Barefoot Across Mauritania Odette de Puigaudeau

It is difficult to imagine what the land of the Moors was like in 1933, when two young women of refined upbringing, having sailed aboard a red-sailed Breton langoustier, deliberately chose to be set ashore on the beaches of Port-Étienne (today Nouadibhou) and lose themselves in the sands. No official mission, no grants, little money, hardly any baggage: they set out on camelback along unknown routes (covering several thousand kilometres in this manner), in a region where even French military patrols dared venture with caution. These vast, barely pacified solitudes remained largely under the sway of local raiders—proud warriors who lived by the spoils of their rezzou and had earned a fearsome reputation for silencing without explanation any foreigners bold enough to cross their lands. Against all odds, these warriors extended to the two intrepid travellers the welcome reserved for the brave, and soon formed with them ties of the deepest friendship.

One must read Barefoot Across Mauritania (the cult classic that introduced Odette de Puigaudeau to the world in 1936) both as a love song and as a cautionary tale: the desert, under the inspired pen of this remarkable woman (much like under that of T.E. Lawrence or Isabelle Eberhardt), reveals itself to be the ultimate sanctuary of beauty, and the supreme place where our fragile freedom finds its meaning and renewal.