Fjord Riders and Team Bilnor are now all back in Sweden and Norway.

You can download our film which is 90 minutes long. It's lots of action and with subtitles in English. Samples from the movie can be seen on youtube.

You'll find the torrent file for downloading in the Media pages. You will need some kind of bittorent client. The video is downloadable in two versions: One .iso (4GB) for burning on DVD and one XVid.avi (700Mb) for less quality. Please have some patience as my computer is not connected 24h/7days.

Today our plan was to shortly visit Timbuktu and then leave south because nobody seemed to be able to pay for the Lada, but as we now are in the end of the world things change very quickly. We start the day by getting a guided tour around centre ville of Timbuktu which has a very interesting history. The day is also spent with dealing our car with the Timbuktu mafia which are a bunch of young guys flashing with their mobile phones and claiming to be the friends of Ari Behn (prince of Norway) while he was writing his book here in Timbuktu. They also try to get customers for our car but after seeing quite a few we realize that Timbuktu is not a good place to sell the Lada. People here are very poor and we don't want to just dump a quality Lada for nothing. It feels a bit sad anyway since here in Timbuktu we for the first time in Africa meet other Lada Nivas. At least two of them. In the afternoon we are on our way back to the hotel but we are suddenly stopped by the police. It shows out that we miss some paper for the car and the police want us to pay a fine of 80 Euros. Since they also refuse to give us a receite for the money we do not pay the fine and after a long time at the police we manage to escape but still without the papers in place. We suspect the mafia also was involved in this. Now there is a problem with clutch in the car... This day never ends and we find a good mechanic that help us but the problem is still obvious. We are not very keen on driving from Timbuktu when the car is like this but as a sudden all things change. The police arrives and they obviously regrets trying to fool us. The papers are now in place, maybe because we claim to belong to the big race of Budapest Bamako. The chief of the police don't want to be associated with corruption since we are claiming to take the case further. Just a few minutes later the military arrive and it show out they are both willing and able to give us the 1500 Euro we want for the car. 40 Minutes later we sit in the hotel writing contract and the Lada Niva is sold to some generals of Timbuktu. After the deal is closed we quickly arrange our departure which will be at 4'o clock next morning. Getting out of the city after making this car deal seam like a smart thing to do and tomorrow we will be on our way back to Bamako. This is the end of the story of Lady Lada Niva as we now it and hopefully it will serve well her in Timbuktu.

Today we start the day with trying to update the website in Douentzas only internet cafe (internet by sattelite) but since Douentzas electricity is coming from a local diesel aggregate and since this is not at all stable, I give it up after some time. Instead we visit some of the 15 Norwegian missionaries living and working in Douentza. At noon we start our trip to Timbuktu and it is a long piste with hard packed sand. The best thing to do is to keep a steady 80 km/h and almost fly over all the small bumps. A quite fun drive that last for some hours until we reach the Niger river. Here we have to take a boat and we are lucky to get on the first one that arrives. We pass some hippos in the water but they are quite shy and not very easy to catch on camera. Well in Timbuktu the same thing happens as allways when we come into a new town. Lots of people start following us on their mopeds and try to buy our car, guide us or get us into one of their friends hotel. It is quite tyreing to have so many people shouting and trying to get your attention but we have become quite used to just ignore all opinions and just do what we want.

Next morning we continue on the track and pass lots of villages again before we arrive in Bandiagara. After some food we continue a litle track going in to Dogon Country. The Dogons are very proud of their roots and living close to the nature. They are hard working farmers and during our trip we are impressed of all the women and kids working in the fields. The nature is an incredible mix of dramatic mountains, dry sand, rivers and green irigrated fields. The Dogons themselves are a mix of muslims, christians and animists and there is lots of holy places and interesting history to learn about them. That is why we get a guide to lead us through. A guide is essential to get the background and not do the wrong things, e.g. walk on the holy places. We spend a two day walk in Dogon wih our nice guide and we also se lots of the Tellem Villages that are build high up in the mountains. The Tellems are not here anymore but they used to be a people of pygmees living in small caves in the mountains. They were a strong and mythic people and the Dogons believe they might have been able to fly (or at least use some magic powder to climb in the mountains).

On the second day we leave our guide and continue the journey through Dogon Country with the Lada. We pass some really hard off-roading in the mountains, driving on steep roads and through a rocky piste. When we reach the plains we spend the rest of the days driving trough villages and tons of soft sand. We visit a market and it is fun being with the friendly Dogons. They are always smiling and waving to us. In the evening we reach the last big city before Timbuktu.

This day we were planning to go Timbuktu but in a spontanous moment we decide to take a little track heading into the mountains of Dogon. We pass a lot of small villages and many woman are decorated with earrings. The landscape is incredible beautiful and the villagers seeme to be very productive. Everywhere there are people working on the fields or building houses or making bricks from the mud. There is quite a lot of water here so the vegetation is beautiful with palm trees and nice rock formations. When the dark comes we suddenly realizes that we are on steep cliff and we decide to spend the evening and night there. It is incredible to be out in the nature with only the light from the moon and the stars while cooking some dinner on our stove. To bad we already exchanged our tents in Bamako for different souvenirs but anyway the mosquito nets is all that is needed.

After leaving Bamako we use two days two arrive in Djenne, where the famous mud build moske is situated. We have to take take the Lada on a little riverboat to get there and the town itself is really nice and beautiful. It is not a lot of tourists here even if we meet a few. When driving in a car there is always lots of people coming up to you and many people want to buy the car. We spend the night in Djenne and enjoy the village life.

After a couple of days in Bamako it is now time for a some adventures. Morten, Håkon and Öystein is going home while Aasmund and me are going to take the Lada up to Timbuktu. We are also planning to visit Dogon country.