How About Some Desert? – Part 1

Location:

Western Desert

For those who haven’t seen my pre-Egypt post, here is the map of my entire journey:

For the purposes of my next couple of posts, your focus should be on the West side of the map (left side for those of you who need a hint…)

Day 3 of my journey, our Bedouin guides came to pick us up from Cairo. Our bags were loaded onto jeeps and we set off on a super long drive into the desert. When I say super long, I mean it must have been 7-8 hours of driving, plus about 2 hours added on for pit stops and food. I think my approximations are correct (I’m not sure because I slept through a lot of the ride…it’s a gift I have).

Our guides did all the cooking when we were in the desert. And the food wasn’t too bad at all. I wasn’t expecting much, so I guess it surpassed my expectations. Well, as long as I don’t have to cook it, I’ll enjoy the food. I guess one downside is the fact that the desert is where our meals started to consist of pitas…consistently…constantly – as in EVERY day. Some meals, we’d get a treat and get some other kind of bread! Oh and goat cheese was a huge part of meals too…as were cucumbers and tomatoes. Those were pretty much our staples. And those are pretty much the things I’ve been avoiding as of late.

Along the way to our destination, we stopped for some photo ops. Yup, we stopped in the middle of nowhere. To take pictures of sand, rocks, and more sand. It was really REALLY HOT. But what else do you expect when you visit Egypt in summer? (Crazy tourists…)
Here are our trusty jeeps in the middle of nowhere:

Our destination was the White Desert. Don’t worry, the Desert doesn’t discriminate – there’s also a Black Desert! Don’t ask about a Yellow or a Brown Desert, because I don’t think there are official deserts with those names…but all sand is pretty much brownish/yellowish so those colours dominate when it comes to desert presence (almost like Toronto…!).

It’s kind of obvious why the Black & White Deserts have their respective names.
The Black Desert gets its colour from the black rocks on the conical mounds.
The White Desert gets its colour from a combination of chalk and limestone. It kind of looks like snow, huh?

When we finally reached our destination in the White Desert, camp was set up.
When I say “camp” I mean there was an area where the Bedouins could cook and you could sit to eat (pictured).

Your sleeping area was any spot you could find in the sand – the one requirement was that you must be able to physically see the camp & jeeps from where you are. I guess you can get lost really quickly if you’re disoriented…i.e. when you wake up? – everything looks the same out there.

There were no tents.
No poles to pitch.
No tarps to set up.

We all slept under the stars.
On thin mattresses.
Around a campfire.

(Bliss!)

And yes, it definitely gets chilly in the desert – sleeping bags and blankets were very necessary.

The sky was clear and the stars shone brilliantly – the view upwards was nothing short of amazing. You’re just going to have to imagine what the night sky looks like with no light pollution. I’ve never seen so many shooting stars in one night.

Oh, and the moon? It was so bright, you didn’t need a flashlight at around 3-4am. After seeing the moon rise in the desert, I’m going to have to say that it definitely rivals a sunrise or a sunset. The sun’s nice when it glows red, but the moon wears red better.

The only other living things we saw that night were desert foxes. They look like little white dogs (very cute), but apparently they like to steal flip flops? So we had to keep our shoes in the jeeps. Somewhere out there, there is a fox den made of flip flops…

And here’s where I leave you with pretty pictures to sustain you until I decide to type out part 2.

Left pic: These are known as inselbergs (or outcroppings) which are shaped like a chicken under a tree. There are a lot of outcroppings in the White Desert – these ones just happen to be the famous ones.
Right pic: The sun just setting in the White Desert – view from the top of a huge inselberg.