At last we give up the idea of reaching the main dunes and decide to camp on one of the smaller ones. When we want to try to take a picture of the incredible starlit sky, the camera issue pops back into our minds. There seems to be sand inside the zoom mechanism. Endless reanimation efforts later we have to admit that we've broken our most important item. We end the day in a grim mood, we'll figure out what to do in the morning.
Early next morning, we try to make the best of it and walk up to the dunes, at least upto one of the smaller peaks. We wonder if breaking the perfect wind-made ridge is considered harming the environment... What to think of the fellow-motorbikers who ride up the dunes to the summit with their lightweight machines, or the 4WDs that leave tracks all over the place. The dunes cannot handle many more tourists, it seems, even if our side is completely abandoned at this hour. Or not so... a caravan of dromedaries passes by, close to our tent. And a next one. They turn out to belong to a group of tourists that have spent the night in an "oasis", a nomad-style tourist camp high up in the dunes. We ask them to take our picture and they agree to send it to us. Their local guide reminds us of the existence of disposable cameras, that are available in the village of Merzouga, on the other side of the dunes.
It takes us some more hours to get the luggage ready, and when moments later Isabel doesn't find the key to her brake disk lock anymore, we start wondering if we have lost it... the spirit of travelling, I mean. It seems as if we are just not good at it anymore. And besides, the people in this country are tiresome, and we feel like we aren't getting anywhere this way. Suddenly, two blue-turbaned Tamasheq show up on their mobilettes. They say hi, sit down, ask for drinking water and start to chat with us, and it is only 20 minutes later that they invite us to a nice family-ran hostel some kilometers away. Since we might need some help getting out of here with the bikes, and the piste further south only seems to worsen (more sand), we accept their offer. After a lot of pushing, we ride the bikes back onto the main track and follow our friends to the hostel. Their little mobilettes are thirsty by now and we stop over at a small farmer's house, to buy fuel, a coke and drink tea. No signposts here to advertise this "station de service". By now, our temporary guide Mohamed has proven himself to be a nice discussion partner, and we are tempted to spend the night up in the dunes. But first, he jumps onto the rear of my bike and shows me the way to Hassi Labied, a village some 20km away, to pick up a couple of disposable cameras. I'm speeding and enjoying how the Tenere is dancing over the sandy stretches and bumps as if it were the smoothest tarmac ever. Mohamed is smiling when he gets off the bike later. He's been scared a bit with his only protection being a turban (he declined the offer of wearing Isabel's helmet), but what a hell of a ride... A shower and a 90min dromedary ride later, we eat a nice tajine with a group of Italian tourists. Marcello is a motorbike fanatic himself and doesn't find words to express how he admires Isabel's achievement to ride her bike all the way to the Erg as a novice...
Next day we ride back to Erfoud and then continue to Tinerhir, some 150 kms west. Abdelaziz, the attendant at the gaz station where I clean the chains and axles first, offers us a nice chat and we share the tajine his wife made him for lunch. In just a few days, we have met several really nice people. If one gets out of the most touristy places, it IS possible to meet people that like to discuss things and do not just want to sell you something... After another very nice experience in Tinerhir (a friendly tea for no reason whatsoever but hospitality) and sadly a bad one (a hotel that is better avoided), we find ourselves looking for a camping spot in the Toudgha canyon. By an incredible series of events, we end up camping near a water source on a flat grassland, amidst beautiful mountains of the Atlas range, in the merry company of 2 French ladies and their Moroccan guides. They offer us a beer and local wine from Meknes and soon the place is turned into a disco berbère, we are dancing to the cars' indicator lights, singing and drumming on the already somewhat dented bodywork of the cars... Next morning, nomads bring their cattle to the source, and Hassan and Youssouf ask them if they can provide us with a little goat tonight for a mechoui, a whole-piece grill. They can, and after a resting day with a visit to the hamam, we spend a night around the campfire waiting for the poor animal to be slaughtered and grilled. Intestines, heart and lungs go into a nice tajine...
By now we have been buying and using lots of disposable cameras and a better solution needs to be found. It turns out that the safest and fastest way to get a working digital camera that we like, is for Isabel to make a quick round-trip to Belgium from Agadir. It leaves us just enough time for one piste through the Jebel Sagho, the mountain range that separates us from the desert near the Algerian and Mauretanian border. We are keen to give it another try...
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