The long day was coming to a slow and long anticipated end. Sun was setting down over the arid plains full of dry earth and rare trees or bushes. We were closing in on Douentza, a not so inviting but necessary little junction town on a road between Timbuktu and Mopti. The sight of low rock bulges and hills had me sensing that the end of bumpy and shaky ride is coming soon. And also the sun was glowing with the last rays producing that golden light. Which made me wanna take photos. Right there and then. And since we were driving there were only two options left – either shoot trough smeared front window or lean out trough the side window.
Stupidly as it was I, of course, picked the more daring and interesting option of squeezing half of my body out trough the car window at speeds easily exceeding 70 km/h on a bumpy jumpy road that Malians like to call “la piste”. Or the track if you will. As you can imagine such an endeavour isn’t too safe. But hey! I did my best to make it as safe as I could. I’ve strapped the camera tightly around my right wrist (after all protecting the camera is more important than anything, right 😛 ) Slowly, and I really mean sloooooowly I’ve started squeezing my body out trough the windows. Left hand firmly grabbing the handle inside Toyota, I was on the lookout for every bump that could surprise me. After quite a long pull I’ve finally made it. My ass was hanging out the window and Almou, who was navigating the jumpy bumpy road could finally tangle the seatbelt around my legs. In case you are wondering, ja, the seatbelt and left arm gripped around the door handle were meant to be my protection. 🙂
Just as I was finally getting all comfy and used to irregular bumps and swerves and was starting to enjoy shooting long dust screens trailing from another car in the distance and the beautifully arid scenery in the sunset we were suddenly stopping. Few hundred meters from the track on our left was a stranded 4WD with a bunch of people standing around it and desperately waiving for us to stop. Turns out that their Toyota has had it. It had to transport 8 passengers and a driver with all their luggage back from the Festival au desert and had finally decided that enough is enough. Machine broke down. This car definitely gave up. And the only thing we could do to help them out was to leave all the passengers on the spot and take but the driver of the unfortunate vehicle on already overloaded board of our Toyota .
We have left the knackered driver at the car repair shop in Douentza, the closest town, where he could negotiate the rate for a mechanic to come back to the left behind car with him and fix the broken car. On we went quite quickly – just a quick coffee and a bite – as there was still a good two hours drive in front of us before reaching Sévaré near Mopti and it was already dark.
By the time we have finally reached Sévaré it was already quite late and we all were pretty tired after the long and eventful day and the tourist we were driving back from the Festival au desert were happy to find their comfortable air-conditioned rooms. Hot showers and mosquito nets and the sort. Deserved and welcoming change from a few days spent in the traditional Tuareg tents in the Sahara desert.
To be continued…
