My original desire to leave Atar early so that I could cover as much distance as possible is frustrated, as is often the case, by my predilection for a good night's sleep. In the absence of any sense of urgency, I rarely choose to get out of bed if what my body asks me to do is the opposite, which leads me to leave almost always later than I like to plan in my head. I know I have at least two days to go until I get to Choum but I have no idea what the road conditions are like. I go there in search of one of the experiences that I have longed for the most in recent years, to ride the longest iron train in the world to take me back to the coast and be able to continue towards Western Sahara.
The sun peeks over the horizon as I'm leaving Atar. There is not a cloud in the sky, and gone are the white days of Ouadane where particles filled the air. Only the wind hasn't picked up yet, which inspires me to pedal hard using all my energy. The enthusiasm for the adventure on rails that awaits me is the gasoline that fuels my muscles. The last houses are scattered on the sand several kilometers after leaving the center of town and once again I find myself exposed to the desert full of absence.
If it weren't for the excitement that I bring with me, this would be nothing more than a new day of Saharan monotony. Traveling by bicycle is one of the life experiences that I enjoy the most because it is the one that keeps me the longest amount of time in the present moment. However, there are moments like these, in which the ruminant mind, always eager for more, is so charged with expectations that it takes hold of me, leading me to go through the days dreaming of the experiences that I'm hoping to live later on. I know that when I do this, I'm giving up living in the present moment while risking a potential disappointment afterwards, but there are times when it is unavoidable. As if taming the restless mind weren't enough, the monotony of the desert doesn't help either. I want to stay present but inevitably I turn to my dreams to find an escape from boredom.
I keep cycling north alone because despite the tarmac this road seems to have been abandoned or perhaps not yet populated. I think I can count on one hand the vehicles that have passed me since I left, so it doesn't surprise me that when I reach each village there is not a soul walking in the open air. No one goes out for walks or shopping in this incandescent sun, which speaks as much of people's sanity as my lack of it. In these ghost towns, where every day the wind buries the houses under the sand, I feel the closest thing to a witch who flies by on a broomstick. I'm glad I made the decision to go out loaded with enough water and food for 3 days because if I hadn't, I doubt I would have found anything to eat around here.
This is how I spend the day, pedalling from one ghost town to the next until I reach an unexpected sight at the time when the sun begins its final descent over the earth. 40 km since I started, I find myself at the edge of a drop where I stop the bicycle in awe to contemplate the scenery. From where I’m standing, I can see the jagged edges of the Adrar plateau delineating its boundaries. A massive step defined by an unbroken sequence of rocky slopes and truncated peaks stretches out on either side until it disappears beyond the limits of my vision. Ahead of me lies the track that winds down between these pyramidal mountains. Beyond and below, on a horizon I can barely see through squinting, I make out a new patch of undulating dunes bathed in the late-afternoon sun. Instead of plunging into the adrenaline rush of the descent, I decide to postpone it, take a few minutes to eat a few biscuits and bask in the grandeur of this moment.
There are descents that are enjoyed at 75 km/h, and others that invite you to keep your hands on the brakes because when beauty sublimates the heart and takes your breath away, I never want it to end. It is the first moment since I left Atar in which the present once again takes control over the thoughts of tomorrow. I'm rolling downhill slowly, which means destroying the magic of the desert sounds with the screech of my worn brakes, but it's a luxury I'm willing to give up for taking in these colors and views. When the descent comes to an end a few minutes after sunset, I no longer need brakes and the soft breeze that I generate with the movement sweetens my ears again. Behind me is the wall that I have just descended and now I am surrounded by dunes populated by acacias and a million possible places in which to unload my stuff to spend one more night in a million-star hotel.
The first light finds me in the early hours of the day dreaming deeply on the dunes. I need to make several attempts to unstick my eyelids from my pupils and many more to get my back off the ground. Sitting on the mattress, I stretch, thanking the wind for not burying me under the sand during the night. Silence gets inside my body plunging me into its emptiness. With the first glimmers of the sun I see the shadows of the acacia trees progressively emerge on the undulations of the dune, in ghostly shapes with multiple branches stretching out like arms and fingers that climb across the sand. The show forces me to slow down my breakfast. The roar of my new gas stove is only tolerable because turning it off helps me appreciate even more the magic of the silence that surrounds me. My senses are on edge. I can feel the warmth of the sun like soft caresses on my skin taking away the cold of the night. The aroma of instant coffee dilates my airways, anticipating the stimulation of my papillae. With my feet buried in the cold sand, I drink it in small sips as I watch the sunrise. Minute by minute I savour Saharan life.
Only the certainty that the rise of the sun will transform this paradise into a hellfire in the blink of an eye, drives me to pack my things and get back on the saddle. Otherwise I could stay here for days and nights. Shortly after leaving, I show up at the edge of a new step. The descent is less pronounced than yesterday’s and the landscape lacks the same drama, but even so I delight in looking at a horizon of mirages. I reckon that I have about 80km left to reach Choum when the silky tarmac I've been riding on since yesterday comes to an abrupt end. Now, lying in front of me there’s a sea of and and dozens of tracks that appear and disappear, that come together and fork a thousand times. The absolute absence of traffic makes me doubt about their very origin, but I cannot stop to wait in uncertainty under a sun that is now burning me alive instead of caressing me. With such a sandy ocean ahead and no signs anywhere on the horizon, I can no longer predict whether I will arrive, or how long it will take me to arrive, and in the case of arriving at all, I cannot know if I will be able to make it before 5:00 p.m. when the train passes through Choum. Whatever the case is, I have no choice but to jump into the sandpit to find out.
There is a perfect point of climax in which a series of circumstances converge that lead me to redouble the enjoyment. It is the moment in which the harshness of the road and the environment offer a high level of difficulty enough to pose a challenge but not so much as to drain the energies to the point of breaking down the spirit. It's hot but not hot enough to suffocate, windy but not enough to slow my pace, there's sand but not deep enough to bog me down, no specific signs or trails but I kind of think I can spot a general single direction. These are the optimal conditions. I spend the whole day pumping exceptional levels of adrenaline, gaining ground against uncertainty through the physical and psychological strength I have built up over the years. At the only point where I feel lost, a truck carrying stones for the road works appears on the horizon. Leaning out of the cabin window, his driver says to me in broken French: “Do you see those two mountains far away on the horizon? Well, that's where you have to aim to, Choum is right behind them."
It is the only piece of information that I needed to know that I would no longer die lost in the middle of the desert, thus two hours later I ride into this forsaken Saharan corner in the middle of the afternoon. As in all the ghost towns I passed yesterday, here I don't see anyone walking along the wide sandy boulevards that separate the wooden and tarp shacks. However, after pushing the bike for a while, I hear a voice call me. The brightness of the day forces me to take several seconds to elucidate its origin until under the awning of a house with white shining walls I can see a gendarme come out. He explains to me that the train doesn't arrive until 6 pm and that for security reasons I must wait for it inside the gendarmerie station. I have already heard this story like a broken record so many times in several places and it is still impossible for me to conceive of any risk to my physical integrity in this lost place at the end of the world. Although it was those same experiences that also taught me not to argue or contradict any of the rules. For this reason, given the heat and the clear absence of things to do in this small town, I do not object to anything he say and am happy to go with him to his den where I’m able to savour the reward of the end of this stage under the cooler shade. Sitting in the backyard, I spend the rest of the afternoon relaxing while listening to music and fantasising about the big moment I've been longing for. I'm already here waiting for the train.
