Paris Dakar Stage 55 to Nouakchott

Stage 55 of 60, day 64 of 71: 122 km, 175m, 3:45, 63 shifts, ave speed 32.4, max speed 54.1

All the days in Mauritania feel the same, go to bed really early, very tired, but it’s almost too hot to sleep. It finally cools off a little at 2-3am. Get up 6-7, get ready, eat, get on the bike and ride off in the relatively cool morning air (not actually cool). Ride for too many hours, battling winds, traffic, rough road surface, thirst, and bidon water that feels like it’s 50+°C. Certainly it’s uncomfortably hot when I pour it on myself. Get to camp, drink, eat, repeat.

Today was all that again. On the plus side, the road surface was better and we ended in a hotel in Nouakchott, the capital city of Mauritania. It’s one of the largest cities in the whole Sahara, with 1.2 million people. Mauritania is pretty big, a million square km, but only has 4.2 million people total.

We rode along until we came upon a shack with drinks. The locals have truck batteries hooked up to a solar panel, powering refrigerators full of cold drinks! They are super happy when we show up as it’s generally a group of four or more riders with each person buying multiple drinks. We had a couple of stops, then made it to lunch at 70 km. It wasn’t noon yet but it was getting really hot already. An interesting side note – I’ve noticed quite a few times that basic arithmetic here is not comfortable for people. Every person we buy from struggles to multiply a number like 30 by 4 or even easier ones. Some are very thankful when we whip out a phone and show them on the calculator. I didn’t notice this any of the other countries we’ve visited.

After lunch, we cranked out in a paceline, diagonal because all day we had a side wind. Wytze, me, Daniel, Bart and Kris. After a while a couple of others we were passing inserted themselves into the front row, kinda rude, and after realizing they wouldn’t leave, I suggested to Wytze we take a holiday, our code for slowing down. 44 to 38: that did the trick, then right away we found the best drink stop ever. Unlimited drinks, huge selection, cold, in a clean shop. We celebrated our success in not blindly continuing or escalating a speed war, neither particularly safe.

After a good long stop we had only 15 km to the hotel. We did get stopped at a checkpoint where they wanted name, birth date and passport number. Wytze gave a fake one and I just nodded when one guy asked if the other guy had already taken my info – I was going to be Jimi Hendrix if it came down to it. The rest faked it or showed actual id. Then we were in town, on a long, flat road. Finally we pulled in at the Hotel Hayatt, not a typo. We were ushered in and asked to park by the pool. Perfect! Whip off helmet and shoes and dive in! That felt really really really good! I don’t know the temp, around 39-40°C in the shade, but burning in the sun.

We sat around in our bike clothes in the cool water for a while, then slowly drifted to rooms for proper showers etc. I went down the street to the surprisingly good super market and got a liter of water, a liter of orangina and something super duper rare: an ice-cream bar!

We relaxed in the afternoon, basically staying in our air-conditioned room, loving it. About 7pm we had our interesting cultural experience of the day. Daniel had made a friend two days ago at a drink stop who invited us to his house when we arrived in Nouakchott. He is a Deputy of something in the government and travels to Morocco and Senegal. He called and said he was on his way to pick us up. There he was, same Toyota Land Cruiser, and we were off. It turned out dinner at his house was tomorrow and it was only tea tonight. When we said we needed food, he knew just the place, the Palacio. Driving the back streets, some unpaved, like he totally owned the city, we went there but it was a drive-thru fast food place with a long line. Long story short, we tried two other restaurants, one from Google and one from trip advisor; both were non-existent. Daniel found a third and it was real. It was weird but we got in and sat outdoors in a nice garden. We ordered salads and main dishes – Daniel and Wytze went with the waiter’s recommendation: camel stew. I had monkfish with rice and veggies. It was a nice dinner, then we tried to pay but no, he had to pay. Only he didn’t have enough. We felt weird about having this guy pay most of our €60 dinner of which he ate only a tiny amount, but there you go. I’m not sure what will happen tomorrow, we might have a “required group dinner” or something, or we might go to his house. There was something more than just the language barrier – communication was just hard.

Enough about that. Today we have another rider profile. This time it’s Kathy Lovell, an amazing woman from New Zealand who I didn’t have the pleasure of meeting until we all got to Paris, what feels like a lifetime ago.

Kathy, where are you from and how old are you?

I’m from New Zealand and I will turn 70 years old in 2 weeks – 21 November, have one daughter and 2 grandchildren.

Tell us about your bike…

I ride a Merida, 28mm tyres, XS Frame size as I weigh only 48 kg and stand just under 1.5 metres.

What motivated you to sign up for Paris Dakar?

I started my sporting life as a runner. Ran a 2 hour 48 min marathon [!] in 1989 and won NZ cross country champs in 1990 [!]. Have done quite a few kayak paddling tri-athlons, including winning the North Island Coast to Coast [!] which goes from one side of North Island to the other. Took up cycling in 2010 after my husband died as a way of meeting more people and having something to look forward to in the weekends. We had travelled a lot – worked in China, Malaysia and Mongolia [!] so I have very fond memories of those times together. Decided I had to keep travelling so first went to cycle Madagascar in 2018, Italy 2019, Balkans 2021, completed 100 Cols in France in 2022 as well as riding around Netherlands. Registered for P to D in 2018 for start date 2020 but Covid stymied it for a few years. I had always wanted to do a big ‘event/adventure ride’ and had not been to Africa.

Do your friends think you’re crazy?

Many cannot believe the extent of this ride but admire me for doing it.

What else do you want people to know about you?

I’m not sure what’s next – am seriously considering riding the Danube River from source to sea. Have ridden the Rheine. But my 11 year old grand daughter is a NZ champion artistic roller skating so I am really keen to support her further. In 2014 I went with 10 other women to Kari Kola in Nepal to teach the women to sew. Took 9 sewing machines, huge quantities of fabric, accessories, scissors etc. It is now a micro industry for them and they are doing well from it.

Wow, thanks Kathy! What an amazing life you lead!