about26-5 Across the Sahara to Timbuktu

Across the Sahara to Timbuktu

from the Ray I. Doan Photographic Collection

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Day 5

Miracle of miracles they got the four-wheel drive fixed. It turned out to have a broken power transfer hose and someone in Timbuktu had a used one. There is apparently a thriving market in used parts for the Toyota Land Cruiser, which is why you don't want a Land Rover in Mali, no parts. My cough didn't seem to have settled in my chest, as I expected, but I ached all over to the extent I wondered if I had the flu in spite of having a flu shot. I had a runny nose and generally felt miserable, but since I'd come from here to Timbuktu to get here, the show had to go on.

We headed out the salt trail again looking for a salt camel caravan to photograph. Nimit was constantly sure there was one over the next hill but we drove 35 km to the Arab village of Agonay without finding one. The people of the village said a salt caravan was due in the village in the next hour. I wondered how they knew that since they didn't have a vehicle. On hour by camel is not more than 15 minutes by truck, so we drove out to see. We couldn't find any salt caravan. Finding a salt caravan was to Nimit, the equivalent of finding a Leopard for Charles, our guide in Kenya.

The Agonay village was on a wide-open sand dune, and even though we had a gray overcast sky, it was the best thing I'd seen to photograph. I asked Nimit if he thought I could photograph in the village. No problem, according to Nimit. When we got back to the village I got out my panoramic camera and setup my tripod. That got me people running from every direction wagging their finger and shaking their head, no. One guy was practically screaming 'no photo, no photo.' I got Nimit in on the act and he found the village chief. About a dozen men gathered around, all shouting, for a few minutes until Nimit said OK, take pictures.

A nomad tent camp in the village of Agonay.

It turned out they had an established policy for photography. Pay 2,500 Ff (about $4.00) and take all the pictures you want. That was satisfactory for everyone but the one hothead. I started around the village and found one tent with a bunch of goats. I liked the look of that scene so spent a lot of time shooting there from different angles. I hadn't seen anyone around the tent but kids. After a while a woman came out of the tent demanding money. I was in the process of getting out some money when her husband came out of the tent swinging a rope at everything in sight. He was hitting the kids, the dog, the goats and even the trees. His wife said, wait until he goes back in the tent and then give me the money.

We drove back to Timbuktu and got to the hotel in the early afternoon. Then we noticed a cargo camel caravan was loading on the square right in front of the Amanar Restaurant. I asked Nimit if I'd be able to take pictures of them loading the camels. No problem, according to Nimit. Amadou and I set off for the square. I started taking pictures and was getting a sort of constant finger wagging head shaking, no, but I kept moving around taking pictures from different angles. Finally one guy came up and demanded money. I gave him 10,000 Ff (about $16.00) and he said, through Amadou, take all the pictures you want. I started again but now I was getting a steady stream of complainers. I was referring them to the guy that I'd given the money to but now they each wanted money. It was escalating to the near riot stage when I gave up and put away the cameras. By now I had figured out Nimit didn't know what he was talking about when it came to this picture-taking thing.

Downtown Timbuktu, with a camel caravan loading up for the trip to the salt mines at Taouadeni.

I went back to the hotel and found Nimit and said I wanted to negotiate a price to photograph the cargo camel caravan when they were outside of town in the dunes. He said he'd arrange it. Nimit got Salem to work on it. Salem got a bother-in-law of one of the camel drivers to arrange a deal. Many of the salt caravan people live in Timbuktu or have family that live in Timbuktu. This group was an outward leg of the salt caravan. On their way to the salt mines at Taouadeni they carry cargo they take around and sell in the nomad camps along the way.

These days there is no one at the salt mines in Taouadeni. The former dictator of Mali used to operate a prison for political prisoners at the mines. He shut down the prison, due to international pressures, shortly before he was overthrown. Nimit said he was lucky he'd shut it down, or he'd have been there. Practically no one survived a sentence to the salt mines.

The camel caravan drivers have to mine their own salt when they get there. Apparently it's not very hard to do, at least for a camel caravan driver. The salt is just beneath a thin layer of sand and apparently there is an unlimited supply, free to anyone who can get there. The size of a single slab of salt seemed to have been established by the first people to bring back salt and the size remains unchanged today. They chisel out a slab about four feet long by a foot and a half wide by two inches thick. Each slab weights about 100 pounds and a camel carries four slabs. The camel caravan driver has to load the camel in the morning, unload it for a lunch break, reload in the afternoon and unload it again in the evening. If a camel caravan driver has ten camels he has to load an unload 100 pound weights over a thousand times in the 13 days it takes him to get from Taouadeni to Timbuktu.

At night the camels have their front legs loosely hobbled and are turned loose to graze. During the night they can wonder as far as 3 km from the camp so rounding them up and loading in the morning can take several hours. Several camels have to be devoted to carrying water. The water can be in goatskins but there is an appreciable evaporation loss with goatskins. The current preferred method of water transport is in tire inner tubes, tied off at the ends and slung underneath the camel.

My photo deal with the camel caravan drivers was loosely arranged. No price set. It was just established that I would pay to take pictures. I'm sure these guys thought they were better at negotiating than I was, and of course they were right. When the cargo caravan was underway we drove out into the dunes to photograph their approach. We had decent light, for a change, so maybe I got something we can use. When I thought I had enough I stopped and made arrangements to pay.


These are the camel caravan drivers that are on their way to the salt mines at Taouadeni.	Nimit is holding a standard size slab of salt mined at Taouadeni.

Nimit said he thought we should pay then the value of one slab of salt, 20,000 Ff. I agreed and got out two 10,000 Ff notes. The camel drivers howled in protest over that measly amount. According to them, they didn't have any change, so I should give them each 10,000 Ff. They wanted 60,000 Ff, despite the fact there was only five of them. We finally settled on 30,000 Ff or about $50.00 for the photo session. I'd venture a guess they were the best-paid models in Mali.

Nimit was still determined to find an incoming salt caravan. So, we turned around and went back to the salt trail. We went out a ways without finding a caravan. I wanted to do sunset pictures on the cargo trail, because it was more scenic. Nimit hated to go back to the cargo trail because we wouldn't find a salt caravan, over there. Anyway, back to the cargo trail we went, where I photographed the sunset. Just after the sun set we looked up and saw a salt caravan coming towards us, here on the wrong trail. I took pictures of them as they walked past us, with my Contax 645 camera. That camera had the fastest lens I had. It wasn't quite dark yet and I was showing 1/10 second wide open at f2.8. I had the camera on the tripod so it's possible I got something. Anyway, I've seen, with my own eyes, a camel caravan coming from the salt mines to Timbuktu.

An outbound camel caravan from Timbuktu.

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This page was last updated: March 15, 2008