Nature in the raw, the awe-inspiring power of wild places, has the most immediate
influence on the youngsters. Initially, it is alien and threatening, but as confidence grows they
come to terms with it. They respect its power and violence, but at the same time they are drawn to the peace and beauty of the empty places.
Alasdair Kennedy

Back in the early 1980s I joined The 153 Club, a bunch of Saharan enthusiasts who’d travelled in the area covered by the ‘Michelin 153’ map (right). In fact, having been there was a condition of membership which at one time cost £1.53p.

Apart from the Sahara Handbook, information on desert travel was hard to come by then, so I’d joined in the hope of getting that from the three-monthly newsletters as well as maybe meeting some other active Saharans. My recollection was actually more of a reunion group of mostly former Minitrek clients (an early overland company). I attended a couple of club meetings in London, sent in a couple reports, then went my own way, though I did get to know ex-Minitrek driver Mike Foster who, in 1991, wrote Sai Bilma about joining the gruelling Bilma salt caravan.
One of the newsletter’s more lively contributions (as opposed to reminiscences), came from a geography teacher called Alasdair Kennedy from former Shorefields School in Dingle, Liverpool (now King’s Leadership Academy). From 1970 he organised summertime school trips to Algeria and beyond for over 15s (from ’82 including girls), using cantankerous 1950s ex-army 4×4 trucks.
It was writing up the mid-80s Imps trike fiasco which made me recall Kennedy and his similar adventures for unprivileged youths from ordinary schools. As Kennedy said in his book, below, ‘such activities can no longer retain the image of being indulgent “jollies” for a fortunate few.’ The school’s address was given as Dingle, but in later reports Kennedy switched to the adjacent Toxteth suburb to underline the school’s deprived locale. In 1981 Toxteth had gained notoriety as one setting for the many inner city riots of that year, partly attributed to heavy-handed policing. Though not involved, we were raided ourselves following the Brixton riots a few months earlier.

Kennedy had first co-organised a scientific visit to Assekrem in 1966 while a student at Durham University using a pair of Morris one-ton trucks (above left). One truck got wrecked in the Hoggar and was towed back as a trailer, bringing to mind Emile Lelay’s 2CV motorcycle stunt.
Once qualified as a teacher Kennedy developed the Sahara expedition idea, but with teenagers and using old trucks was the cheapest way to do it. The kids or their parents had to raise the fee (£340 by the early 1990s), and once there, all were fully involved in keeping the show on the road, as well as undertaking small-group mini overnighters through the Hoggar or Mertoutek village, which became a home from home for many future expeditions, before sometimes heading further south. In 1994 the curtailed Moroccan expedition was featured in a short Channel 4 documentary. This was a couple of years after Kennedy wrote a how-to book or thesis: The Expedition Experience as a Vehicle for Change in the Inner City. On p26 1992 book notes:

When this learning takes place in demanding natural surroundings, where there is an element of risk [Sahara], it ceases to be something artificial which is imposed for reasons of convention, and becomes something which is welcomed, because of its survival value.

Over 25 years over 300 kids from Shorefields and other schools got to experience a central Saharan adventure, and now there’s a Shorefields Sahara Expeditions blog recalling those expeditions, along with YouTube vids and photo galleries. It’s worth repeating these long trips took place in the school’s summer holidays when the Sahara and Sahel are a heck of a lot balmier than Merseyside!
Many of the reports describe unusual weather phenomena common at this time of year, including strange, windless mists of fine dust rolling over the camp or vehicles, choking visibility just before the main sandstorm strikes, often ending in a brief rainstorm and, on one occasion, heightened levels of static electricity when merely touching metal would give you a sharp zap.
The soundless vid of the 1973 above trip went all the way down the Hoggar route to Agadez in Niger, then back up the Tanezrouft via Tessalit in Mali to Reggane and on to Ceuta – in mid-summer all jammed in the back of a poorly ventilated, ex-army Austin K9 radio wagon and ambulance. (The same route was repeated in 1988). By the time they got to wet season Niger they were running with the bonnet’s off to help shed heat, but the 4-litre petrol sixes still suffered from vapour lock, and you imagine a whole lot more. (Later, diesel Bedfords were used.) Back then that’s what desert overlanding was – lurching from one breakdown or reversal to another which, along with your health, was pushed to the limit by the intense heat, dust and Sahelian humidity.

The 1971 trip (pics, report, vids above) sounded especially gruelling, staying entirely in the enervating desert for several weeks. On this one a SWB Landrover accompanied the Austin K9 and a similar Morris truck. Having come from Djanet via Tam and the Aïr, in Agadez, they’d run out of time to visit Kano in northern Nigeria, but took up an offer to join some French heading across the Tenere to Dirkou. It was sort of on the way back north and a loop I more or less did, but over a couple of trips.

Passing the then extant Arbre Tenere, after a visit to Jerome’s fuel depot in Dirkou (bragging, as he always did with Brits – like me 33 years later – about fighting with Monty in WWII), the three vehicles set off alone for Djanet along the desolate, Berliet-balised Chirfa piste (left). The intense heat combined with crappy fuel from Jerome’s played havoc with the Morris which was down to 2mpg – so bad the Landrover had to shoot ahead hundreds of kilometres to Djanet to bring back more fuel. Like the 1973 film, the end of 1971 Part 2 video rushes to the end and skips most of this drama.
You wonder how this was for the kids engaged in a combination of an Outward Bound course and Foreign Legion selection? It’s hard to keep a grip on your own struggles let alone maintain the morale of a bunch of heat-struck teenagers. It must have taken skilful and thoughtful leadership, like Roy Pratt demonstrated in the mid-80s Imps expedition, except with greater experience, Kennedy seemed far better at planning for the multiple contingencies the summertime desert throws at you. At such times the best place to be was probably sat clinging on, in you baggy Y-fronts, to a pitching truck cab’s roof!
A few stills below from the YT vids. Loads more on the WP blog.