Dakar Challenge

17/04/2026

A new borehole courtesy of this year’s 2026 Dakar Challenge (Plymouth Banjul) run.

This year’s money raised has gone into immediate effect erecting a new borehole at the scout’s headquarters. This will facilitate the whole surrounding community too. Access to clean drinking water for everyone.

Thanks once again to this Dakarists.

10/04/2026

Latest news.

Another cause that recently benefitted from the Dakar Challenge donations from the 2025 run. A new borehole was built giving the people of the village access to clean water.

Many thanks once again to our participants.

10/04/2026

Thank you!

Hello everyone we have finally returned from our extended travels around west Africa.

We’d like to thank all of the participants of the Dakar Challenge 2026 and some of the 4x4 Challenge 2025/26 for your fantastic donations of your vehicles and their contents, your generosity has helped and will continue to help many people for a long time and we are forever grateful.

As you are aware we had issues with the government tax and this is still on going. After the uproar of the first auction attempt resulting in us calling it off Dave and Minyan went to the parliament buildings and met with the vice president the following Monday to review the sudden higher tax rate that was imposed upon us. They also met with the speaker of the house to work out how a motion can be tabled to over turn this. ..And thus still pending.

The second auction went ahead, sadly without us present as we had moved on. All of the cars sold successfully and still raised a good amount of money that will go a long way to making a difference to the small charities that we help.

So once again thank you very much everyone you were great!

27/02/2026

Thank you very much to our 4x4 challenge class of 2026.
You’ve been great. Safe onward journeys.

25/02/2026

4x4 Challenge day 9 final day. (23rd Feb)
Up at 7.30am and decamped for the final time. Used our Jerry cans to fill our tank and re inflated our tyres for the long roads ahead. Drove to Akjout and bid goodbye to 2 of our team (Alan & Tony and Kieron & Seamus)as they would be peeling off north along the way to drive home to England and Ireland .
All was going smoothly until about 2pm when Buck and Gav’s car broke down. The steering box came off the chassis. It took 30 mins to strap it on but then meant 50 mph for the rest of the journey (274 miles in total) feeling reminiscent of 2 years ago in our old freelander….
We arrived at our usual hotel in Nouakchott around 6pm and got properly clean with welcome hot showers. We bid farewell to another friend Peter Ingvar Sund, who was flying home to Norway.
As it’s Ramadan nothing is open until later so we eventually wandered out around 8.30pm to find food. .Shawarma and chips £2.50 each!
We also found a Paul’s on the way home and stopped for dessert!
Then waved off our co team mate buddy Gavin as he departed for the Uk. Our numbers now depleting.

24/02/2026

4x4 Challenge Day 8 (22nd Feb)
Got up at 7.30am and had a piping hot shower. The electricity went off so got ready and packed in the dark. After breakfast, fuel stops and car sorting we eventually hit the road around 9.45am. And when I say road I mean that extremely loosely…. Miles and miles of rough corrugation for pretty much the whole day. It was exhausting. The opel of our German/Norwegian team had an issue so we sat by the side of the ‘road’ for well over an hour while they fixed it. Another 10 mins up the road we stopped again and this time Gavin realised he’d lost his camera so had to go back to look for it. .. 30 mins later and no luck. Today was the start of car issues because the next was a flat tyre that needed changing on Buck & Gav’s Pajero. When we finally came out the other side we passed through a little village where we had to wait for hundreds of goats and sheep to come down a hill. Around the corner we were greeted by stunning scenery and we finally reached the oasis of Tergit. Unfortunately a very dry season meant it wasn’t as green as last year but still pretty. We had a paddle in the warm water and then went and found a spot nearby to camp for the final time.

24/02/2026

4x4 challenge Day 7 (21st Feb)
After our nice camp yesterday we got up and left at a leisurely 9.30am. Drove some more nice big dunes and reached our Auberge in Oudane by 10.45am.
Everyone checked into clean rooms with hot showers. Then we popped into the local village for fuel and supplies. Got the tyre on the Suzuki fixed and headed off for the Richat Structure aka The Eye of the Sahara. More sandy dunes and then very rocky tracks. This year we saw no other tourists at all and had the summit to ourselves. Afterwards we tiptoed over the rocky hills back to a sandy wadi and shaded under a tree and had lunch.
After that we made our way back through the soft sand and to the hotel where we had a 3 course dinner of soup, camel stew and couscous and fruit.

24/02/2026

4x4 Challenge day 6 (Feb 20th)
Relaxed morning. Breakfast with everyone before they went to visit the sinking library and old town of Chinguetti. (We did it last year so used the time to catch up on admin)
We met up with them all after and filled the cars up and got supplies for tonight’s camp. The guides got a goat for a bbq but he was still alive and strapped to the back of the pick up…. He got named Wayne.
We then started on the very sinky sand dunes. Great fun. The first person of all people to get stuck was Dahid! (Our guide) which was very funny. Apart from a flat tyre on the Suzuki all was well and we arrived to our camp ahead of time… and only the second person to get stuck just as we arrived was Gavin!!
After we pitched up the general consensus was not to eat Wayne so we all shared an already prepped goat for dinner instead. Long live Wayne!
While we sat by the camp fire, the stars were amazing and little wild gerbils ran around us.

24/02/2026

4x4 Challenge day 5 (19th Feb)
Feeling much better. We left our auberge, filled up the cars and headed for the Choum tunnel. A 2km long abandoned tunnel that used to be used to transport the iron ore. Complete darkeness for about 4mins, quite eerie.
After that we headed towards Atar through a pretty village and beautiful scenery up zig zag mountain roads. The road to Chinguetti was slightly better this year with less deep sand. We got there in good time to our lovely hotel with hot showers. A welcome luxury to those who’d done the filthy iron ore train last night. We watched the sun go down on the roof and toasted Alan’s birthday. 3 course dinner with camel casserole from our lovely French host Silvette.

20/02/2026

4x4 Challenge day 4 18th Feb
Woke up feeling a lot better but still very woosey. Dave and most of the gang left at 9.30am in a bus to go to the point where the Iron Ore train stops 2hrs away.
I spent the day resting and they spent the day waiting. There’s no time table so it arrives when the carriages are full. It finally arrived at 7.30pm, 2 km long… around 200 carriages. Dahid bartered a deal with the guards to let them on (as it’s actually not allowed) if they helped load nearly 200 goats & sheep. After about 30mins of passing the animals up they finally clambered on as it got dark. The ore isn’t sharp, jagged or lumpy but fine dust. They nestled down in the mounds dressed in boiler suits, googles and scarves. With zero light pollution the night sky was amazing. They could see Mars, Jupiter, Milky Way and many shooting stars. Apparently it was quite cold but they had a great time and a bucket list item ticked… and for us a challenge item also ticked as last year the train didn’t come. Next year it just needs to be in the daylight!
When they got back to our digs at around 1am the guides were falling about laughing as they were all black with the ore dust.
An amazing experience had by all who were brave enough to give it a go!

18/02/2026