Casablanca--> Dakar Aug 1st- Sep 27th
 

Hey all, hope you don't mind a Yankee asking some (probably a hundred) questions about my upcoming trek.

My roommate and I are meeting at CAS airport, (He's French, and taking the route from S. Spain) and from there we are going to take our time getting
down to Senegal. We have 2 months, and we are looking for the best trip of our lives.

I think transportation is our main concern at the moment. We both have our Motorcycle licenses, but we aren't sure about renting a bike, or maybe just hitching rides on buses, or hiring a guide...

Any advice will be helpful. I've been looking through this forum for a few days writing down some of the places people have recommended; most notable Tim Cullis' GS Knowledgebase, but I think there are a a lot more of you out there that have had a blast in some of the cities I haven't heard of yet.

Thanks in advance!

-Matt

Matt,
I take your point, you have read into here already, but it is all a bit vague to me: you have some good info on the countries already, from what you say, so come back with specific questions I suggest, if you are not clear about anything.
As for means of travel: well there is a wealth of info in here (as well) about bikes, including some about hiring.

Backpacking:
You are probably going to get fuller info from elsewhere.

Hiring a guide:
I've never heard of that for the countries you indicate, other than on a daily basis. There are bike "adventure" companies who will organise everything for you - search around here, including the sponsors of this website, for more info.

Hope this is of some assistance,

Hi Matt

Saw your post on TT. My recent blob (aka blog) to Dakar might provide some info: There and Back Again

Sorry, I'll try to keep my questions specific from now on.

It's just hard to get specific when you barely know a 30th of the cities you want to visit, I need IDEAS!

I think you'll struggle to hire bikes but with two months it should be pretty straightforward to get to Dakar by public transport. There's always someone who'll take you even if the buses don't run!

I found the desert parts much more enjoyable when I had my own transport . There was a "life in my own hands / please God don't let me break down" sense of adventure that I didn't get with bus / bush taxi travel. Most of the time it just felt hot and uncomfortable on the buses. In Aug /Sept it is going to be hot and you might want to consider that this year Ramadan starts on Sept 1st.

If you want a real sense of adventure how about doing the trip on bicycles! You'd get to Dakar easily in that time, be independent and have no problems with shipping back afterwards. On the other hand, Aug might not be the best time to be cycling through the Sahara.

By contrast I really enjoyed the couple of trips I've done by public transport around West Africa and in some respects these were better than the ones where I went by bike. No border problems, no navigation worries etc and pretty relaxing after you'd changed your cultural mindset. You only had to worry about whether the crack in the bus roof was going to be affected by loading another crate of chickens onto it!


Suggestions for places to go /do - If you get to Dakar with time to spare, the 36hr train ride to Bamako is worth considering. If trains float your boat (sorry) then the ore train from Nouhadibou to Choum and then bush taxi to Atar would be memorable (although there are reports that the train is not taking passengers any more)

edit.