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Camping in the desert

Posted By on September 20 2009

I am writing this from the back seat of the car as we drive down the coast of Western Sahara. Its 8.45am and the sand swirling across the road has already picked up the sun’s heat. This quintiessential desert scene bears little resemblence to our experience last night, which was anything but ‘undeserted’.

For a start it was raining. Not the torrential, ‘Noah and the flood’ kind of rain, but more of a gentle Scottish drizzle. It felt strangely homely, in a dreech kind of way. We had decided to camp on the beach, protected from the wind that whipped off the sea by a giant bush twice the size of the car.

It felt remote. It felt isolated. Apart from the rain, it felt like we were camping in the desert. It was therefore with some surprise that we heard another Land Rover pull up ten minutes later. Out jumped Ali and his son (also called) Ali (see photo left). Ali was fisherman from Laayoune who had a tent some 9km north of us. He said he escaped to the tent when work was quiet to while away the days fishing with his son.

He invited us to join him for a bit of sunset fishing and whilst he hoiked in a large tilapia I landed two plastic bags and stood on a sea urchin. It was Ramadan, so he couldn’t join us for dinner, but in the spirit of the second homer community he said we must pop over to his tent the next time we were passing through.

No sooner had the Alis left us than Salama and his son Whaleed popped their heads around the canvas to say hello. Salama was a fisherman from Tarfaya who also had a holiday hut near the beach. He had brought his whole family down for an evening of shrimp fishing and to catch up with the neighbours in the tent next door. Off they pottered with their head torches bouncing around in the inky black night like fireflies.

Their lights were soon swallowed up by the bright glare of the patrolling Force Auxiliare – a special branch of the Moroccan military tasked with securing the country’s borders. The local area had a troubled history of emigration, with many Mauritanians, Senegalese, and Nigerians loading up tiny boats and attempting tto cross a 90km stretch of water to reach he Canary Islands. The journey is obviously treacherous and the boats (according to Salama) were underpowered and over crowded. Our beach had received a large number of bodies of those who had failed to make the journey. What were these men checking for? More bodies.

After twenty minutes of peace, Salama returned from his shrimping exploits with a frown. His head torch had finally given up the ghost. He gave us a cup of shrimps and we sat in the glow of our lanterns and ate them with him. It transpired he had friends all over the world and spoke German, French, Spanish and (few phrases in) English. Do not cry over spilt milk he said, in an accent rooted somewhere between Cockney and Cassablanca. As he got up to leave he said that Fatima and the girls in the tent down the beach had invited us to a late night tea drinking session and that we should leave soon. It was beginning to feel like an episode of Coronation Street.

We arrived at Fatima’s tent to be greeted by seven cackling women, who ushered us in and plied us with mint tea and fresh fish. In terms of keeping up with the Jones’, Fatima’s tent put us to shame. A bread oven, gas stove, sleeping space for six, understated interior décor – it made our high tech camping equipment look as attractive as a week on the Mir space station. Salama explained that Fatima’s husband was an Arabic teacher in Laayoune and the family came up here for the summer. They would look after the children, do some cooking and enjoy the sea air. It sounded a bit like Brighton.

We finally left at 9.30pm, with a promise to meet Salama for some early morning fishing. We found our way back to our tent to enjoy a quiet night of camping under the stars. Within ten minutes we were fast asleep.

For more photos of the desert click here.

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