Day 210 14th February
Chegara to Foum Zguid
Up at 8 and found that Georges had been up early and seen the sunrise from the top of a dune of which I was quite jealous, but I probably needed the sleep. I woke in the night to roll over in my double bed and discover the other side was much firmer and more comfortable but only at about 3am!
I made tea and we chatted to Mohamed about the route and other stuff. We had bread and honey for brekkie and Georges decided we needed to leave pretty soon to avoid the heat of the sun making the sand too soft. I managed to get up to the top of a dune with a surfboard but it had a broken strap and the underside was hanging off so I couldn’t really get much of a run down but I enjoyed it and I could have stayed all day with a decent board.
We packed up quickly and were on the road at 11, but not until we had dug Georges’ boules set out from a cubbyhole under his bed to give to Mohammed as a gift to say thanks for having us,. Of course we had to have a few games then to show how it’s done!
Then we were off but the sand was deep and after about 30 minutes we needed to stop and let the engine cool, so out came the gas and I made some coffee. Back on the road we hit some more big dunes and thick sand and the next stop was in the shade under a tree at the Titanic restaurant in the middle of Lake Irike where we had tea and checked out the boat.
Georges got chatting to the owner and the next thing I know we are picking up two lads from the next restaurant along the plain. Yesin got in the front seat while Mohamed was left to get crushed in the back! They were nice lads who spoke a bit of English but no French, unusually.
After a few bumps to the head from the roof we let Mohamed out for a break and I brewed up some more coffee and made sardine and green pepper sarnies while Georges went searching for fossils and meteorites. We carried on after lunch and saw a massive caravanne of camels and some spectacular views as the desert turned to stony pistes and then back to sand again.
After a few more stops we arrived in Foum Zguid and went to see the Germans in a campsite where we didn’t seem welcome for some reason.Who knows?
We dropped the boys off at the Oasis Hotel and got a price of a twin room at 40 dirhams each, but we went in search of Khayma campsite and Georges negotiated 60 dirhams for the two of us camping. We went to get diesel for which I paid 260 dirhams for a full tank, which seemed pretty good to me. Then we had dinner of chicken brochettes and chips with salad while watching Barca lose 4-0 to PSG. Back at the campsite we polished off the bottle of gin and I lit the stove which we sat around chatting until midnight.
Khayma camping 30 dirham each due to Georges’ negotiation.