A long and inspiring night of musical festivities at the Festival au desert that had lasted well into the wee hours was followed by a way too early wake-up call in the cold morning. We were all excited but pretty much tired and destroyed. A cup of Nescafé was supposed to get us going and make us ready for a whole day long drive taking us from the festival site near Timbuktu, crossing the great Niger river on an overcrowded river ferry that everybody was trying to catch, navigating 4 hours of bumpy dirt track passionately referred to as “la piste” and saving the day for the passengers and driver of a broken Toyota 4×4. And then we have finally managed to hit our destination – all important roadside town of Sévaré.
- Late afternoon fishing on Niger river at Tombouctou fleuve near Timbuktu, Mali. Photo by Marko Preslenkov.
With so many extraordinary adventures on the road we have arrived late. After all other parties were long enjoying the cosiness of air conditioned rooms, stretching their legs and resting sore backs on those cosy beds. When we have finally hit the town most of the festival goers were already back from dinner and getting ready to call it a day. So we quickly drove our clients to their hotels for a late dinner and slowly drove off. It was then that a small detail became apparent to me. We have only booked the rooms for tourists. The rest of us – Almou, Ahmed as the driver of the second car and me – were left with no place to crash. No room booked under our names. I guess they were naively thinking we don’t need a reservation. So, with everybody making their way back from the Festival au desert and crashing for the night in Sévaré or Mopti we were left with no room nor a single bed and what it looked to be a truly long night in front of us.
But hey, this is Africa! Of course there was a solution. Almou had it all figured out. A grand plan. See, there is a peculiar trick to all those tourists occupying all those cosy beds and rooms that we coveted so much. Most of them would fly out of Sévaré the very same night at 5am on a single weekly Point Afrique flight. Which means they would have to vacate their rooms at 3am latest in order to pass all the proceedings at the airport on time. Tourists out, the three of us in. Easy schmeezy. Now all we had to do is to stay up till that magical 3am cutover and we could finally go dreaming our sweet and deserved dreams.
Not surprisingly we have raised to the challenge and managed it with aplomb! Our simple solution was to go on a drinking spree. Worn out completely after a night of partying and especially after a day of travelling we ended up in the only place that suited our stile – the infamous Bissap Café. With friendly staff and the owner a friend of ours we felt right at home. Few rounds of whiskey and Almou was the first to drop off. Escaping into the car he proclaimed Nisan’s back-seats his kingdom for the night and happily felt asleep while Ahmed and me were trying to do the right thing and hold the fort by drinking till it would be time to drive all the way back to the hotel.
Bizarrely enough we have both managed to sustain the drinking till the two o’clock when we’ve decided it was about bloody time. Slightly intoxicated I was worrying about Ahmed’s condition and ability to drive but he was assuring me he’s quite alright and that he’s the one driving us back. Now, between Bissap Café in Mopti and our hotel in Sévaré is somewhere between 12 and 15km of mainly straight road. And that straight is a true straight line. With a only one single slight turn during the whole ride. And it was even before that turn that Ahmed realised he can’t pull it off. So he stopped the car in the middle of the road and killed the engine.
Slowly walking around the hood of the green Nisan 4×4 plenty of things were rushing through my head. It’s a strange feeling marching on a deserted road somewhere in Western Africa in the middle of the night heading for the drivers seat of a powerful and heavy car knowing that you had quite a few drinks on top of a long long day. And knowing you are the last man standing. The one that needs to make sure that the other two come home safely. The one that just remembered there is a turn waiting on the path. A turn you really should not miss. And the last thing that I’ve asked Ahmed before he dosed into sleep on the passengers seat was whether there are any speed limits imposed in Mali. As if this was biggest of my worries. Forget immense tiredness, what excessive levels of alcohol in the blood or million other things, I was preoccupied by getting caught speeding! And as stupid as the question was, the response could only be produced by pure sleepy mind of a genius – “T’as jamais vu un seul flic avec radar en Afrique?“. Which would come across roughly as “Have you ever seen a cop with a radar in West Africa?!“. Bang! Straight to the point. Of course there newer was one.
Somehow I’ve managed to dodge all those inexistent police speed traps and hit the proper turn for the hotel. Slowly pulling up the driveway I have realized we still might be a moment or two too early. It was half past three and the tourist hadn’t left yet. So I’ve killed the engine and relaxed. I was to close my eyes just for a second. And next thing I remember is chatter of a bunch of shadows standing by the hotel entrance door. Most obviously the tourist waiting for their ride. Suddenly I realised there was one standing by my door looking inside the car. The curiosity got the better of him and he was trying to see who is sleeping in a parked car in front of their hotel. Finally the van had arrived to pick them up. There were more of them coming out of the hotel and as usual there was one being late and everybody was waiting for him.
Finally they have left and I was sure that was it, the moment I was dreaming of. The moment I was to get my own precious bed. But no! Lo and behold. The owner of the place had forgotten to mention this whole idea to the night guard and the night shift for that matter. So not only did we first had to convince the guard to let us in we also had to plead with the night shift to go and swap those still hot sheets with clean ones before the three of us could finally drop down. It was well after half past four when I’ve finally closed my eyes. And it was well into late afternoon that I was served the best and most deserved breakfast coffee…
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