Egypt Sahara Desert - What to bring on your trip
Article and Photos by Andie Byrnes ©2008-2009
Toiletries
and medication
Take sun protection cream. You should judge from experience and then
add another couple of factors to be safe because most people seriously
underestimate the power of the sun in the desert. Lipstick-style sun
sticks with very high factors weigh nothing and will be invaluable if
you have underestimated your sun block needs. You may want to take some
type of after-sun solution too, in case you overestimate your tolerance
and burn. I take Germoline, but there are plenty of specialized products
on the market. Lip salve is also a must. The heat can be deceptive -
a breeze can lead you to seriously underestimate the power of the sun.
Sun stroke makes you feel sick and dizzy and can lead to worse things.
Treat the sun with respect and make use of shade when it is available.
Water is for drinking, not for washing, so wet-wipes are an absolute essential if you ever want to get a sense of being clean. Wet wipes make you feel human. Go to the baby goods section of your local supermarket - they will be far less expensive and much more generous in size than the posh skin-care types in the face cream section. Often the supemarket’s own-brand offerings are the better option because they have solid plastic lids rather than sticky clear seals. The seals become clogged with sand, cease to seal and your wet wipes cease to be wet, which completely defeats the object of having carried them all the way to the desert. You may come to detest that baby-fragranced aroma after a while, so you may want to take fragrance-free ones. On the other hand, even a light scent can hide a multitude of aromatic sins! Your main luggage will be on top of the car, so keep a pack handy in your hand luggage for using in the car after a jaunt - they are an instant relief after extreme heat and sand.
Toilet roll will be required. Some tour companies will supply toilet
roll and others will ask you to take your own supplies, but it is much
the best thing to take your own supply as well. Toilet roll weighs nothing
and can be useful for all sorts of things.
Your tour guide is unlikely to be a qualified pharmacist and is therefore
not permitted to prescribe you with any medication. This means that
you need to think about what to take. It may be wise to ask your Doctor.
My own personal collection of potions includes antiseptic cream, pain
killers, antihistamine, insect repellent (the mosquitos in Farafra are
savage), anti-vomit and anti-diarrhoea pills, eye drops (the sand can
be very abrasive) and hydrocortisone cream. This is always accompanied
by an arsenal of plasters, cotton bandages and liquid-skin type products.
My record of walking into things, off things and over things is legendary
- I never do more than graze myself, but I like to have the security
of knowing that I can pamper the damage.
Clothing
On the subject of clothing, the most important piece of advice is that
you bring a hat to wear with your sun protection cream. In the unlikely
event that you find you don’t need it you can leave the hat in
the sun but it is a vital part of your equipment. It will probably prevent
you from burning but, should you burn, it will mean that you can still
leave the vehicle during the day!
If you are female then a stay in the oases means that you will need at least one short-sleeved shirt, rather than a vest because it is impolite to reveal shoulders. It is also considered to be extremely insensitive to show legs, so trousers are required. Men in shorts are regarded as a considerable oddity as it is thought that they are in their underwear. So in all cases trousers are a good idea for the oases.
It is very much a case of personal preference what you wear once you are in the desert itself. One lady who came on one of our tours wore lipstick and Chanel No.5 every day, which is one of numerous great memories, but most of us have somewhat less exacting standards.
Long sleeves and light weight trousers are essential. Jeans are heavy, and even lightweight stretch jeans tend to be a mistake because they make you perspire. A trip to an outdoor shop should provide you with some basic items but failing that you can make do with light weight cotton-based items. Specialized clothing is available but usually unnecessary.
Unless you are very secure about your skin and what levels of exposure to the sun it can handle, you should avoid shorts and short skirts. And again, always take a hat - the sun is truly punishing.
If you are assigned to one car for your trip and don’t want to wear anything more than a vest top, it is a good idea to leave a long-sleeved shirt in the vehicle, together with your hat and sun lotion, so that you have it available at all times. Layers are a very good approach - vest tops let you stay cool in the car but having a long sleeved shirt offers protection in the sun. Simple cotton scarves are a godsend - they can be wrapped around the head for complete protection of the head, neck and shoulders, or just draped where needed. This allows you to enjoy every moment of the day without worrying about the fact that you are getting a bit red around the edges!
Footwear needs to be considered. I wear open-weave running shoes which look like trainers with mesh instead of leather during the day and something lightweight in the evening around the camp. Others wear hiking boots which are practical for uneven surfaces but tend to be hot. Open toed sandals can collect sand and gravel like shovels - some people seem to have the knack of walking in them, but most don’t. In addition, they afford very little protection against rocks and anything that might take offense at being stepped on.
It may seem odd to recommend that you take some form of swimming gear with you, but if you are passing through the oases then you may have the opportunity for a dip in a hot spring - an opportunity not to be missed. After a long hot day there is nothing more enjoyable than the feel of the mineral water. During the day you can look up at the palm trees and at night at the stars.
When considering what to wear at night I would recommend vest-tops, sweatshirts and leggings, accompanied in my case by socks. You may not need to wear them but they may be very valuable if it gets cold - and if you need to go for a walkabout in the middle of the night. It is cosy to curl up in your sleeping bag at night, safe in the knowledge that you will be as warm as toast, and it is nice to know that if you do need to take a stroll behind a sand dune to answer the call of nature you can enjoy the night sky without acquiring goose-bumps.
I seriously recommend you to keep one outfit, preferably sealed in a bag of its own, for the going-home leg - the hotel and plane. It is always a nice feeling to know that when you get to a shower you can change into fresh clothes.
Technology
You will need some form of lighting. A torch is useful, but a miner’s
light even better. You may feel like a bit of a lemon at first, wandering
around with a light on the front of your forehead, but believe me you
won’t let it worry you for long when you need both hands to accomplish
something in the dark. Wind-up and shake-up products don’t need
batteries and they seem excellent but can be noisy at night. Lighting
is not just useful for investigating the depths of your luggage in the
middle of the night, or for reading a chapter of your book before you
drop off. You will probably to make your way to answer a call of nature
by moonlight and starlight, and very lovely it is too, but you will
probably want some lighting to be on the safe side. Lighting also can
be very handy for getting a better look at dark nooks and crannies in
caves and overhangs during the daytime too. Rock art was not always
painted in convenient places.
I advise you to take more batteries than you think you are going to need. Late nights, sleepless nights and early mornings all take place in the dark and you are not going to want to be counting the battery hours that your torch has left. Similarly, if you are taking a GPS unit with you, they do tend to chomp through batteries, as do cameras and personal stereos/MP3s. Solar battery chargers have been making an appearance in travel catalogues but I haven’t had the chance to use any yet. Being able to relax knowing that you have all you need will give you the sense of freedom that makes this sort of trip really enjoyable.
Mobile phones may be of use. There is no coverage in the desert when you leave the oases, but there is usually excellent coverage in Bahariya, Farafra and Dakhleh - even out several kilometers from the road into the White Desert at Farafra. However, you can also use a mobile phone as an alarm clock. Most phones will allow you to set an alarm and switch them off to save the battery, reactivating themselves in the morning to set off the alarm. I bet it plays havoc with the local wildlife each morning, but needs must!
Binoculars are great for looking at any bird and other wild life, and
for bringing the night sky into focus. The stars are amazing in the
desert and even a pair of standard binoculars can significantly enhance
the experience). If you are a sky-watching novice a planisphere can
help you find your way around the night sky. You can spot migrating
birds and nesting birds of prey at the right times of year, and just
looking through binoculars over the vast distances can be a really impressive
experience.
If you are bringing a camera you should bring a decent case for it to
protect the precious thing against the sand and any falls, and for the
same reason make sure that you have a filter permanently over your lens.
You might also want to bring a spare camera, a camera cleaning kit (particularly
important given the prevalence of sand) and plenty of any spare specialized
batteries all fully charged up. I always take more photographs than
I think I will so I carry a number of digital storage cards which I
carry in my hand luggage. Several smaller cards are better than one
big one in case the one card becomes faulty, which did happen to me.
Don’t forget to look up in your manual how to turn off the flash
facility if it is automatic – temples in the oases don’t
permit it and it would damage the wonderful rock art. The desert is
magically photogenic, as is the rock art, and if you like photography
you are going to love the experience of pointing your camera at this
amazing landscape.
I have never taken a laptop and see no need to take one. Apart from the inconvenience of carrying it around it is almost impossible to stop sand getting into the keyboard.
It is not always possible to recharge your technology (camera, GPS, mobile phone, laptop etc) in the vehicles using the cigarette lighter because these are usually reserved for the tour team’s own equipment which must take priority, so make sure that you have enough spare batteries and that you have enough fully charged specialized batteries to last you. Just charge them up in the last of the oases hotels before you go to bed.Other practicalities when packing your luggage
Take sealable plastic bags with you - you will find them a godsend. You can get them from the freezer-bag section of any supermarket, and do be sure to select at least one back of the large ones. There are three principal uses for them:
• Sand gets into everything and can seriously mess up the works
of anything mechanical - you will find it less of a challenge to keep
things working if you seal them in a bag.
• There are some things you just don’t want to leave in
the desert, things which won’t biodegrade, and these must be taken
with you. If they are hygiene related, they may not weather well in
the extreme heat - seal the offending items away and dispose of them
in the communal rubbish sacks when convenient.
• They are also great from preventing your toothpaste or shampoo
from ruining your holiday clothing when it makes a break for freedom.
You might find it handy to take a good handful of supermarket bags with you. They are fantastic for organizing your main luggage when living out of a tent - you can even find your way around your luggage in the dark by knowing which items you have placed together in bags. And they are a good way of isolating used (beyond the pale) clothes from clean(ish) ones. Clothes tend to be recycled because it is impossible to take enough to deal with the conditions and there is no water with which to wash them, of course. But if you go down the supermarket bag route be careful to sort yourself out before everyone goes to bed – you can make yourself very unpopular by rustling your way through your bags when everyone is trying to sleep!
Optional extras for your luggage might include relevant tourist guides, listed at the end, an Egyptian Arabic phrase book, a large map of Egypt and some parcel tape. I never travel without parcel tape. Easing oil can have its uses too. If you are likely to want some idea of how big things are, take a tape measure too, which can also be useful to add to photographs for scale. I also take hair thingies with me - fabric coated elastic bands which I use to scrape my sand-infested hair into a pony tail, but are also invaluable for a thousand other uses. Some people’s eyes found the sand more troublesome than others, and bring wrap-around sunglasses or goggles. I had no trouble with my contact lenses, but a spare pair of prescription specs are a sensible precaution.
Because luggage travelling on the roof-racks may become exceedingly hot during the day you should make sure that no aerosols or anything that might explode or melt should be taken along.
Egypt Sahara Desert - Driving and Sightseeing
Egypt Sahara Desert - Planning your Trip
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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