I just arrived by boat to the shores of Africa. Miners, guides, and I will all be taking this expedition. We went across the ocean and up the river. It has been a long journey towards Africa and I'm quite tired but their is no time for sleep. We now are going to have a three week expedition that we must embark on without delay.
Our three week travel to Timbuktu has begun and it is grueling. This desert is quite the obstacle course. I am extremely tired and thirsty. We have encountered one sandstorm and it was one the worst experiences of my life. I have never seen anything like it before and the men with me were very worried. Once we get to Timbuktu and get the gold and salt, we will have to make this same trip over again back to the boat as well. This is going to be a major test of mental strength.
We are now in Timbuktu and we are going to get salt for trade. We are using many camels to transport the salt back to the ship. From Timbuktu the salt will sent out to other towns in Mali. It is especially difficult to do this because the salt is in huge slabs. On our way though we got very lucky. We saw Mansa Musa, the leader who converted to Muslim. It was a very special experience to see him. Everyone in the crowd stopped just to take a look at him before going on with their day.
Sources:
http://www.timbuktufoundation.org/history.html
http://www.google.com/imgres?q=gold+and+salt+trade
http://www.google.com/imgres?q=timbuktu+map&um
http://www.google.com/imgres?q=timbuktu&num
http://www.google.com/imgres?q=1400s+ship&um
http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/learning_history/1492/1492_timbuktu.cfm
http://www.humanitiestexas.org/news/events/golden-age-empire-mansa-musa-timbuktu-and-islamic-african-empire
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