Sixty thousand square kilometres of sandstone in northeastern Chad, weathered by wind and heat into arches, bridges and towers, rising to about 1,450 metres. Water survives here in gueltas, desert pools, at least twenty of them perennial or nearly so, and one of the strangest consequences is a population of West African crocodiles cut off from every other crocodile on Earth and dwarfed by the isolation. Dorcas gazelle, reintroduced addax, 199 migratory bird species, and isolated North African ostriches still hanging on. On the rock is 8,000 years of art: cattle make up over half the animals painted, with people working alongside their livestock and carrying hunting gear. UNESCO listed it in 2016 and African Parks has run it with the government since 2018. Vandalism is a real and documented problem here, most recently in January 2017.
Ennedi, Chad
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