Planning your trip to Egypt Sahara Desert
Article and Photos by Andie Byrnes ©2008-2009
If
you plan your holiday well you will have a great time, and one of the
elements that makes it really work well is the management of the tour
itself, from the booking of your holiday to the daily teamwork of the
people who will be taking you out into this vast and glorious landscape.
It is difficult to get a feel about the people behind a tour company
brochure so give them a call and see how they sound. Go onto holiday
or Egyptology websites and ask around for advice from people who have
travelled in the area before.
It is unlikely that you will wish to travel without a tour company, even if it is a local one in Egypt. The tour, even if it consists of a single person, requires an Egyptian tour manager, two cars in case one fails, and must sign in and out of military checkpoints. Travel permits are required for travel in Egypt’s desert areas, and a soldier must come along with any tour going into the desert. As Chris Scott says in Sahara Overland, the easiest way to arrange a holiday in the Egyptian desert areas is to go with a company who will work out all the details on your behalf.
When you consider who to travel with, make sure that you are booking with an experienced travel company, and one which has a responsible attitude not only to its tour members and its team of guides and drivers, but to the area you are visiting. There are far too many stories about travel companies who don’t explain and enforce basic guidelines about treating the desert with respect. The responsible strategy of any group visiting is to leave everything as it was found, unless graffiti or rubbish are found, in which case the game plan is to remove it if that can be done without inflicting further damage. The desert is exotic and beautiful and should remain so.
Tours can be very invasive in areas as remote as this, but just a little consideration and common sense can minimize the impact of human presence on the landscape and its fragile wildlife and heritage.
Medical sense before you leave
If you are travelling to any African country you should visit you doctor
and check if you need any pills, potions or injections for anything
from polio to malaria.
The last thing that you need in the desert is toothache, so a visit to the dentist might be a good idea if you haven’t been for a while.
Wear in any new shoes that you may have purchased beforehand so that
you don’t end up with blisters.
You might want to manicure your toes whilst you’re preparing for
the holiday –long toe nails being pressured by tough shoes can
lead to very bad bruising and considerable discomfort.
Check your airline
Before you leave the house make sure that you have checked out baggage
restrictions with the airline, and any security restrictions at the
airport from which you are flying.
British Airways introduced some unpopular baggage rules, and if these are violated there are hefty penalties. Egypt Air has always been more forgiving. But check with whichever airline you are travelling with and make sure that you know which terminal you are flying from.
Don’t forget that if you are travelling with Egypt Air the airline will tolerate you taking alcohol on board for your own consumption, but does not serve or sell alcohol on board.
If you prefer to eat on the airport rather than eat airline food then check out the restaurants on the terminal for the airline concerned. When flying from London’s Heathrow airport I always try to fly Egypt Air simply because I like Brasserie Chez Gerard on Terminal 3, but of course there may be excellent alternatives elsewhere.
The Itinerary
Keeping to an itinerary is important if you are going to visit all the places that you want to see and make it back to the airport in time for your flight, so being on time for breakfast and having all your property packed away for departure each morning is vital. An alarm clock may seem like an odd desert accessory, but mine (in the form of my mobile phone) is invaluable for waking myself and giving an alarm call to others.
If there are delays, like car breakdowns or stoppages for other reasons, it may be necessary to miss items from the itinerary and although this may be disappointing it is important to be flexible. Your tour company will go to every possible length to make sure that you see all the places listed in your itinerary but sometimes sacrifices must be made in the interests of safety.
On the other hand, if you have time to spare and your military escort is happy with the new arrangements, it may be possible to go off-itinerary and visit some additional places or spend an additional night in a particularly attractive area. I love going off the itinerary and adding additional visits if I can, and it adds an element of additional adventure to the occasion. Mind, so does one of your vehicles breaking down, which did happened once!
If there is a place that you going especially to the area to see make it clear to the tour guide so that if sacrifices do need to be made your individual requirements can be taken into consideration. Of course it may not be possible to take your wishes into account but it is worth mentioning them because every effort will be made to ensure that special requests are met.
Arriving
To get to the desert you will probably fly into Cairo or Luxor. Depending on the route you take you will either go to Aswan and out through the Toshka farms, past or via Napta Playa towards Uweinat, or you will head from Cairo towards Bahariya, through Farafra and spend time in the White Desert and Dakhleh oasis before heading off into the desert via Abu Ballas.
The
oases of the Western Desert are an excellent stepping off point into
the desert, full of charm and interest, with a uniquely friendly but
unintrusive air about them which you can find no-where else in Egypt.
They are green and well populated, but unmistakeably rural with fields
and irrigation channels, palm trees and farm animals. They are dotted
with hot springs, small hotels and simple restaurants. The locals tend
to be interested but quite shy, and there is very little in the way
of tourist facilities outside the hotels. Each oasis has a character
of its own and each has its own very unique archaeological remains.
There is usually time to visit some of these sites, which date from
the prehistoric to Graeco-Roman periods and have some wonderful Mediaeval
Islamic villages and buildings as well.
Once you have left the tarmac and headed out into the desert life changes unimaginably. Vast tracts of desert with soft sands in all shades, stony surfaces, colourful outrcrops rolling sand dunes and vast plains of unimaginable flatness all meet your gaze as you head southwest. The first camp under the stars is always a memorable occasion, with the camp set up to make everyone feel at home beneath a fabulous starry sky.
Egypt Sahara Desert - What to bring on your trip
Egypt Sahara Desert - Driving and Sightseeing
Andie Byrnes trained as an archaeologist and is presently carrying out post-graduate studies in Egyptian Archaeology (prehistory) at UCL, London. She writes and manages Egyptology News, the most comprehensive news blog about Ancient Egypt and related topics.
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