The blowing sand rocks our Land Rover as we reach the outskirts of Timbuctou.Mahmoud leans over the steering wheel and peers into the hazy lemon yellow that fills our windshield. There is no horizon between earth and sky and I wonder how he can continue to drive with no reference points, yet on he goes with the instinct of a desert nomad. I realize for him, this is normal. He tells me these storms can last for days but I do not care. I have finally reached one of the oldest and most remote cities on earth, so let it blow.

I have come to see the Tuareg, The Blue Men of the Sahara, an ancient Berber tribe that ranges from southern Morocco, through Mauritania, south, here, into eastern Mali. They are regal in their indigo turbans died from the ink of Mediterranean sea urchins and their flowing blue robes. Astride one of their white camels they are a sight directly out of the “Arabian Nights.”

Later, at the hotel, in my hopes to enter their world for a brief time, I ask Halis, my Tuareg guide, if it might be possible to don the blue robes for a quick photo, hoping he will not take offense. “No problem,’ he says as he disappears into the night. An hour later he is back at the door, arms piled high with blue fabric. “We will all travel as Tuaregs,” he says, “It will make things easier.’
I do not know what this means until he points at the wall map. Tomorrows destination is his home village of Aroeoun, a former Foreign Legion outpost, north of Timbuctou in the trackless Sahara. This is an area my guidebook calls “Bandit Country.” It is the only speck on the map for 120 miles in every direction.

I had not bargained for this but cannot pass the opportunity. Halis has shrugged off my query about bandits, saying they will not bother us. My own paranoia will have to decide if this is simply his own hubris, or a statement of fact. I am going into the deep desert not only with, but dressed as a Berber nomad. Later I will learn more practical reasons for wearing these clothes as the constantly blowing sand that enters every opening of my body in western clothing is stopped dead by the flowing robes of the Tuareg.

I awake early, tying and retying my turban in hopes of not making a fool of myself. Just after dawn I walk through the hotel lobby feeling totally self conscious but no one gives me a second look. I am just another Tuareg in seach of morning coffee. An hour later we are bouncing over loose sand, headed north, with 20 gallons of gas and four chickens on our roof. What have I done?

There are no roads and few trees, only low scrub brush and moving dunes. Tuareg boys learn every star in the heavens and can easily navigate by them, but when I ask how he does this by day, Mahkmoud points to a tree and says, “That is where we ate spaghetti,” and at another saying, “That is where we camped with the Germans.” He knows every natural formation like I know my living room, for this is his.