Desert Soul Adventures

22/07/2024

Ciao, Algeria, arrivederci!

Anybody else wonders why the (ex) pride of Italy, ex-Alitalia (now ITA Airways, Italia Trasporti Aerei Airways) fly aircraft registered in Ireland? That includes all the former Alitalia planes now flying for ITA that used to be registered in Italy and now boast Irish flag on their tails. Remember, Alitalia bankrupted at the beginning of the pandemic (and Desert Soul didn't).

Here's the fascinating answer:

The answer is twofold. In 2001 several countries got together to sign a treaty called "The Cape Town Convention on International Interests in Mobile Equipment."
It was designed to ensure that the owners of high-priced movable objects, such as aircraft, could be recovered if lessors defaulted on payments. Eighty-four counties, including Ireland, signed the treaty, but Italy and Russia did not.
It would be difficult to repossess a plane registered in Italy

This means that if an Italian airline fails to make a payment on the lease of an aircraft registered in Ireland, it can quickly be repossessed. However, if the leased aircraft was registered in Italy and the airline defaulted on a payment, the plane's owner would need help getting it back.
Despite Italy being in the European Union, the aircraft's owner would have to navigate the Italian judicial system. They would first need to start at a local level and then work up to a higher court, with the entire process possibly taking years to resolve.

Secondly, Ireland has very favorable tax laws for large corporations. Guinness Peat Aviation was the first aircraft leasing company to select Ireland in 1975. Others soon followed, including the world's fourth-largest aircraft leasing company SMBC Aviation Capital in 2012. Today one in five leased commercial passenger aircraft is registered in Ireland. Ireland is a beneficiary of this, with aircraft leasing companies accounting for 2.6% of the nation's gross domestic product (GDP).

Corporation tax in Ireland is 12.5% in the aircraft leasing sector, and under section 110, leasing companies can claim back all their expenses.

Source: https://simpleflying.com/italian-aircraft-irish-registrations-guide/

22/07/2024

🚙 Dear fellow riders: 🏍 How high will we reach on this dune? 🕵️‍♂️
Who has the right answer? 🎯

22/07/2024

🚌 Ok, it's not from today - spotted a couple of days ago in Beni Abbas in central Algeria. It is a mobile post office, serving all the surrounding villages on a daily basis.
It's an SNVI 100 V8 with exactly the same engine we have in one of our Desert Soul Adventures trucks: a V8 Deutz F8L413F air-cooled engine, still being built into vehicles more than 30 years after ours was fitted into the truck.

22/07/2024

Hot tap water in Taghit and...
cold tap water in Taghit.
😂

20/07/2024

Well - I will definitely not be asking you what this one is. It's a Magirus Jupiter with a Deutz F6L613 on the back, drilling for water.

20/07/2024

Timimoun: outlet of a 20-kilometre-long fouqqara (what would be a ghettara in Morocco)

19/07/2024

Timimoun: Castles and Ahmed, the proud owner of his coffee-shop.

19/07/2024

I know you see those lines! 😆😍🏍

19/07/2024

Anybody any idea about what brand these beauties are? My conclusions: the truck has a Deutz engine and Chinese 14.00R20 tyres; the car is probably not a BMW.
Anybody knows more?

19/07/2024

And then, there are another 390 km from Tamanrasset to the border with Niger. So roughly, 2.400 km from the north to the south of the country.

18/07/2024

Check this tyrannosaur's tooth and imagine how adventurous would our enduro tours be if the dinosaurs didn't go extinct! We would go racing in all directions like panicking ants if a dinosaur would strike. 😂
The oasis of El-Menia with the Grand Erg Occidental in the background.
Charles de Foucauld.

17/07/2024

Reinforced guiding team today. Some kind of success was achieved today. Moving southwards. 47°C only. A bit disappointed - seems that I missed the strong heat wave. 😂

16/07/2024

And so we killed the day and returned to Ghardaia instead of advancing to El Menia. I simply can't leave this place with empty hands. The gain of today is only that now we know that we don't know much. Been offline for most of the day, which most importantly included satellite imagery - changed the SIM card and skyrocketed to 4G.
Another attempt tomorrow morning.
My apologies for the poor sound quality - only did one take and found it out too late.

16/07/2024

Second report from Ghardaia: the fine.
First report from Metlili: watermeloooooonzzz.

16/07/2024

First report from Ghardaia, scouting for a new tour in Algeria.

15/07/2024

🦅🕷Grand Erg Occidental it is! 🌴Getting ready to scout 🚙 for a new tour to be added to Desert Soul's list - not a new country, but since it's that vast, it will offer a completely different experience for our clients. Of course, doing it in January 🦊🐭🐪, not in July 🐍🦂.

12/07/2024

Not the hottest place in Africa yet. That one comes next week.
This is some reminiscence from a trip in Andalusia last month.
To rectify myself a bit - it was the 3rd season of the Spanish TV series La Caza that was filmed here in January 2022, entitled Guadiana.
Podéis verlo aquí: https://www.rtve.es/play/videos/la-caza/capitulo-1/6834296/

11/07/2024

🔥 As if working on the truck at 34°C was not enough, I am traveling to an even hotter place in a couple of days. 🐍🐁🌴

17/06/2024

Exploration in progress ... vehicles missing.

15/06/2024

You are wrong if you think you can only get stuck in desert sand. ;)

08/05/2024

While preparing the 2025 Algeria tour at a different location in the country, I came across this video of a beautiful ride following Margaux's line in the area of Tassili n'Ajjer earlier this year.
How do you like it? With Margaux Misi

02/05/2024

Greetings from Gibraltar
Caution: adult content!

03/04/2024

Mmmmm ...

12/03/2024

That climb! And the reward.

11/03/2024