Newlyweds’ Desert Honeymoon--a 271-Day, 4,500-Mile Journey Across the Sahara

Michael Asher and Mariantonietta Peru have just had a honeymoon short on relaxation but long on originality--a 10-month trek with camels across the Sahara.

During their 271 days across the world’s largest desert, the couple traveled on foot and camel from the Chinguetti Oasis in Mauritania, to the River Nile in Egypt through Mali, Niger, Chad and Sudan.

They almost died of thirst, were arrested by police and hounded by baying hyenas that encircled their camp at dusk.

With only a guide and three camels for company, they once trekked for 12 days without seeing another person. When they argued, they walked on--in complete silence.

Feared Bandit Attacks

Constantly they feared attacks from bandits.

“It was a hard honeymoon,” said Peru, 30. “There were many moons and not much honey.”

Often the intense 104-degree desert sun sparked futile arguments.

“Sometimes we didn’t talk at all,” said Peru, who dreamed of lemonade and fresh salad as they ate supplies of powdered milk, dried gazelle meat, sardines and rice bought from local markets.

“I had hallucinations of a fresh tomato,” she recalled, almost disbelievingly. “And when the only available water stank, I had to convince myself it was the water from Rome.”

Traveled Like Nomads

The Italian general’s daughter and the former member of Britain’s elite Special Air Service (SAS) regiment, who married one day before departure, ended their journey in May.

They are now writing a book for an American publisher who gave $19,500 toward the trip’s $24,500 cost.

Britain’s respected Royal Geographic Society says it is the longest camel journey made by Europeans.

“Certainly we know of nothing which compares,” a spokesman said.

The couple traveled like nomads--except for a compass, maps and flares--clothed in turbans and jellabiya , loose hooded cloaks worn by Arab men.

Twice Arrested in Chad

“I did start with a couple of paperbacks,” Asher, 34, admitted. “But there wasn’t time to read. Everyday we got up at sunrise, loaded the camels and trekked for 12 hours.”

In Chad, the two were twice arrested for not having a travel permit and taken by police to the capital, N’Djamena, where the Interior Ministry issued one. They were later rearrested: the word “camel” had been omitted from the papers.

“Officials took us to N’Djamena by truck where the director of security laughed and apologized for the mistake,” Asher said.

Officialdom again struck at the end of the 4,500-mile route when Egyptian frontier police refused the exhausted couple entry from Sudan, explaining that it was illegal to cross on foot.

‘In the End, They Gave In’

“I said we would die if we went back. In the end they gave in,” Asher said.

The expedition was inspired by an attempt in 1972-73 by author and traveler Geoffrey Moorhouse to cross the Sahara from west to east without a motor vehicle. After 2,000 miles he gave up when three of his six camels died.

“It’s tremendous someone has at last gone across by camel the full width,” Moorhouse said. “I imagine it’s the very first time someone has done so.”

Caravan routes of indigenous people go north-south, he said.

“To do something nobody has done gives you an incentive,” added Asher, author of two books on the desert, including “The Forty Days Road,” which chronicles his earlier travels with Bedouin nomads in the Sahara.

‘Beautiful Nothing’

“But we are also interested in the environment and desertification. It’s a beautiful nothing--not a rock, not a stick, not a stone,” Asher said.

They are stunned at how swiftly they readapted to European life: “We even look at our watches again.”

But their passion for the extraordinary seems unmarred.

Now they want to enter a 2,037-mile camel race due to take place next year in Australia.