Sorry for the delay in any new photos or diary entrys. We have just crossed the Sahara desert and so finding good internet cafes is a bit tricky. So from memory this is how the sahara desert crossing went.
After Essouaira we headed through the tourist resort of Agadir which is basically the last big town until you hit the sahara desert. We are getting a bit better with preparing fish which are by far the cheapest thing to eat and pretty nice too. Outside of the main tourist resort route the Moroccans seem alot more genuine and we have been invited in for cups of mint tea with the campsite owners.
We ended up finishing all of the alcohol fairly early on through the desert, so we were a ‘dry ship’ for over a week! Heading south we get into the disputed Western Sahara where there is a heavy UN presence. Any risk of violence here is long gone as Morocco has pretty much claimed the area for itself by spending alot of money on the infrastructure and flags. The temperature definately took a dramatic increase with 40^C being normal in the moving car and a few times over 50^C when parked.
Theres alot of Police road blocks in the area, the police are especially interested in your occupation. We maintained good cover by claiming we were office workers, so the arms smuggling is still a secret. We’ve met alot of nice people on this part of the journey who have given us some good advice about the oncoming Mauritanian border crossing (thanks to Anne and Alex the laughing Bavarians).
The border crossing traverses a so called ‘mine field’. We opted to not use the expensive guides after hearing horror stories from more than one traveller. The crossing proved fairly easy we initially took the smugglers road but then saw a convoy who looked like they knew where they were going, so we followed them into Mauritania.
