OUR HOSTS & TUAREG HOSPITALITY

After breakfast and lunches we continue on our way and will stop around an hour before sunset at a sheltered place for setting up our temporary home for the night, camping out in and amongst the cliffs and dunes, having covered up to 200 km in the 4x4s if the going is good, and up to 20 km (or considerably less!) if it isn’t! 

Each person is responsible for setting up their own tents (with a little help from their friends) or bivouac and then there is time to relax, and explore our surroundings, perhaps setting off on a mini excursion.

Supper is prepared, and we eat after dusk.

It is accepted that all participants are prepared to work together in preparation of the lunch menu and evening meal as Sharing promotes Caring.

The dinner is varied, sourced from locally produced fresh produce, of meat, fruit and vegetables if available, and served with pasta, rice, bread, cous-cous, or potato.

See the following link for a sample menu  

It is now that we can choose to retire early or chat around the flickering camp fire, discussing the days events, debriefing, making up stories, and generally chilling out until we are all ready to turn in for the night.

OUR PEOPLE; YOUR TEAM

Our tours take place with up to two vehicles, sometimes three, depending upon how many participants we have. 

Our guides are hand-picked; they are reliable, friendly, good, honest people. 

Local Tuareg are always chosen in preference above others because they know the desert extremely well, they have experience in tourism, and we, as a group, can be secure and comfortable in the knowledge that, not only will you we looked after, but in our own small way, crucially, we are supporting indigenous livelihoods.

The Tuareg have lived in these regions for over 2000 years, many are nomadic or transhumant (following their sheep and goat stock to better pastures). 

The Tuareg accompany us when we camp in the dunes and the mountainous Massifs. Most of them speak French, English is not a common language and is spoken rarely. However we may be very privileged to be offered an English speaker on very rare occasions! they are very few and far between....a bit like some of the settlements we transit... 

On our trips, integration is considered very important, indeed it is fundamental to the success of our tours. Participants will always be asked whether they are prepared to integrate and participate with our drivers and guides with daily chores like ensuring embers are dead, making sure nothing is left behind in the camp, and sometimes, general housekeeping.

There might also be times when we ask of you to offer us a helping hand or three to help dig the vehicles out of the sand… Our drivers, guides and assistants are human like the rest of us, and do need their beauty sleep, and good, wholesome food after a gruelling day in the desert is a must! 

The costs per person for the trip reflects our unique way of conducting our tours, and this makes for a far more cohesive, interested, interactive, considerate and consolidated team. Exclusions do apply however, and any requests will be considered with sensitively; the health of our participants will not be compromised, and the conduct of our staff always reflects this.