Even though the convoi-principle stil pllied, it didn´t take long for the cars to scatter along the dirt tracks leading south into the wilderness from Kiffa. All we had was a general direction (south) and a line drawn on our GPS map indicating one of the wheel tracks. We started of pretty hard so that we would get in front of everyone else, and wouldn´t have to eat their dust all day. If you are riding closer than 100m to another car on these tracks, your car interior, air filter, lungs and mouth fills with the fine dust. Riding hard is fun and fast, but not good for the car. It dind´t take us long to bounce the last strength out of our suspension, and even shorter for the Cape to Cape team to have a puncture. After fixing it we headed on, Ou car up front and their following the dust cload at a distance. Unfortunately we made some bad turns and after a half an hour we discovered that we were on the wrong side of a river fifty meters wide. Angrily turning the car around we headed back untill we could cross it. Now all alone with no teams within radio contact, long behind the military vehicules and in a tired car with dangerously high engine temperatue, we got that uncomfortable feeling in our stomachs again. The same feeling we got when we stranded alone in the desert a week earlier. We drove even harder now along what seemed like the best route, getting very nervous every time we were on the wrong side of some hill topps or when crossing big areas of soft sand. Getting stuck out here would mean many hours of walking to get help. that is whatever help you can get from a shepherd village only speaking their tribal language.

As we cossed on of the sandier parts of the "you stop - you stuck" type, we saw a village through the savanna vegetation. Just outside it there were some military vehicules, and then we saw more and more B2 cars. Very happy to have cought up with the group we learned that we were now among the first cars to arrive here. Our route had been very efficient, and we had bypassed all the cars that left us behind earlier on. We started on the route again and soon crossed the border between Mauritania and Mali. The Mauritanian military escort left and we had to manage the distance to Kayes on our own. 

The rest of the day we drove along with the Polish Pajero Squad, the Dutch Peanuts and the Swedish Cape to Cape teams. The Swedes had another puncture, and since their spare tyre was all ready in use they got one of ours. Slowing us further down we were starting to lag behind the others again. We had been driving across the Savanna for eight hours, but were not near the end of the 240 km crossing. Finally we made the decision to make camp for the night, before we would loose the daylight. Next to a dried up river bed we placed our three cars in a circle and pitched our tent on the roof rack. The wildlife and the snake grass on the ground dind´t exactly tempt us to sleep down there. The evening was spent repairing the two punctured wheels - redneck style with propane and a lighter, as well as getting dust out from the car.