Into the desert!
Trip Start
Oct 19, 2008
1
13
16
Trip End
Nov 03, 2008
Ksar Ghilane, Tunisia
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Today in brief: set out from Tozeur early, and drove across the causeway over Chott el-Jerid, a salt lake. It's dry most of the year, except for a couple months in the dead of winter where the rainfall makes floods it. Briefly stopped to take in some desert buttes before having lunch in Douz and wandering the market. In the late afternoon, we arrived in Ksar Ghilane, a town on the edge of the Grand Erg Oriental (a large sea of sand dunes in the northern part of the Sahara Desert). We went on a camel ride! Sitting on them while they get up is quite an adventure.. a little like being on a horse that is bucking. I was amazed by the sand.. it's so fine, it feels like velvet and the colour--a burnt gold that's incredibly vivid, especially in contrast to the blue sky. After the camel ride, we watched the desert sun set.. unfortunately it was kind of cloudy, but still pretty. We spent the VERY VERY COLD night in a campground huddled under layers of blankets.
