From Pristine Pays Dogon…
Our trip to Dogon Country starts in the city of Mopti along the Niger River. The driver is supposed to drop us in Dourou, a village along the Falaise, or the 150 kilometer long escarpment from where we have to take a brief but steep hike down into the valley full of the mysterious villages, myths and rites of the Dogon people. After leaving the main road, we drive for a few hours along a road which is in fact nothing more than a pile of rocks. Luckily, our driver has made this trip numerous times before and has no problem finding the way in his battered, old grey Peugeot sedan.
The history of the Dogon people is based on oral tradition and, therefore, rather muddled, but it is clear enough that they were not the first inhabitants of the valley. Their predecessors were the Tellem, who were hunters, built their houses on the rock on the cliff face, buried their dead in caves high above these houses, and made some of the earliest cloth and wooden objects in sub-Saharan Africa. Nobody knows how they entered their homes; tradition has it that the Tellem were able to fly or use magic powers, but it seems more likely that the wetter climate of the previous millennium allowed vines and creepers to cover the cliff, providing natural ladders.
After lunch, when the scorching midday heat is over, we start our hike, which takes us from Dourou along the plateau to Nombori in the valley. The scenery on the plain is a beautiful combination of red rock, yellow grass and green trees in the afternoon sunlight. The silence is overwhelming and only interrupted by gusts of warm, dry wind which turns our skin into sandpaper.
Once we have made it down into the valley, hopping from rock to rock for about 200 meters, the sun is about to set, and we settle into our ‘campement’ for the night: a rooftop of one of the village houses. Dinner is simple and prepared by the family that owns the house.
After our first night under millions of bright stars and breakfast, we spend the next three days hiking from village to village, setting off early every day and resting at campements between 10am and 3pm, when the heat is unbearable and the only sensible thing to do is take a siesta against the backdrop of the picturesque villages with their Hansel and Gretel-like granaries (storage houses). Nights are always spent on roof tops, under the stars, providing the most spectacular wake-up scenes imaginable. One thing that strikes me is that the male Dogons, who are farmers, are actively taking part in the farm work, a rare phenomenon in Africa. Also interesting to know is that the Dogon people invest in buying cows, which they give to a Peul (a pastoralist tribe also roaming the valley and other parts of Mali) to take care of. The day they need their money, they sell a cow or two, thus providing an alternative banking system, as no physical banks are available in the valley.
After four days in Pays Dogon and a spectacular climb back up to the village of Sangha, the driver is there again to take us
… To Ancient Djenné;
A town that hasn’t changed much since the Middle Ages. Djenné is most famous for its mosque, the largest mud structure in the world, a Word Heritage Site standing more than 18 meters tall. It was originally built in the 13th century and rebuilt several times since, the current structure dating from 1907. Every year, thousands of people volunteer to resurface the mosque with mud before the start of the wet season preventing the building to collapse under the heavy African rains. The view of the mosque is even more spectacular on Mondays, when thousands of street stalls make up the most colourful market one can imagine. We spend a few days roaming around the pretty town, which unfortunately has suffered from a sad mistake made by development workers a few decades ago: the Djennenké used the nearby river to bathe in, do laundry, clean kitchenware etc until foreign aid provided money to install numerous water pumps, pipes and taps throughout the town, requiring trenches to get rid of the waste water. Channels get clogged with a black, slimy substance which smells horrendous and poses a serious health hazard. Luckily we are here in the dry season, and are staying at a cute and comfortable hotel on the outskirts of town serving delicious three-course meals made of home-grown vegetables and home-made jams in the candle-lit courtyard.
And along the Niger River…
There are several ways to reach Timbuktu, the remote Sahara desert town once famous for its position in trans-Saharan trade of especially salt and gold. We decide to travel with the locals by river on the COMANAV, a diesel ferry; a journey which takes us about two days and two nights. At this time of year, the level of the Niger river is already quite low and the ferry not too crowded. The bottom level and the space underneath is taken up completely by cargo: fruits and vegetables, Chinese and traditional medicine, smelly meat, a car, animal skins and anything once could possible want to sell along the way(clearly, water melon season is at its prime). The middle deck contains first, second and third class cabins, and the top deck an open space where fourth-class passengers stay, a bar cum restaurant (including DJ with humongous PA system) and luxury cabins. Our first class cabin is basic but comfortable enough with a basin, fan and bunk beds. Toilets and showers are at the far end of the deck, and way cleaner than most other facilities I have seen in Africa (or on European trains for example).
The journey is relaxing, with plenty of excitement once you reach a larger village where the ship docks. The DJ starts playing LOUD music (Céline Dion of course being very popular), and everybody frantically offloads their merchandise. An in promptu market immediately develops at about 10 meters from the shore, and lasts for about 45 minutes, after which the ship horn blows, a sign for the traders to pick up their wares and get back onto the boat to continue the journey. Whether day or middle of the night, the scene repeats itself around six times. The rest of the time is spent on deck, reading a book while passing small fishing villages and entertaining the kids on board, who can’t get enough of the pictures of their own country in the Mali travel guides we carry with us, and eating our simple meals of meat and couscous or rice (and the most revolting Nescafé ‘coffee’ ever: with ginger and lemon) in the noisy bar.
…To AQIM in Timbuktu
We reach Timbuktu before schedule, a first in Africa, and, this being Timbuktu after all, a place with a magic sound and history to it, settle in the best hotel in town, a boutique style place with beautifully decorated rooms and a roof terrace overlooking town. Timbuktu isn’t much more than an outgrown village at best, with only two paved roads, many donkey carts and mopeds, and a few four wheel drive cars with turbaned Tuaregs changing the streets into clouds of dust. Timbuktu enjoyed its golden years from the late 15th to the late 16th century, and its decline since is more than apparent. But somehow we come to like the place, discover explorers’ houses (some of whom made it home after reaching Timbuktu, others who didn’t), visit the tiny Catholic church (its caretaker interestingly enough being a Muslim), watch ancient Arabic manuscripts in a small library, are invited to a Tuareg wedding ceremony, observe the Friday prayer at the mud mosque, and enjoy a camel trip into the Sahara desert, where we visit a Tuareg settlement. We drink traditionally prepared tea, have our meal under the stars, and ask tons of questions about these fascinating people, who live at night and find their destinations guided by the stars, all of which they know by heart.
On Friday afternoon, our journey comes to an abrupt end, when we hear about a kidnapping of four tourists and the murder of one of them on the outskirts of town, near Flamme de la Paix, in the exact spot we had lunch just two days before. The Malian president has ordered for and planned an evacuation of all tourists from Timbuktu (only 22 it turns out later) the next day. After consultation with the Dutch embassy and the police, we decide to leave our hotel and spend the night at the police station rooftop with most of the other tourists, where we have easy access to information and feel we are safest. The entire operation is impressive and well-organised. The hotel gives us mattresses and sandwiches to get us through the night, police and army guard the police station and provide a heavily armed convoy to the airport the next day, and the president sends a plane to come get us. Then again, this journey did not end too well for those directly affected. We learn from embassy representatives who pick us up from the Bamako airport that it was indeed Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) that was responsible for the attack, probably trained and supplied with weapons in Libya by Khadaffi. The three people (a South African, a Swede and a Dutchman) have not been heard of since.
