when you drive through emptiness. I do not have an explanation for this. But I feel that when driving on desert sands, you are conscious about the sand over which you are driving, the movement of the vehicle, the feeling of the steering wheel and what your body feels is not something you experience regularly in your day to day life. So your mind does not feel you are doing something you are used to always. It is a new experience with no records in your mental screen. Whereas, when you drive on perfectly laid roads, invariably laid perfectly straight through the emptiness I have mentioned earlier, your subconscious mind retrieves, embedded visages from your cache of memories. As you are mostly used to driving at night on roads with trees on the sides, the mind starts overlapping the visible image of the existent road with the mental image of the non-existence trees. This is my explanation and hope to solve this puzzle one day. Laayonne to Dakhla: The next morning we drove again on excellent roads along the Atlantic Ocean to the port town of Dakhla. We had to exhaust all the alcohol in the vehicles before you cross into Mauritania as per the rules there, you cannot carry in liquor to Mauritania, since it claims to be a perfectly Islamic country. (But in my travels I have not come across a place in the whole wide world, where you cannot get a woman to screw or booze to drink). There was a beach party at the camp where most were staying a few miles before Dakhla, (though I stayed at a top class hotel). The party I am told did not end till the start next morning! I went back to the hotel to have a much needed shower and sleep. Before we ended the day, we packed the booze bottles in thick packing tape and hid them all over the car even under the engine and spare tires. Dakhla to Noudhoubou: Dakhla was the last stop before we enter Mauritania. The border control on the Western Sahara side is a well laid out place with well-built control rooms. The entire border is fenced as we could see from the Western Sahara side. The control staff is absolutely corrupt guys. Even if everything is in order for the border crossing, you have to pay a “fee”. We fill in many forms in English, half of the entries illegible or wrong. All they want to see on the form is some form of writing though they cannot read English. Having paid the “fees” and interacting with arrogant, ignorant but corrupt border guards, who speak only French or Moroccan, we cross the gate into no man’s land. The time was 6.20pm, a few minutes after sunset, and it gets dark in these areas by the second. The no man’s land is the biggest garbage dump you can see. Garbage everywhere, blown in by the desert winds from the Western Sahara border control outpost. This was the scariest part of the rally, scarier than driving through the Sahara at night. The border from Western Sahara to Mauritania is a no-man’s land of around 20 km wide on an average. The entire area is filled with landmines. There are no markers, pathways or roads. You are supposed to follow the tracks of the earlier vehicles on the desert sands, but this idea is stupid, as the tracks do not stay for long in the ever changing “sandscape”. You cannot get down from the car, as if you step a few feet off the track on the desert sand, you could be blown dead by a land mine. Just a couple of weeks ago a British team in a Land Rover (not from our rally), lost their bearings, veered away from the safe track, and within 5 feet were blown to pieces by a landmine. The rally road book gives the GPS co-ordinates you have to follow on the no man’s land to reach the Mauritania border check post. You just have to follow the GPS and drive. Here again is a fallacy. The GPS co-ordinates are not so exact to a few inches. You could follow the co-ordinates and still be off track considering this error. There is an unorganized group of “guides” who are standing in the dark. They are used to this place and can take you safely to the Mauritania border check post by the correct route. We asked one of these “guides” to get into the car and negotiated a fee. Just then we heard a horn from a car in the stillness of the desert in front of us. We asked the “guide” to guide us to this car. We found it to be the Lada team whose car had stalled. Luckily they were on the safe track. We stopped in front of them and tried to start that car. No luck. We took the tow -ropes from our car and towed the Lada to the Mauritania border check post. That was one hell of an experience. The Mauritania border control is something to be seen to be believed. In the middle of nowhere on the sands of the Sahara at near zero temperatures, we had the first experience of seeing border check points in the desert where the personnel work with candle-light! The border control itself is a tent and the staff, live and work in these tents. Most of them are high on alcohol or hashish! (Islamic country!!) Again a “fee” is demanded which we pay as a matter of regularity. The guards make illegible entries in a torn notebook that in all probability will be blown away soon. Then they ask for “cadeau”, that is gifts in French. Yes! We will give you the “cadeau”, but please get the formalities finished. We give them a few pens and notebooks with biscuits. They ask if we have any booze. We say no, since Mauritania is a Muslim country we respect your traditions and we will not bring in booze or drink in Mauritania. The guards have a laugh and tell us everyone takes in booze after giving them a bottle or two! Anyway, we pass out of the border control and the no man’s land. The first stop is still miles away- Noudhoubou. We drive for sometime on a “piste” (used, untarred track on the sand with wheel marks from earlier vehicles) and reach a tarred road to go into Noudhoubou. The town is dusty, garbage filled town with one specialty. All cars are Mercedes Benz. The cars are in the state of disrepair that cannot be described. Once in a way we see a new Benz driving past jostling for space with donkey carts. We reach well past midnight and go to the designated camping site in the middle of the town. Even at that unearthly hour there are hordes of moneychangers around you even before you can open the car doors! Some rally vehicles are already there. We check into a dormitory with common toilets. There is a restaurant just beside the camping site and run by a most beautiful French/Moroccan girl. The way she handles her customers is unbelievable. We have some beer in the car, (mind you we are in Muslim Mauritania) and adjourn to the restaurant for some hookah smoking and food. We have a most delicious Mauritanian meal. The beauty of the girl was the only distracting thing! Noudhoubou to Noumghar: Next morning, we leave Noudhoubou to travel to the much-awaited Beach Camp at Noumghar. You drive along a good road on the sands of the Sahara along the Atlantic Ocean and reach a point near Noumghar, where we turn perfectly west towards the Atlantic Ocean shore. The Sahara joins the Atlantic Ocean here, as it does from north of Laayonne. The sand dunes are beautiful and the sands seem to be blowing on to the road at many places, covering the tarred road completely. In some patches shrubs with small plastic barriers have been laid out to prevent the sand from blowing on to the road, but this mostly is never effective. The Sahara sand is filled with seashells, and dried marine animal coverings of all shapes and sizes. As a matter of fact, much of this is being collected to make lime for plastering in the Saharan oases we passed. The sand on the seashore is our “road” for about 30km. But the vehicles can be driven only at low tide. So we wait for the low tide and start driving on the seashore. To one side is the ocean. To the other side are the sand dunes. In between the shoreline is a narrow strip of beach. This strip is our road. You race at high speed on the seashore, (as slow speed makes the vehicle sink) on the partially dried sand surface, while the waves literally lap your wheels. If you get stuck on this stretch, you just have to abandon your vehicle with your belongings and run to safety on the dunes as the tide will become high in a couple of hours and drag the vehicle into the ocean! Here again we had to help the same old Lada that again stalled! Stop, get towrope, pull the Lada and go to the camp. When we reached the camp, which is part of the Parc National Du Banc D’Arguin. This is one of the must-see parks in the world, a national park of Mauritania that is home to millions of birds migrating between Europe and South Africa. What a sight to see millions of birds fly overhead or land on the sea! And, the peak migration time is just now, December and January. As we raced across the seashore, we had a most unexpected visitor- a winged one of the human variety. A powered paraglider ! A small engine strapped on his back and a parachute and our friend followed the rally along the seashore and landed at the camp to keep us company and also. Hmmm, show off a bit! (We later on spotted him at Noukchott too!) The sun was setting. The rally vehicles were parked all over the beach. The “Bully bus”, or the “party bus” was open, music blaring, and all camping equipment out and of course booze flowing. Each team was busy making it’s own dinner and partying till near mid night. And then! There was a shout. Everyone goes toward the origin of the shout on this dark beach, and we see the Lada slowly sinking into the sand! Soon a wave comes and laps the Lada wheels and it sinks further! The Lada team (who had the uncanny ability of getting stranded in the most dangerous places) had parked their vehicle well below the high tide mark. As the tide increased, it started lapping the Lada, and when receding the Lada was sinking. As we were there, we heard another shout. This time the waves had entered a tent pitched within the high tide mark. We tried starting the Lada, but the engine was unresponsive. But the Lada team decided to sit and watch the car and the tide than having it pulled out and it was well entrenched into the sand and little chance of it being dragged into the sea. The worst that could happen they said, was that it will disappear into the sands, and they would dig it out next morning! So saying they had some more Vodka and Unicum. Way after mid night the camp fell into a dreamy silence! The next morning dawned bright with our “winged visitor” giving demonstrations on his motorized paraglider. The Hummer Team thought this was the time to ride the dunes and went off on the Hummer up and down the dunes. The Dune Buggies were brought out from the large vans and everyone was racing across the dunes and on the water washed shores. Amazing site to see dune buggies on desert dunes, hurtling down into the Atlantic spray! Now here was an opportunity for some girl watching. All the girls were in different states of undress, and Andros the Lead organizer made it a photo op to capture curves and cuddle the cuties! A motorized boat turned up on the sea with fishermen selling the first catch in the morning. Lobsters and fish were purchased and cooked to last till lunchtime. Yes! Lunchtime was on the beach since the low tide was again between 3.30pm and 5.30pm and we had to wait for the low tide to trace our way back on the shore to Noukchott. Noumghar to Noukchott: So there we were. Racing across the sand of the Sahara, which is also the shore of the Atlantic. And we were the last to leave the camp. Tracing our way back to where we left the highway the earlier evening to drive on the sand, we get back on the tarred road for the drive to Noukchott. This time we had another problem. The 4-wheel drive that we used for the sands refused to get disengaged. This made the vehicle wobble without traction on hard surface. We stopped a couple of times and reset the gears, but nothing happened. OK, we said, we will drive the next 100km at slow speed through the roads in Sahara to Noukchott. It was already becoming dark. A few kilometers on the road in this dreadfully slow speed and suddenly the 4 wheel drive setting disengaged by itself! We had already lost precious time and we hurtled towards Noukchott. The party at Noukchott was on the seaside in a resort and the traditional Bedouin feast of roasted camel was a highlight. We checked into Novotel Hotel, the best in town for a rather belated shower and rest. But there was no rest. Beer party at the bar was on and the dinner service was closed. So off to bed in the early hours on tuna sandwiches, each the size of Dolly Parton’s “assets”. Noukchott to Boutilimit: The route from Noukchott to Bamako now splits. There is one official route through Mbout, Hamoud, Kayes, Kita, which is the treacherous one recommended for extreme terrain vehicles, and the other easy route through Boutilimit, Kiffa, and Niori and on to Bamako. The adventure through Sahara and the road past Zagora made us choose the safer alternative route. The short drive to Boutilimit was done easily. We saw a camping site with a display of nearly a whole cow ready to be made into “kebabs”. We booked a whole large room and had a traditional Mauritanian desert meal. Boutilimit to Kiffa: This drive again on very good roads with quite a few towns in between brought us to the camping site at Kiffa. The camp itself is well organized and we checked in early to enjoy the evening at the camp. We also checked the newly laid “Highway of Hope” connecting Noukchott to Bamako that has recently been completed and is not on the published maps. Some new portions are not yet on the GPS also. Kiffa to Niori: This was a very picturesque drive. Strange shaped mountains and rocks and most areas filled with old volcanic lava. The highway, newly laid, made the drive easy and a small portion connecting the old highway to the new highway and bye pass roads through major towns brought us to the Mauritanian border town of Gogui. Many police check posts on this road and each point the [policemen want “cadeau” or gifts. So many pens and notebooks were given to get their OK. We were nearing the Mauritania- Mali border. We were in a hurry as we had heard that the border check post in Mali closes at 6pm. Here we overshot a customs checkpoint. In a jiffy, there was a car racing behind us waving us to stop. The only word he said in French that we understood was “fish” (that is the pronunciation, I do not know the spelling) which means papers. We showed him the papers for the car and our passport. He asked us to turn the car and come to a broken shed in the middle of the village market with a Mauritanian flag (torn worse than the Indian flag we had on our car!). He asked us once again for our passport, insurance and “fish” and took a bribe of 20 Euros to let us pass. We drove on to Mali and the first town is Niori. We arrived at the check post and were told that since it is late, the check post is closed and we should stay in Niori and come back at 9am the next day for the passports to be stamped. So we searched out a desolate old camping ground run by a Malinese with his many wives and a full fledged bar. (Muslim Mali!!). By the time we had settled down there were a few locals coming and asking us if we want to sell the car! Dozens of beers bottles and a few other participants in the same camp made a nice evening. The owner of the camp told us a lot about the “Highway of Hope” to Bamako and said it was “very good”. Soon we are to find how wrong he was, or may be his definition of “good” is totally different from ours. Niori to Bamako: Next morning we had to go and show our “fish” to the border check post and also get our passports stamped at a police station as per Mali rules. We searched for a police station, got our passports stamped and also got the border check post stamping for the car, yes, after paying the usual “fees”. The drive to Bamako proved that all the information we got at Kiffa and Niori about the highway was wrong. Miles and miles of the highway outside Niori is just being laid! So dust track for maybe 50 km. Then a portion of laid road. And then starts the piste. Soft sand that’s all. No road. The highway work has just been started! The entire stretch from Diema to Didieni took nearly 10 hours. It mostly passes through Parc National de La Boucle De Baule, which we think meant National Park of Flora and Fauna. We did not see anything except dust, dust and stranded vehicles! The swaying and the jumping of the car dislodged the clamp of the roof carrier on one side and the clamp had actually bent away the edge of the car body on the other. So we stopped in the middle of the dust and sand and put all the tires on the roof into the car and on the rear seat. A most horrible thing to do in the sand, dust and heat! And then we drove on to join the tarred road and the drive to Bamako. Nearing Bamako, the whole road looks like India. Drunks swaying on the road, some lying on the sides, markets, villages, people, people, people and people. Nearer Bamako, the sky turns dark. Pollution and smoke. The time was around 6pm. The time to make dinner. Wood fire in all places even in the town of Bamako, capital of Mali. We found a hotel to stay the nite and checked in. Bamako is one large bazaar. There is no place where something is not being sold. You stop at a traffic signal and you can buy anything from a telephone calling card to a woman! But the roads are well laid out and excellent cars on the road. It is a boomtown that stretches for miles and miles. We were early for the finish by a whole day. As the motto of the rally says, “: Anyone, By Anything, In Any Way”. We had to register arrival at the Kempinski Hotel next day by noon. We checked out of the hotel we were staying in and drove to Kempinski, the bigger of 2 hotels in Bamako, perhaps the whole of Mali. Placed by the Niger River, it is just an ordinary hotel by world standards, but rather big for Mali. We entered the hotel and immediately we were mobbed by hundreds of car dealers wanting to buy the car. Some participants had already checked in and we did the same. After a shower, we cam e down to meet the others and hear the stories they had to tell. Many were still missing. Some cars had been totaled and sold. Some totaled and abandoned. But most reached Bamako. Finish Party: Late in the evening there was a finish party at a beautiful restaurant in Bamako. Wine flowing, women in all shapes and shades as hostesses and pizzas fast flying off the oven. The party ended way past midnite, and the participants still had the energy to go out and savor the flavor of Mali nightlife till the early morning.

On the whole the rally was an once-in-a-lifetime experience. I will not do it again as I cannot afford to pay for two such rallies in one lifetime! Second, the physical and mental exhaustion is too taxing. Lastly, is it worth risking your life just to say I’ve done it? But once you finish the rally you realize a few things. We have a wrong conception that Africa is backward. The roads and electricity distribution in West Africa is better than in India by leaps and bounds. The towns even in disputed Western Sahara are so well laid out. The roads and streets are world class. The electricity distribution and the perfect distribution without fluctuations should be an eye opener for India. Store shelves are lined with the best products from around the world. (What a different scenario we find in India when anything “global” is seen as a threat to the “local Indian” producer of shoddy goods. Then, the smile! Something absent in India, from a street-side vendor to the check out girl at the posh international supermarket. Lastly, we think it a great achievement in India to cross the Atlas Mountains or the Sahara by vehicles. The hordes of tourists who are swarming all over the deserts and mountains of Africa, not forgetting such strange and rare places as the Western Sahara, Mauritania and Timbuktu (or Tombouctou) shows that India and tourism are far apart. All in all a great rally experience, a once in a life time drive. I cannot forget it.

RALLY ROUTE MAP