festival-au-desert
 

Does anyone have gps-coordinates for essakane in Mali?
I would like to attend the festival there in January, but nobody says, where Essakane is.
It's certainly not on my map.

http://www.festival-au-desert.org/

It is said to be about 70 Km north or west of Timbuktu anywhere between 2 and 5 hours driving.
From the fotos on the net I can only gather, that it is fairly rough driving there. I would like to drive there on my own without a guide.
Does anyone know the route?

I don't have the GPS co-ordinates but went there in jan 2004. You don't say when you plan to travel up to Essakane-which is not on any map as it's so small-but if you are in Tombouctou the day before the Festival starts You'll never get lost! 4x4s leave regularly for the site and basically you follow them!
If you get lost and find yourself near a red large rock outcrop about 150 metres high, the site is about 5Km North West. Or ask!

Hope you enjoy the experience and unlike one of my chums don't get bitten by a scorpion (the non-fatal type)! I had an astonishing experience and will never forget all the bizarre happenings and the wonderful music.

A tip. If you need to get back to Douenza the day after the Festival ends, get up VERY early on Monday morning (we left at 3AM) otherwise you will spend hours waiting for the ferry. In fact we broke a spring and didn't get to the ferry until 1pm and then waited til 5 to cross. This was bad news because the piste to Douenza is horrendous at night. The dust kicked up by other 4x4s makes it like driving in fog. Dreadful. I will never forget that journey.

Enjoy..

Q

Thanks Quintin, very helpfull.
I plan to be in Timboktu around the tenth, spend a couple of days there and then head out to the festival.
Thanks for the Ferry tip. I will keep this in mind.

Can you tell is it possible to get the with a bike? Or the roads from Timbuctou to the place are very rough?

Also how safe it is to leave the bike and stuff there while being in festival? Or it's better idea to leave the bike somewhere in Timbuctou and get there with 4x4?

Thanks, Margus

it is my understanding, that you can hire a watchgman there, or get together with other travellers.
if 4x4's make it there, a bike shouldn't have any problems.
independance by means of your own transportaion should have priority. expect a scrable for transportation back to timbouctu and rather high prices.

If you go on the Festival web site you will see photos of 4x4s on the tracks North of Tombouctou. From them you can form your own opinion as to whether you can make it. However to repeat a posting I made some time ago, when I went there were a number of Citroen 2cvs/Dyannes from the Citroen Club of Slovenia who'd made it so you should have no problem.

Security is another issue. For starters it's the only festival where stage security is left to the Army complete with AK47s! Mind you that didn't stop a guy who was all of a metre tall climbing on the stage! Secondly, crime is or certainly was virtually unknown amongst the Touaregs and they will vastly outnumber Western visitors. That said, one local guy was caught having stopped off the water supply from the Water tanker and then trying to sell it's water back to the locals. He was caught by the Army and I can tell you he won't be pulling that trick again! Frankly I think you'd be more likely to have problems leaving your bike back in town. We left all sorts in our (open) tents all day long and never had any problem. Mind you there was a youngish girl on the next dune who had her own Kalashnikov (which was almost as big as her) so maybe that's why we were fine. Honestly that's true!

Have a great time. I did.

Q