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We were out of the hotel at 6:30 am and in the street
outside tried to find a taxi. For such a busy place the night before the street was incredibly quiet. At least it wasn't too warm yet. On the way to the airport Olivier persuaded the taxi driver to stop at a café
where we had a quick cup of coffee and a bread roll. At the airport we had to climb through some building work to get to our trikes.
The wind was still quite strong but not as gusty. We
packed and changed the flight plan for Nouakchott instead of Nouadibou. This meant that our flight for the day would be in one leg instead of two. The weather looked good – a tailwind and no sandstorms.
Before we take off on a long flight the last thing we
do is go to the toilet. It was good to find a clean toilet for a change. I have been into some pretty disgusting toilets in Africa now that I think about it. Ugghhhh!
We were airborne at 8:10 and immediately headed
across the bay towards the south. I could see lots of white horses on the water and when I turned downwind my ground speed went up to 75 knots. The weather looked good, although it was a guess because it was hazy
and dusty ahead – and we were unable to get a weather report for Mauritania.
For the first three hours there was very little
turbulence, so we didn't worry about sticking to the coast – sometimes cutting across large peninsulas and wandering up to 10km inland. The desert stretched to our left as far as we could see. There was very little
vegetation, flat rocky ground, large brown pans and sand dunes. As the day heated up it became turbulent and hot. I undid as much of my clothing as I could to try and cool down. Fighting the turbulence made me
really sweat.
After five and a half hours we landed in the desert
to transfer fuel from the auxiliary tanks Olivier was carrying. It was 2:30 in the afternoon and the wind was from inland and very hot. Gusts of wind could be seen approaching – the dusty gusts hit us every few
minutes and covered the trikes in fine sand. We drank hot water and ate a tomato, bread and some cheese.
The last hour was tough. The turbulence kicked the
trike around like crazy. We landed at Nouakchott airport to a warm and friendly welcome from the Mauritanians. After parking the trikes in the Aeroclub hangar, the fire truck driver gave us a lift into the centre in
a very rickety Renault where we booked into the Hotel Petit Paris.
700 km today. A good days flying, although one of our toughest.
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