Around about the beginning of March, we decided to follow a safari out into the world’s highest sand dunes and see if we could survive. Our trip was actually a ‘self-drive’ safari, guided by a professional driver who led us through the desert and made sure that we did’t get lost and perish in the ‘same-ness’ of the vast dunes.

He also made sure we didn’t drive into one of the many sand-pits in between the dunes. These are gouged out by swirling wind and can be very well hidden. You can see one just behind us and to the right.

This was the first real ‘dune-bashing’ test of our (nearly) new Pathfinder. I have to say I was impressed by the vehicle!

Prevailing winds have given the dunes a gradual slope to the west, with much steeper and bigger drops to the east. Over the course of the day-and-a-half safari, we repeatedly drove eastward, up through the twisting dunes to the top of a dune face …

and then dropped over the edge and down the other side in a series of very harrowing one-way roller coaster rides!

This picture doesn’t do justice to the height of the dunes, so I have put together a little video to show the highlights to better effect.

One spectacular point of the trip was driving down this stepped dune which was still very high, but broken into these lovely terraces.

Of course it wasn’t all fun and games (except when this wasn’t you!). As you can see in the next couple pictures, the dunes can be rather unforgiving to the person that doesn’t ‘feel’ the sand and know when to put your foot down, and when to calm down.

We spent the night under the stars where we were treated to a lovely dinner in the dunes complete with Shisha and a few beverages after dinner. We shared a few stories and laughed at each other for getting stuck.

In the morning, we took off only to run into a large herd of camels wandering through the desert.

As a final note, at one point we thought we had run into a bona fide mirage -a giant jeep! On closer inspection, it actually was a giant jeep. Don’t ask…