Egypte / Egypt 2002

July 16, 2002 – Siwa Oasis

Early wake up at 5:30 to be ready for the jeep at 6am.

At 6 sharp, the jeep is here whereas we try to buy some water. In the vehicle, we meet David and Barbara, two Dutch who are in Egypt for 1 month. Our driver drives quickly while watching to the horizon to see when the sun will appear. We are just on time to see the sun rising from the dunes in front of us. At the top of one of the dunes he stops the engine and let us admire the spectacle.

We resume the trip in the dunes, approaching one lake and he will tell us that this is the cold spring. Maybe the Siwans qualify this one as cold but for us foreigners it is well above 25°C water that we have in front of us. Masato is the only brave to dive in it as I forget my swim equipment at the hotel.

The cold spring

Then we stop on a hill to see all the fossils that the wind discovered years ago. There are a lot of them and we are wondering what this part of the desert should be, a deep sea to let theses fossils here, unbelievable!!!

We end this morning part of the trip at the hot spring which is very very hot for us. But that’s here that our driver will take his bath. We just have a seat around it while talking and drinking tea.

The hot spring

At 9am we are back in Siwa. We stop at the Palm Trees Hotel where we have a good breakfast in the garden full of sand and palm trees.

Then we just spend a lot of time talking about travels and many other subjects.

With Masato, we are back at the Youssef Hotel for a break because the temperature is well above the 50°C.

At 3pm, we are back at the Palm Trees Hotel because we want to rent bikes to wander around Siwa but we find an American in the garden, Mike and we will talk with him for a while. First I thought he was French because he was reading a French book but I was wrong he is American, and here in Egypt to learn Arabic on the spot after learned it for a year in Chicago.

We have a rendezvous at the hotel at 7pm to see the sunset from the dunes. So I decide to wash some clothes before the start!!

7pm sharp, we leave the hotel at a very slow speed to reach the dunes on the other side of Siwa. Normally I will sleep in the dunes tonight but the wind is stronger tonight and Salah convinced me that it should be better not do such a thing it could be painful not sleep during the whole night. Our driver stops and while we watch the sunset I ask him to take a picture of us. Unfortunately, I understand why he doesn’t drive too fast, he can’t see much. The picture is blurred but maybe it was a style effect!!?

Finally, Masato will leave Siwa tonight as I convinced him to see Luxor before coming back to Japan. And as he wrote me a few weeks later he did it. He took the evening train in Cairo at 10pm and arrived in Luxor at 7:30. He went to the Grand Hotel, they remembered me and he took their tour (60 EGP with a student card). In the afternoon, he saw the Luxor temple and the Karnak temple and on the same day he took the train in the evening to come back to Cairo to take his plane. What a journey!!!

Tonight, I join David, Barbara and Mike for the dinner at Kenooz restaurant. The restaurant like the hotel (Shali Lodge) is very recent and the decoration is beautiful. I only take a dessert, Om Aly, with bread, sugar, and raisins. Delicious!!! We have also our 2^nd power failure in 2 days but here it will last longer, nearly 2 hours.

one of the best places in Siwa

Barbara and David leave us as they want to sleep before catching the bus the following morning.

With Mike, we just seat at the bar terrace to enjoy some cups of tea and smoking a Shisha with no lights around. The whole town in the darkness, only some trucks or pick-ups give us some light.

At 1am, we decide to visit Shali, the old city by night and enjoy the view on Siwa as the electricity is back in the village.

Main expenses of the day :

Night at Youssef Hotel : 5 EGP

Breakfast : 5 EGP

Drinks (water, soft drinks, tea…) : 15 EGP

Evening meal : 11 EGP (Kenooz Restaurant)

Desert trip : 50 EGP

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