A story of one of the legendary W123's of Mercedes on vegetable oil
Posts tagged ‘sahara’
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| Nice bus from a dutch fellow I met on Essaouira camping |
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Another friend at the camping  |
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| Interesting overlanders vehicle! |
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| Back in Essaouira again |
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| Lots of elderly people from Europe enjoying the warm winter in Morocco |
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| Essaouira square |
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| Picturesque Essaouira |
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| Square in Essaouira |
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| Saharagelber in Essaouira |
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| Saying goodbye again to my two friends |
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| Essaouira beach |
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| The long lonely road continues for thousands of kilometers |
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| Tar and sand |
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| Now listen ya’ all! I am your host for today and will tell you about the Sahara. |
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| Enormous heat in the Sahara |
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| Western Sahara coast line |
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| Camel transport. How many are in there? |
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| The Sahara dunes |
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| My own campsite in the Western Sahara |
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| Seeing the sun rise in the Sahara |
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| Good colors early in the morning just after sunrise |
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| Abandoned W123 T modell in the Sahara |
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| Sahara early in the morning, Mauritania |
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| Saharagelber in the Saharan desert on the way back to Europe |
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| On my way to Nouackchott |
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| Sahara, Mauritania |
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| 1 camel and 4 persons in the back of this Landcruiser |
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| W123 300TD in the Sahara |
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| Saharan desert |
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| The Sahara |
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| Grazing Camels in the Sahara |
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| Sahara, Mauritania |
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| Transatlantic route, Sahara |
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| Sahara, Mauritania |
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| 119000km on the clock! |
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| W123 Taxi, Mauritania |
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| Driving the Transatlantic route through the Sahara (Mauritania) |
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| Sahara, Mauritania |
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| W123 in the Sahara, Mauritania |
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| On my way to the north, driving back home, I’ve got 5 days left and 9000km to drive |
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| Direction Nioro, North-East Mali |
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| Very useful tool: The compressor. My spare tire had to be inflated first. |
| Hitting 118000km |
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| Broken tyre this time. It’s sometimes difficult where to place the jack. I collected some stones to place the jack on so I could lift the car, instead of the jack digging itself in. |
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| Entering the real Sahara again |
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| Saharagelber in the desert |
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| Baobab tree |
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| Driving to Mauritania, close to Nioro |
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| Sign close to the Mauritanian border |
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| Main road to Aayoun El Atrous (Mauritania) Driving and driving…. and driving. |
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| Sahara sunset |
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| Bush camping with the Saharan nomads. I asked some nomads if it was okay I stayed with them, they were okay with that. That evening I sat with them but we couldn’t exchange any words, they didn’t speak french but only their local language. |
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| Cooking gear |
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| Relaxing and enjoying freedom |
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| Tombouctou town |
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| Sandy Tombouctou |
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| D(r)iving into the Sahara Our german friends stayed behind en we went into the sahara with the good old Benz |
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| Staying the night with saharan nomads |
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| Feeling utterly relaxed, drinking tea with the nomads under the stars |
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| Our stay with the nomads in the desert |
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| Waking up with the camels. Our friends from Switzerland slept in the chairs of the germans and hung a mosquito net over it. Looks pretty cool |
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| Sahara sunrise with the camels |
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| Waking up at 6am, time to go on again |
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| Camel with blue eyes |
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| Ready to go to Tombouctou today |
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| Direction Tombouctou |
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| Taking the side of the dyk was a bad idea |
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| The Ferry to cross the Niger |
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| All cars stuffed on the ferryboat |
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| Yes!!! Tombouctou!!! |
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| Driving through the town Tombouctou |
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| 300TD monster reached Tombouctou |
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| Dirt looks cool |
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| Strong W123 |
Afther breakfast we filled the Benz up with SVO (straight vegetable oil) and filled the car up at the gas station for 4,42 dirham per liter, something like 60 eurocents! In the evening we turned from the road and drove over the sand and through the bushes and found ourselves a nice spot in the Sahara, some 1000 meters from the road about 130km north of Dahkla. It felt great to park just somewhere in the western sahara and set up the rooftent. It was peaceful and quiet and the wind made it feel relaxed.
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| Camping Le Bedouin. In the middle of nowhere, and it feels just that way. One stand just on the sand and can use the shower and the toilet. |
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| Look out for the sign in the middle of all the other signs around! |
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| An odd road sign we don’t have in Europe |
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| Lots of boring parts… |
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| …and sometimes a boring place, but atmosphere it has! It feels like we’re on our own road movie. |
Today we departed for the sahara, we saw some wild mules and an amount of nice birds. It was a long trip today we had already seen the big dunes. Furthermore the area consisted of great plains with stones. I found out the car was leaking motor oil today, which was strange and I hoped this would hold for the rest of the trip, I have to keep an eye of this. During the trip we did not see a lot of cars, and the cars we saw were mainly Mercedeses. Lots of W123 taxi’s but also loads of W201’s and W124’s.
That night we arrived at the camping ‘Le Bedouin’. After you see the sign ‘Le Bedouin’ you drive for about 5kms over a piste and then you arrive at the camping, there is practically nothing but sand and stones over there. It is windy and small place but very clean.
You just park on the sand and during the day you can stroll around.
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| The Cactus, a real die-hard able to survive in the dry sahara |
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| Melissa being excited. Fort Bou-Jerif |
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| Endless roads |
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| Are we there Yet? |
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| Bird watching |
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| Some nice part with a small lake and greenery |
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| The dunes, Sahara |
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| Our favorite time of the day: cappucino with a bit of Amaretto while driving and enjoying the surrounding views. |
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| The official beginning of the Western-Sahara |
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| The camels |
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| A camel with the sea in the background |
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| Spooky.. |
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This morning we strolled over the camping and breathed in the atmosphere of traveller who all have great destinations. Some stay in Morocco, and lots are heading for the sahara, some are travelling through the whole African continent and some are just travelling the world in a couple of years.
Today we drove to Tan-Tan, we saw this camping on our Michelin map. After some driving we found out we had taken the wrong direction, we had some bad roads but it was worth taking these road, as the environment over here is pretty nice.
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| Our place, not too good, directly in the sun, but it was just for one night, as we will continue for the Sahara now! |
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| Americans, so BIG TRUCK, ‘nough said |
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| An Unimog truck, also way too big if you ask me. |
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| Yeah, what to say about this? Higher as an average house! Just the biggest truck I’ve seen, 6 wheel drive MAN truck. Higher price than an average house too, must be around 250000/300000 dollars I guess, including living room, bathroom, and so on. |
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| Old firearms Mercedes overland truck, 1/100 of the price of the MAN 6×6 overland truck I think. |
We had to take some stony and sandy pistes. We finally arrived at Fort Bou Jerif, in fact this really was an Oasis! It is a great bastion which is really a recommendation, it’s in the middle of nowhere. We had some great dinner over there, it was good food which made this place really a perfect one. After dinner we sat outside below the starry sky, from this place you can see a massive amount of stars.
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| Coast line |
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| Their filosofy: If it’s able to drive, it’s not too much to carry on the roof. |
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| W123 Taxi, Agadir, Morocco |
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| W114 taxi, Agadir |
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| Taxis in one of the duty-free, sandy villages in the western sahara. In various parts in Morocco they have their own color, as in other african countries. Here you see the often used white/blue combination and the sandy brown color, which is the same color as they were originally in Germany. Most of the time they use the 240d’s with manual gearbox. |
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| On the Transatlantic route. Here you see the W123’s where 7 people are stuffed in the car, sharing the taxi costs to cross the sahara via the transatlantic road. Most of the time they use the 240d’s with manual gearbox. |
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| W123, queen of the saharan highway |
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| Very motivating with 40-something degrees celcius |
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| Another queen of the sahara, all stations are Peugeots of the 504 type, and not the T-modell of the Mercedes W123 somehow. |
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| Around Tan-Tan, a stony part of the Sahara |
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| Around Tan-Tan |
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| Camping in the open at Fort-Bou Jerif |