The Banques is the large salt deposit that has formed around the western edge of Lac Assal,Djibouti. Lac Assal (Lake Assal) is the lowest point in Africa - 550 feet below sea level and is the saltiest lake in the world. It also gets extremely hot here during the summer with temps of over 135 degrees. John and I were here yesterday and it was a cool 101.
Salt Investment is building a large salt production facility at the Banques. The first picture above is of a part of the Banques as it looks naturally. The salt runs up to 40 meters deep and is so hard that heavy Astro trucks and trailers can easily traverse it. The other two pictures show John testing the temperature of the water in one of the crystallizer ponds and that pond itself which was formed by removing the top 35 centimeters of salt and forming a long rectangularly shaped box. This pond rapidly fills up with water from the lake,the wind and sun evaporate the water and salt remains. They took the salt which was removed from the pond area and formed salt roads which surround and allow access to the ponds. John is crouching on the side of one of the salt roads in order to get his sample water temperature.
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