23rd November 1985 : On The Road to Nowhere

It was absolutely freezing in the truck, even with both sides up this morning, when we continued on the drum-marked route; spent first two hours wrapped in Nikki’s blanket with head buried-so I saw nothing.

When I emerged, we were travelling through a vast expanse of sand with occasional odd rocks and beginnings of mountains on the horizon. Saw the feet that perhaps produced last night’s animal tracks: camels in groups and singly, white and brown, smooth and hairy, big and small. Nikki and Bob headed off to talk to a family gathering wood, but they turned their heads and walked away. Some stretches of the desert looked like graveyards, littered with the shells of abandoned vehicles resembling the carcasses of dead animals, wheels in the air, some stripped, others retaining various internal parts. The mountains on the horizon became more rugged and dominating as we neared, at one stage doing a huge sweep almost into the shade of one range where we saw our first signs of civilisation in days: several huts and tracks.

It warmed up marginally after lunch but I kept my jacket on. So much for my idea of hot desert - it's probably warmer back home in Melbourne.

Then we did it - got lost. After seemingly endless miles of criss-crossing tracks lined with fuel drums, Kelvin was doing compass checks out of the cab window to try and get his bearings. Ended up getting help from a group of Algerian army officers in a tiny compound, one of whom was a young lad finishing his 24 months of service who greatly appreciated having western women to look at and talk to. The soldiers also filled our jerry cans with water and staggered back and forth filling our truck.

The men directed us 15km back in the direction we had come, where promptly got bogged twice in really deep sand, and had to push and sand mat out loaded with wood. Parked for the night in a basin under a beautiful orange sky.

Meal supplies short and Ann got in a dither having to cook with one tin. But we all got fed.

Sat up for hours around a campfire of glowing coals.