Timbuktu increased competition from newly available trans-Atlantic sailing routes caused the city to decline. The first European to reach Timbuktu, Alexander Gordon Laing, did not arrive until 1826, and it was not until the 1890s that Timbuktu was formally incorporated into the French colony of Mali. Today, the city is still inhabited; however, the city is not as geopolitically relevant as it once was. Timbuktu is located on the southern edge of the Sahara north of the main channel of the River Niger. The town is surrounded by sand dunes and the streets are covered in sand. The port of Kabara
Timbuktu Gao and Mopti. Its 6,923 ft (2,110 m) runway in a 07/25 runway orientation is both lighted and paved. In the imagination of Europeans and North Americans, Timbuktu is a place that bears with it a sense of mystery: a 2006 survey of 150 young Britons found 34% did not believe the town existed, while the other 66% considered it "a mythical place". This sense has been acknowledged in literature describing African history and African-European relations. Timbuktu is also often considered a far away place, in popular western culture. The origin of this mystification lies in the excitement brought to