Mauritania is one of those countries that still rewards the genuinely curious traveller. Most of it is Sahara — vast, empty, and strikingly beautiful. The northwest is dominated by the Adrar plateau and its ancient desert towns, now UNESCO World Heritage sites. The Atlantic coast offers remarkable wildlife. The southeast holds the ruins of an empire most people have never heard of.
It is not an easy country to visit. Infrastructure is sparse, heat is brutal from May through September, and the security situation in the interior has been unstable at times. But for those who make the effort between November and April, Mauritania offers desert landscapes and historic towns without the tourist crowds found elsewhere in North Africa.
Mauritania sits on a cultural fault line. The Arabic-speaking Moors of the north and the Black African communities of the Senegal River valley in the south share a country but not always a common history. The legacy of slavery — formally abolished in 1981 but only criminalised in 2007 — still shapes social relations. Understanding this tension is part of understanding the country.
Nouakchott, the capital, was little more than a village when it was designated the capital at independence in 1960. It has since grown into a sprawling, sandy city of around one million people. It is a reasonable base but not in itself a reason to come.
