I had arranged for a driver to take me to Chinguetti from Atar for the day. There is a mini bus that goes each morning, but nothing is guaranteed to return to Atar later in the day, so a driver seemed prudent. I mean, worst case scenario, you get stuck in Chingeutti overnight, which would be ok, but I had plans to hop a train and I wasn’t going to risk missing that.
We left after I had breakfast at my accommodations (Nescafé and a baguette – I was like 4 days into the trip at this point and already sick of baguettes). My driver seemed pleasant, but he didn’t speak English or French (and I could not speak his language), so who knows. Despite knowing we could not communicate, he would, from time to time, try to talk with me, which inevitably just ended in an awkward moment of smiling and silence.
The drive to Chinguetti was about two hours into the desert; we went over some small, vegetation-free mountains, and then we were very much in the Sahara. The sands formed dunes and blew across the road, sometimes covering it completely. Camels wandered by.
Four times each way we were stopped by the police and I provided my fiche (passport photocopy and other information). Unlike on the drive to Atar, no bribes were required.
We reached Chinguetti, which is a proper and cute small town, but the reason for visiting it is the historic part.
Chinguetti dates back to about the 1200s, founded as a trading stop on routes across the Sahara, and is the holiest place in Mauritania and, overall, an important holy place for Islam generally, as it was used by people who were unable to complete the journey to Mecca. There is a mosque from the 13th or 14th century that is pictured everywhere, including on the currency.
(Oh, just a digression about Mauritanian money: the currency is called Ouguiya and is abbreviated as UM or MRU [though prior to 2018 it was MRO]. Fine. But what makes it very confusing is that in 2018 they changed the value of the money so what was previously 1000 UM is now 100 UM. The problem is, about half of the time that you ask for the price of something, you are given the old money price. After a few days it becomes apparent when someone is speaking in terms of old money or new money, but initially, when you aren’t sure what anything costs, it is a problem. Like, I took a taxi and it was 500. That’s like $16 CDN. That didn’t seem right, but also the alternative of it being 50 UM (or about $1.70 CDN) didn’t seem right either. It was the cheaper one. When in doubt, just had over the lesser amount.)
The old part of Chinguetti is a pretty labyrinth of one story stone buildings and winding pathways, all filled with sand. There are no paved or even dirt roads. Just sand. In fact, one of the reasons for which Chinguetti has been in the media in recent years is that, apparently it risks being lost to the encroaching sands of the Sahara, as the result of climate change (natural or man made).
Not only would the historical sites be lost, but also of concern are the five (or so) libraries that are in Chinguetti, each of which houses (in one of these ancient mud or stone brick structures) fragile old texts, often religious. Each of these bibliotheques has a keeper to watch over them and also show them to tourists, if there are any around. I was lucky to be able visit one the day I was there. In pre-pandemic times, I probably could have visited more.
Fortunately, there was a young guy around who could translate between me and the librarian, which was good for learning about what I was looking at, but also because the librarian liked to make jokes, which I would have otherwise missed out on.
I went for a bit of a walk around the town, taking pictures of the endlessly appealing simple buildings resisting the sandy drifts. Around Chinguetti was just…nothing, just expanses of empty desert.
Before heading back to Atar, we stopped at a pretty little guest house operated by a French woman and Mauritanian man. The woman brought us coffee and water, gave me wifi access, and sat and talked with me about Chinguetti and Mauritania, where she had lived for almost 20 years. She refused to accept any money.
If you have more time or are keen, you can go farther into the desert from Chinguetti to a beautiful oasis or take long camel treks. I did neither of these things, however, and headed back to Atar.
I had dinner in the town, where I was already known on the streets as Dale from Canada. Word travels fast. Apparently it had been a week or two since they had seen another traveller. At one point I went into a shop looking for batteries and they had none, but ten minutes later, a guy (not the guy from the shop) ran up to me in the street with the batteries I needed. Anonymity was impossible, but everyone I countered was really nice and I didn’t feel like I was being scammed or hassled.
Dinner was what would prove to be a typical vegetarian meal in Mauritania: salad of lettuce and tomato, baguette, and French fries. If you eat meat, that meal would come with a fried whole fish or piece of grilled chicken. Camel and goat meat may also be options. That night I bought a cucumber, oranges, and bananas from the market, just for a little variety.
Back at Inimi, the electricity had been restored, though the water was hit and miss. This marked two days I went without bathing. I slept well inside my cabin this time, as the AC was working. I was excited for the next day, which would be the whole reason I came to Mauritania in the first place: my journey on the Iron Ore Train.
