Sahara Desert

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Breakfast at Kasbah Xaluca (Sha-lu-ka) was buffet.  There was an Arab sitting on the floor pouring tea.  He obviously knows about tourists because he poured into an extra tall glass while we took pictures, then poured it back into the pot and gave us a small glass.

Brahim told us that the name is deceptive, since a kasbah is a fortress that belongs just to a single family.  They call it a kasbah because tourists like the word and don't know better.

Erfoud is known for large tourist hotels and for fossils.  Brahim picked us up and took us to a fossil factory.  A guide showed us how the fossils are extracted.  Thin 2 inch slices are cut from large rocks, and the pieces are polished or varnished.  Anton bought a trilobite fossil.  For only $6000, we could have had a gorgeous fossil table shipped to us.

Brahim took us to the Ziz Valley, where we were handed over to Tata (full name Abdul Karim Tata).  Tata took us on a walk through the valley.  There were palm trees, streams, and lots of small garden plots.  He showed us wheat, alfalfa, tomatos, peppers, and fava beans.  We had to watch out for "donkey beans" on the path.  There can be feuds among families because the land keeps being divided up, to the point where a particular palm tree belongs to a particular person, but they can't access it because it would mean crossing someone else's garden.

After the walk, Tata showed us his home and we ate lunch on his patio after washing our hands in his stream.  We had been told that we were having lunch with a local family, but he was the only one who actually ate with us.  The rest (brothers and sisters) just brought out dish after dish of food.  After lunch on our way back to the van we were swarmed with Tata's kids and nieces and nephews.  We were able to give them gifts without making them cry this time.

Brahim then took us to the market in Rissani.  Rissani was once known as an important caravan trading center. This market was for locals, we didn't see any other tourists there.  Brahim grew up here so he showed us alot of different "factories".  One was a pizzeria factory:  each family puts their own meat or vegetables between 2 thick slices of bread, and marks their name on the bread.  It takes 5-10 minutes to bake in a super hot stone oven.  Another shop made tiles in molds, one at a time.  These were air dried and not baked.  If you want, you can buy a slice of meat from some hanging animal, and take it to the restaurant to cook it for you.

Brahim took us to Ksar Mezguida, it took us awhile to figure out what this was.  It is a walled villa with many different homes, it makes its own neighbourhood.

In part of this neighbourhood he stopped to give a young 2 year old boy some kisses, who turned out to be Elias his nephew.  Brahim showed us his home and his sister Fatima gave us tea and a snack.  The home is clay/stone and 80 years old, much larger than ours but many families live there.

After this Brahim took us to a mosque and another ksar, and helped Anton buy a turban for 40 dirhams ($5).  At this point we figured that Brahim was just buying time, and we may have been right.  When we finally got onto the main road for the desert, the wind was so strong that it created white-out conditions of blowing sand.  At times we could not see 2 feet in front of our van.

We passed a nasty accident, one guy got smushed front and back, but no injuries.

Brahim drove us to the edge of the dunes where we were transferred to Yassour and a 4X4, thankfully enclosed.  We were surprised to see so many permanent structures in the desert, all resort hotels for tourists.  At this point there was no road, just tracks at some points, but Yassour obviously knew where he was going.

Yassour took us to Yasmina Hotel to wait out the windstorm.  The plan was for us to take camels (dromedaries really) from there to our tented camp.  After an hour and the windstorm not abating, the plan was changed and he drove us directly to the camp.  Driving on sand is very smooth, except for the parts over sand dunes. It was very hot and humid, 40C.

The first thing we noticed at the camp were scarab beetles scurrying around.  There is one large tent that is the restaurant, and a circle of 5 tents for tourists.  There are only 5 of us tourists staying here tonight.  Our tent has a large bed, a sitting area, and our own facilities which include a washroom.  We had upgraded to the "deluxe" camp so we could have our own washroom.  Apparently this also meant that we could bring our luggage with us instead of packing an overnight bag.

We went off to explore the dunes in the fierce windstorm, turbans covering our faces.  When we climbed over the dunes, we sank right into the sand.  The sand blew our footprints away in no time at all, so we were careful not to go too far.  We were full of sand from head to foot, but not enough to brave making sand angels.

We asked for an "early" dinner, 8:30 pm.  They played Berber music for us.  We climbed sand dunes in the dark but we couldn't see many stars because of the storm.  When we went to sleep, it was still well above 30C.