I had expected these Ancient Ksour to be really remote, but Ouadane and Chinguetti in 2025 are easily reached. The 82km road from Atar to Chinguetti has recently been turned into an asphalt road via a project sponsored by the Islamic Development Bank. And Ouadane, another 120km eastwards, is accessible via a ‘piste’ (unpaved but smoothened and maintained), where driving 90 km/h is easily possible and no 4WD is needed.

Coming from the Northwest (Atar), we first spent a day and a night in Ouadane. Already on the approach you feel that you’re arriving somewhere special. The old city was built against a hill overlooking date palm plantations, with a maze of streets like a dense beehive. It is much larger than I expected it and also has preserved its outer wall and gates. It is now fully abandoned. We did a walking tour here with a local guide. It's remarkable how high the walls bordering the streets are (upper photo). Entrance to the buildings is via low wooden doors; we visited the house of one of the three founders of the city, El Hadj Yacoub. It had spaces for books and for teaching, and a balcony overlooking the city. The town’s Old Mosque looks brittle but has been restored.

The approach to Chinguetti was very different – we took the sand dunes shortcut route from Ouadane via the oasis of Tenewchert, and you’ll end up seeing the minaret of the Old (First) Mosque appearing from the sand. Next is the somewhat messy Old (Second) Town, separated from the New (Third) Town by a wadi. Chinguetti was built three times and abandoned twice due to encroaching sand. Its name doesn’t rhyme with ‘spaghetti’ by the way – it’s a Berber word pronounced ‘TCHING-kedzee’.

In the Old Town the Great Mosque is the major landmark – you may not enter so cannot really imagine what it looks like except for the minaret. Its decoration is austere, like the kind of Islam practiced in Mauritania. The streets seem to be a bit wider here than in Ouadane and there is more plastic trash to be seen when you peek over the walls into the ruined buildings. Chinguetti’s most notable features are its 12 ancient libraries. We visited the same one as Solivagant did in 2005 – comparing photos it does seem to be a different caretaker though. The town overall is a bit more touristy and there’s no shortage of handicraft sellers, but visitor numbers are still as low as maybe 30 a day.

We then drove back 2km to what is known as the First Mosque or Abeur Mosque (lower photo), the only remaining structure of the first incarnation of Chinguetti (11th century?). Its minaret has the finest stone decoration of all buildings that we saw across both towns. It also has a lovely setting in the sand. 

Especially in Chinguetti, it all felt tired. People were disappointed that they don’t see any money coming in from UNESCO or the government. We know that UNESCO doesn’t just hand out money to WHS, but the locals think the central government is stowing it away into their own pockets. Still, the site could use some support from NGO’s like the Aga Khan Foundation or the World Monuments Fund for improved interpretation and keeping it clean. Some action was recently announced by ICESCO.