Titch gets £500!

Titch was auctioned a few days ago in Bamako for 500,000 Central African Francs - about £575. It all goes to local causes via the Rotary Club of Bamako.

Not bad for a car which was destined for the scrapheap when we got him, and a lot more than we spent on getting him roadworthy.

Meanwhile we've got to just under £1,800 for Water Aid - which will be more than £5,000 when Future and Arup have pitched in.

So that's it until our next journey. We have to go somewhere else after learning so much, and we're both itching for another buzz around the sand dunes.

...and one day I will finish editing all that video!

Follow our photo trail

You can now follow the photos of our journey in Google Earth or, if you don't have the software installed, via Google Maps

Tracks4Africa

Loading stuff onto Google Earth, I kept coming across something called Tracks4Africa. I finally had a look, and it's a group of (mostly) South African eco-tourists who are using Garmin GPS to create accurate maps of Africa for tourists. I'm not sure if my tracks will be any good, but it's another thing to remember if we do anything like this again - there are millions of miles of poorly-mapped road but growing legions of tourists travelling them with GPS devices.
Probably worth sharing with the rest of the group, too.

Where you been?

Sometimes it pays to do a little homework... A couple of days ago I discovered that our Garmin Nuvi 770 had been quietly recording our progress every time it was turned on. Unfortunately, it wasn't turned on very much in the early days of our trip, because I couldn't get the cigarette lighter I'd fitted to work reliably, and we had to save power. That's not a big problem, because Garmin's maps in Mapsource are good enough in Europe and Morrocco to create route maps for Google Earth.
When John of the Desert Prats solved our power problem in Mauritania, we were able to power up the Garmin full time, and use it for a handy idea of how far we'd gone each day. But it was also tracking our progress, so we've got extremely accurate routes for a part of the world where the electronic maps are frankly rubbish.
Now I've married up the Mapsource routes and Nuvi tracks into one huge map of where we've been - well, roughly. It includes key locations like our desert and beach camps in Mauritania, the bush camp in Mali, and the boat hotel in Segou. Sadly, it doesn't have a track for the Tiz-n-Test pass in Morrocco.
You can download the KMZ file for Google Earth by clicking on the picture above, but be warned: it's a big file that takes Google Earth about 10 minutes to process before you can browse it, so download it to your hard disc first, and don't worry if your computer doesn't do anything for a long time. I might do smaller chunks if I have time later.
The green lines are our GPS tracks, accurate to a few metres, while the purple tracks are my Mapsource estimates, accurate to anything from a few metres to a kilometre or more.

Segou...and we're coming home!

In a few hours we'll be heading for the airport, with a mixture of regret and relief. We've spent the last couple of days in the small-ish town of Segou at the Festival sur le Niger, getting under the skin of Mali in a new way. It shows how far we've come - literally and psychologically - that we thought nothing of driving over 100 miles upriver for a couple of nights.
The Sofitel was very comfortable, but it just felt like we were waiting for our flights home, so much so that we've moved them forwards to tonight (or 3.25am tomorrow morning). We couldn't really afford to stay much longer, but after a couple of nights in Segou, we started to wonder if we hadn't been a bit hasty, as other travellers we met waxed lyrical about the delights of Mali and it's people. Timbuktu may not be an option for a little 2WD like Titch, but the Dogon country and Djenne might be worth coming back for.
The opening night of the festival was as amusing for the comedy of disorganisation beforehand as for the entertainment itself, not to mention the hundreds of new 'friends', and the looks on their faces when they couldn't work out why Sylvia didn't understand either Bambara or French. "I'm from Laaahndan" soon sorted it out.
Anyway, it at least gave us the opportunity to say goodbye to the Saffas: Lisa, Trevor, Jonny and Andre, who are staying for the whole festival; and we're flying back with the Mongol Dragons, Dave and Jim, which might make the 12-hour journey via Casablanca a little more bearable. They made a brave bid to get their Vauxhall Carlton to Timbuktu, but had to turn back at Mopti, where the road takes a turn for the worse.
We've handed over Titch's papers to Sonny from the Mali Rotary Club, and he'll be auctioned off in a few days. He should get a few bidders - we've been getting offers since the moment we first stopped in Bamako, and compared to many cars here he's in stunning condition.
I've put some warm clothes near the top of the suitcase. Apparently it's been a little nippy in dear old England? Tonight in Bamako it must be at least 25C, and there's barely a breeze.