by Mike K-H

Now that they are in Africa, doing the real Dakar driving and navigating, competitors' positions are beginning to reflect their experience as well as their pure driving skills - and the South African are showing up well.

Young Giniel de Villiers is learning rapidly from his Nissan tutor Ari Vatanen of Finland. After starting the race well, he was slowly losing ground after entering Africa - but today he finished 4th, retaining his sixth position overall.

Biker Alfie Cox is doggedly playing the leapfrog game. 'Whoever starts fifth finishes first, and whoever starts first finshes fifth,' says Alfie, who has done both in the last two days. 'The riders are all so evenly matched, and the bikes are identical, you just have to wait for the day when something goes wrong for the other guy. You can't have good days every day. There's the most beautiful desert out there and we haven't seen it yet.'

As part of the breakaway group, Cox is now in fifth place overall, with the opportunity to leapfrog to the front today.

The best day for the South Africans belonged to the DHL Bombardier racer, Vicus van Deventer, who won the Experimental Class and moved into second place less than 9 minutes behind the leader. “The Bombardier performs best of all in the marathon dunes and we are now in the toughest conditions. I had a nice day,” said Vicus at the finish.

Yestedays's route was fast but varied landscapes over the first 300km, before reaching the start of the Awbari Erg, 50km of gigantic dunes followed with sumptuous forms, some of which towered an overwhelming 100 metres in height. The difficulty in dune crossing is choosing the right path between the monumental ergs. Afterwards, the trail continued through some magnificent countryside of canyons and great sandy stretches, with all the possible difficulties that a rally such as the Dakar can offer. A testing stage for man and machine alike. Many competitors got stuck in the sand, and problems there were plenty of….

With the dunes behind them, the crews powered through spectacular canyons over long stretches of sand before the route gave way to vegetation towards the end of the stage. The old city of Ghat is found on a hillside, however, like many other places in the Libyan Sahara, there are very few inhabitants. Many of the old settlements have crumbled away, but some, like Ghat, are being restored in the hope of attracting tourists. It is the gateway to the Akakus Desert and awash with canyons, huge rock arches, slender plinths and caves decorated with rock painting dating from 5000 B.C.; the whole area is conserved as a national park.

Click on the thumbnail picture to see a slightly bigger view of Ficus van Deventer riding hard.

This part of the world is worth a more leisurely investigation.Take a look at Richard Dobbie's www.travelsnapz.com for a few ideas.

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Have fun. 

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