Le Pays Dogon

We have spent 6 days and 5 nights in Dogon country - Mali's other major tourist attraction.

Dogon country is centred on a long range of cliffs called the Bandiagara Escarpment, that runs for around 100 km across eastern Mali. It is stunningly beautiful in a generally arid countryside, and at times it felt like we were were walking in the Yorkshire Dales or Snowdonia (except somewhat hotter and no chance of rain!).

We walked from Sanga in the middle of the escarpment down to Kani Komboli which is towards the bottom end. About 45km in total, but it was mostly easy walking and we got used to a long rest period and siesta in the middle of the day!

Laid back Djenne

Today we managed to get ourselves to Djenne and back. Djenne has the largest mud building in the world and is a world heritage site. After shrugging off the potential guides we had a great time wandering round the narrow alleys and admiring the many attractive mud buildings.

Tomorrow we head off to Dogon country for six days. We'll be doing a lot of walking, though as well as organising a guide we have arranged porters for our bags.

Bustling Mopti

The final aspect of our tour was a guided walk around Mopti - the commercial hub of central Mali. It is located on the banks of the River Bani, a tributary of the Niger.

It's a really bustling town, with loads going on in the port and the various markets. It is a place for trading fresh and dried fish, and we also visited the "shipyard" where the pinasses that travel up and down the river are built. The pinasse builders still use mostly traditional methods, and along side the boat builders, were men making nails and the other hardware needed.

We took a minibus back towards our hotel - 22 people crammed into a space that would hold 10 in the UK! It's called getting close to the locals....

There and back

We made it to Timbuktu and back again, and it really is a long way! After a short drive from Sevare to Mopti, we left Mopti in the pinasse at 3pm on Monday and cruised for 3 hours before stopping for the night. On Tuesday, we cruised all day from 7am until 7pm with a couple of short stops at riverside villages. On Wednesday, we started at 6.30am and continued until 9pm! Then we did the final half an hour to Timbuktu on the Thursday morning.

It was great to watch life happening on the edge of the River Niger. Though we also passed time by reading and snoozing. It was also quite cold out on the water, and we weren't really prepared for it.

After a morning exploring Timbuktu it was off to the Festival au Desert, which was a bone shaking 3 hours away. Though 70km driving through the sand dunes was a much bigger thrill than 10 minutes on the off road Land Rover circuit at Gaydon!

The Festival was interesting. We did a lot of "people watching" and it was great to observe Malien life. However, it took us a while to get into the groove of the music.

Our journey back to Sevare was all in one day in a 4x4 vehicle. We left the festival site about 8am and arrived at our guest house at midnight having covered over 400km, only 145km on a paved road.

We may have been totally tired and ready to collapse in bed, but after 6 nights without a bathroom we had to have showers before crashing!

We couldn't say that it was a totally enjoyable trip, but then getting to Timbuktu is supposed to be a challenge and an adventure.

Half way to Timbuktu

Yesterday we took a bus from Bamako to Sevare. It took 9 hours. But it was not dissimilar in quality to a National Express coach so it was actually quite a comfortable journey. Sevare is about half way between Bamako and Timbuktu, as far as distance is concerned. But as we go from here to Timbuktu by pinasse ( a big canoe) it's going to take a bit longer than 9 hours!

Today, we join up with our 7 day tour so will now have to conform to the timetable of our tour guide! So we may not get to another internet cafe for a while.

Bustling Bamako

Bamako is a bustling city. Our arrival coincided with Friday prayers so the mosque was at full volume. Our hotel is next to the mosque!

The streets are full of stalls selling all types of goods, so it took quite a while to find a bar of soap among all the bags, pots and bikes. But you'll be pleased to know that we eventually did.

We took a walk to get our bearings and to get our first sight of the River Niger - it's wide!

We're off to see Bamako's sights today - yes, it's possible to see them all in a day! Tomorrow we will catch a bus to Mopti, which is 8 hours from Bamako but still another 12 hours from Timbuktu. Mali is big.

48 hours later.....

It all started by taking a taxi from our hotel in Dakar to the train station. This station was not the one in the centre of town where we bought the tickets, but was a few km up the line. Our taxi driver dropped us by a level crossing and told us to walk up the track and wait there! Thankfully there was the shade of a big tree to wait under. When fellow passengers started turning up (we were very early...) we knew we were in the right place.

The train turned up about an hour after its scheduled departure time, and departed about 30 minutes later when the world and his goat had finally boarded. We were in 1st class - so thankfully no goats there, but the general concensus of our fellow international travellers was that it was the grimiest, most decrepit train that any of us had ever encountered!

We passed the time chatting to our fellow travellers, watching Africa go by (Mali was much more interesting than Senegal), and venturing to the 'dining' car. The food was ok, but getting from one carriage to the next was a bit hair raising!

Just over 48 hours later, we arrived in Bamako (the capital of Mali); glad to be here, but REALLY looking forward to a shower and clean clothes.....