Land of the Pharaohs - Day 6: The White Desert to El Kharga

Day 6 – White Desert, Farafra Oasis, Dakhla Oasis and Kharga Oasis

Today's route. It's a long drive.

06:30 Gouda’s alarm breaks the silence and I get up. Dawn has just broke. I grab my camera and head off to get some pics before sunrise. It is a hazy, overcast morning. Not at all what I expected.

Our camp

 Jackal was here. His tracks are lying over mine of last night.

 
As I wander off into the chalk-field, I start to discern the geology in the growing light. The chalk mounds are slowly being eroded by the sand, which lies on top of solid, purple-blue rock.

Bedrock

Thousands of years of erosion produced this.

King of my hill.

The view to the other side.

The girls go for their last ablutions in the desert loo. I spot them in the distance wandering around trying to find some privacy in order to do a quick wash without an audience.

The throne room

7:30 Breakfast is served. Spicy beans and bread, prepared on the coals. With mint tea, of course. After breakfast the ‘washing up’ is done by scouring everything with sand and then giving it a quick rinse.

08:35 We say goodbye to our hosts who are having tea around the campfire before they pack up the camp and we head south to Farafra Oasis. Out of the mushroom forest the character changes again. The desert is now a fine, pale yellow, sandy desolation from horizon to horizon.

Over a slight hill and we see Farafra Oasis lying in front of us like a green jewel. As we get closer we see open water: Irrigation dams. Things are happening in this town. Lots of construction. A distinctly more upbeat atmosphere than Bawiti.

09:00 We stop to fill up with petrol and a get to see one of the renowned long range safari groups doing the same. Three Land Cruisers and one land Rover filling their tanks and auxiliary tanks. The advance party would have gone ahead already. From here they go eastwards into the Great Sand Sea for a few days, then back again. That is one of the most forbidding places on earth. Not even the Bedouin will live there. Camel caravans frequently get lost, never to be seen again.

Cambyses, emperor of Persia, sent an army of 50 000 men from Luxor to attack Siwa oasis. Their route took them through the Great Sand Sea. We know that they passed Kharga oasis, but they did not arrive at Siwa. To this day, no trace of them has ever been found. Or maybe it has?

The Great Sand Sea stretches for 1,000 km east to west and 1,100 km north to south. Most sand dunes there are about 100m high, but some have been measured at over 500m high. There is no water. None. In earlier times it took 40 days by camel to cross the desert from Darfur in the Sudan to El Kharga on the edge of the Great Sand Sea. During those 40 days, three quarters of the slaves and three quarters of the camels would die.

Our route will take us along the edge of the Great Sand Sea to El Kharga and eventually back to the Nile.
Gouda goes off to make some photocopies of our documents and to find some batteries for one of our cameras. Around this time he realises that he left his shoes at the campsite. No hope of going back – we have a lot of driving in the other direction to do today. He is not happy.

Before we hit the road, we stop at studio and gallery of a local artist, Badr Abd El Moghny. He uses natural materials, mostly rocks, stones and sand from the surrounding area. From this he produces the most stunning sculptures and sand paintings. Not only that; the whole studio is a work of art, with murals that he painted and pots that he made.

One of the rooms in the studio.

It is the desert, after all.

Here I find a headscarf for a reasonable price. I buy it and go Arafat. Mom and Eli find some headscarves, a tablecloth and some camelhair fabric to buy. Another box ticked – bought some fabric and trinkets to take home.

10:30 On the road. Every now and then, we see newly built settlements. Several houses together with irrigated fields around. They are owned by retired soldiers, given 5 hectares upon discharge.

The desert alternates between white chalk, black iron and yellow sand, but fewer and fewer hills the further we go. When we reach Abu Munkar the land is a flat expanse of sand, the sun is high and the horizon disappears in a mirage.

The edge of the White Desert

As we approach Dakhla oasis, our first stop is Deir el Hagar Temple. It is a temple built in Roman times, venerating the Roman emperors as the rulers of Egypt.

The temple is reasonably well preserved, but I did not understand the context of the temple. Egypt became a Roman province in 30BC, after Augustus defeated Marcus Antonius and Cleopatra VII. I would have liked to spend more time here. 

A mural depicting emperor Titus making an offering to the gods.

 

 The same scene, but with some colour remaining.

The surrounding mountains had tombs for nobles cut into them.

This used to be a major source of grain to the Roman empire. My early ancestors probably ate the bread that was made from the grain that grew here. 

After spending some time looking at the farms of Dakhla (due to a confidentiality agreement, I am unable to comment), we take the road further into town. Even from the road it is clear that it is still very fertile. Everywhere you look, you see field upon irrigated field, tended by people folded double and donkeys watching the world go by. There is clearly also a lot of new development going on here. The whole atmosphere is buzzing; this town is moving! We see polytunnels and even an irrigation dam. In the desert!

Our guidebooks mention that the old town of Dakhla is worth seeing. From the road, we can see an ancient fort, but we don't have much time to stop. This is one of those terrible times on tour when time only allows you to choose one option. I make the decision, and I choose to press on to Kharga oasis. On the way to Kharga oasis we will get to see the sun set over the Great Sand Sea, and from Kharga it is only half a day to Luxor. If we stay here longer, we lose out on Luxor. 

I can see that Gouda wanted us to have a look at Dakhla. Next time.

On the southern outskirts of Dakhla we stop at a resort complex for a loo break and a look around. We could potentially stay here for the night. It looks good, and we could go back to El Qasr. They make me choose again, but I stick to my original plan.

Back in the bus and we head southwest to Kharga oasis. It’s a three hour trip. The desert becomes monotonous. 

Not much to see here.

I fall asleep, only to be woken up at each police checkpoint. The guards are close to their relief date, but they have run out of water and cigarettes and ask Gouda and Talat to help them out. They even ask us for two day old newspapers! It’s newer than the ones they have. At least we get through the checkpoints with minimal hassle.

Eli finally loses it...

 

... and decide to make a 'sand angel'

We continue on, but we are nowhere near the Great Sand Sea to watch the sunset! That will have to wait for next time too.

Sunset through the date palms.

 
We are all feeling rough. Not enough sleep, a day’ s worth or jarring in the bus, the heat, the lack of loos and the monotony takes its toll. It’s not unpleasant, it’s just hard work and we need to get through it.

I wake up in the outskirts of Kharga oasis, about 8 o’clock. Police checkpoint in the dark. Continue. Then a mass of police cars, lights and shouting. Apparently we are not going where they thought we were going. More shouting. We stop at a hotel, our destination, while Gouda clears things with the police. No problems in the end. I must say though, that I saw what I think was an officer. Dressed in a cream coloured uniform. He looked at us like a cat looks at a mouse. Dead eyes. Very, very disconcerting.

After some negotiation, we got some rooms with working showers and working toilets. Bliss! They are on the first floor, which means that mom needs to get up two flights of steep stairs. The rooms could do with a clean, and have never seen a vacuum cleaner, but we are beyond caring. Gouda goes off to find us dinner and a beer for me. He comes back. No beer! No worries, Coca Cola will do fine. Dinner is basic, but OK. Not a patch on the Bedouin fare, though.

After dinner I get into the shower. It has barely started, or it dies down to a trickle and then nothing. My somewhat fragile nerves are exercised by this. Down at the reception desk, the receptionist explains to my dripping self that the town’s water is cut off every night at 10:30. Not to worry, the hotel has a tank on the roof, he says, which should provide all the guests with water until the town’s water comes back on.

Riiight.

Back in the room, it’s 10:30, the shower tap is turned open all the way and I watch the slow drip like a half-wet hawk awaiting Chinese water torture. This is an ideal time to practise swearing: Single words, multiple words, concatenations, speculations upon ancestry, equations with bodily functions, comparisons with camels, likenesses to organs, etc. I could stay up all night.

Then, with a rattle and sputter, the shower comes to life. I conclude my diatribe and watch it for ten seconds. Close tap. Open tap: Water. Yep, it’s a shower.
I turn it off and retract some of the things I said earlier. I wait five minutes. Turn it on again. This time, the water is warm too.

Glory!