Mauritania’s second largest city with a population of around 140,000 persons. Crossing from Western Sahara to Mauritania involves crossing 1.5km of no man’s land, an upaved stretch of road littered with the wrecks of cars that never made is into the next country, abandoned in the desert for who knows what. The zone is policed by the UN to maintain the peace between Mauritania and Morocco who have both claimed Western Sahara as theirs, sadly the UN’s mandate does not cover road maintenance and as a result it is a very rough gravel dash from one country to the next.

Nouadhibou is also where we realised where all the old Mercedes cars ended up (1990’s and 2000’s). Mauritania must have the highest per capita of Mercedes in the world, albeit that they are all beaten up and most barely street legal. And they are used for everything, even off road where we required 4×4!