Typed up: at a shawarma place, Intr\@Net, and New Hotel in Cairo Posted
from: Intr\@Net in Cairo
As when we
bought our tickets, the bus station was very loud in the morning. It’s
under an overpass, and mini buses are honking their horns non stop.
Joann from Australia was also waiting for the bus and headed to the same
place we were. It was nice to have somebody to talk to and to confirm
that we were in the right place. The 8am bus showed up at 8:30, and by
8:45 we were off. The ride was nice, although it still seems hard to
believe that some people bought aisle seats for the entire ride and
ended up standing for the 5 hours. There was a stop about halfway
through, which was a nice opportunity to stretch our legs and to see how
big and empty the desert was.
In Bawiti we
were immediately accosted by several touts. We didn’t have everything
planned out so we went with Ahmed Said who drove us to the Old Oasis
Hotel (our choice). The hotel charges too much for the state of the
rooms and facilities, and the food is bad (and way overpriced) but it
does have a very nice garden which looks out over the date plantation.
After
dumping our bags Ahmed took us to a local restaurant where he let us eat
before launching into his sales pitch for the desert tours he offers.
Basically, he charges more and delivers a better experience than his
competitors. He seemed like a friendly guy, his English was pretty good,
and the price not too extravagant (but out of our budget) so we said OK
to a 2-night trip in the desert, starting the next day. The rest of the
day we just napped and ate dinner.
We were to
be picked up at 10am the next morning, and Ahmed was even early. We were
disappointed to learn that he would not be our guide. Instead we drove
just outside the hotel were we moved to a different Toyota Landcruiser.
We met our guide Mahmud, and our cook Wagdi. Both are still “young,” but
definitely good at what they do. Driving in the desert is an order of
magnitude more challenging than it was on our east Africa safaris. Here
we went truly off road. Most of the time we were on fairly well
established trails but when you’re driving over loose sand or solid
rock, that doesn’t lead to a nicely packed road.
At every
place we stopped we were given as much time as we wanted to wander
about. We encountered one person on a group tour whose car was honking
at him to get back down already. Our first stop was at a hill in the
Black Desert, which is so named because it’s covered in black volcanic
rock that rained down 35 million years ago. We climbed the hill to enjoy
the view, but mostly we enjoyed looking at the different kind of rocks.
We stopped
at a Bedouin village for tea and then lunch, before we continued on and
turned off the road. At a place where gray rock poked through yellow
sand we explored some more. Danielle found a geode (split open already),
and we just had a great time looking at everything. There were also lots
of rocks that appeared to have some rust in them. Then we stopped on top
of a sand dune to play around some. Of course we found some more neat
rocks at the bottom of the dune. We drove straight down the steep side
of the dune, which was a lot less scary than I thought it was going to
be.
Finally we
made camp among some other dunes in an area where we did not see any
other tire tracks. It was just us 4 alone in the desert. The air was
fresh, and it was totally quiet except for the wind and our own noises.
It was cold too, and our long underwear came in handy. Mahmud made a
fire while Wagdi started cooking. Once the fire was going he used it to
grill some chicken, too. Dinner was great and afterwards we enjoyed tea
around the fire. We slept next to the wind screen, under the stars and 3
blankets. (We didn’t see many stars because the full moon was out.)
On our
second day we went by several desert springs, each enough to support a
handful of palm trees. Close to the first one were the remains of 3
Roman mummies in a hollow in the rock. Around there we found our first
pottery shards, which Mahmud assured us were in fact Roman. It’s still
hard to believe, just because at home a site like that would be fenced
off, but here anybody can walk in and touch it. At lunch I explored for
an hour while Danielle took a rest. Walking through the desert was a lot
of fun, looking at rocks, rodent tracks, a hawk, and in general a varied
landscape. It wasn’t even that hot, even at 1pm.
Towards the
end of that day we entered the really famous part of the desert, the
White Desert. It’s sandy with big chunks of chalk poking through
everywhere. Each one is shaped by the wind in a different way. And there
are so many of them that the whole thing feels magical. To make it even
better, we found sea shells in the chalk. The last time there was an
ocean here was 70 million years ago, so as we walked around we crunched
on ancient shells. Of course we also looked at them and didn’t try to
crush too many. Then we camped right there, among the crazy chalk
sculptures.
The next day
we went for a leisurely walk to see more before continuing on to Crystal
Mountain, which is named there for the amount of quartz found there. It
wasn’t quite as spectacular as the guidebook made it sound, but we did
find 2 really big pieces of quartz, and smaller veins were pretty
common. Then we drove straight back to Bawiti, getting through police
checkpoints by handing out a pack of cigarettes and a bottle of water
respectively. We checked into the Old Oasis Hotel again because the
guidebook made it sound like it was the best place in town, despite its
problems.
Then in the
afternoon we got a tour of the Baharia Oasis from Ahmed himself. Driving
through the date plantation was pretty surreal, but the main thing that
struck us was the expansion of irrigation to support more people and
more crops. We also passed a salt lake that people were in the process
of turning into farmland. Like everywhere in Egypt, there are too many
people and not enough land to go around. There was a very sharp
transition between green, irrigated land and then suddenly a sandy
desert.
In the sandy
desert part I climbed Pyramid Mountain (also not that tall, but plenty
steep and lots of loose rock). Danielle stayed below, and was pretty
upset when I took a different route down where she couldn’t see me. Back
in the car Ahmed commented that Danielle looked different, and what
happened? In some ways Egyptians sure are a lot more direct than us
Americans, where you’d never comment on somebody being upset unless you
know them very well.
Ahmed
offered to take care of our bus tickets, which was nice. That night we
ate at Popular Restaurant downtown, which was good and not too
unreasonably priced. We talked to a family of 4 from Seattle who are
travelling for 10 months, with their children. In the morning we saw
them again at breakfast before they went out into the the desert with
Mahmud. Because this was the end of the Eid holiday the buses were all
full, but in the late morning Ahmed got word that 2 spots had opened up
on the 3pm bus. So we ended up spending all day sitting around at the
hotel (with lunch at Popular). For all its problems the hotel garden is
a really great place to sit around and relax.
Equipment rave: We each got a travel
towel
from Rick Steves, and they’re great. They feel a little funny at first
but do a great job at drying you off (much better than most hotel
towels). They dry very quickly, and they pack down very small.
