Mauretania is secure! - December, 2012
Quote:
Originally Posted by nayladog
This is posted by a nervous traveler doing a Spain-Dakar Rally in a back-up vehicle. This will be my first trip through Mauritania and I'm concerned about kindnappings. One of the things that all the travel warnings say is to be especially careful around boarder crossings such as Western Sahara into Mauritania. I would have thought that the boarder which is heavily guarded would be one of the safer places in comparison to the open expanses of desert. Can anyone shed some light on this?
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Hi nayaldog! Here other spaniard that just came from an organised trip, crossed Mauritania early 2013. We had lots of military looking after us. We had very friendly police chekpoints everywhere and, even when doing offroad, we had military and gendarmerie controls about every 3-4 hours or 100-150km. We really felt secure, but always have an eye opened. Governors are concerned about the situation and are working really hard helping organised rallys/tours/etc. not only felt protected, but actually being protected. I saw families, with kids, travelling. As said, we can't actually say it's 100% safe, but believe me, it's not as unsafe as it seems. Apply common sense and the already said prevention actions and you'll do fine  about the border: no worries. it's 3 km of no man's land. Ignore all the people you'll find there, just smile and wave bye bye. better cross in convoy and always follow a GPS track, if you have one, otherwise the correct way can be found by looking at the Mauritanian radio antenna and going towards it by riding ridden paths. NEVER drive on unridden paths trough this area, as it's heavily mined. it's not difficult, people cross it on a daily basis. Saludos!
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