Is Siwa a suitable destination for a family holiday? Aline Kazandjian ventures into the dunes with her children Click to view caption Are you the type of traveller who looks for romantic destinations, away from the crowds and off beaten paths? That is the type of traveller I am. My husband Harry, on the other hand, prefers to travel with hordes of friends. He is attracted to boisterous nightlife venues like a moth to the light. He loves to top that with daytime adventures, usually requiring tremendous physical effort. That is why picking our holiday destination is usually an exercise in matrimonial feuding. But we found the unlikely answer to our problem when we visited Egypt's Western Desert oasis of Siwa. It had something for each of us, and for once we ended up thanking each other for a wonderful time. We joined a group of friends from the Egypt Jeep Club on a five-day desert safari and sightseeing tour of Siwa. We filled up our 4x4 Jeep Cherokee with one suitcase, an icebox full of drinks and an offa (basket) full of goodies to munch on... and last but not least our three children. We took off from Cairo on a Friday afternoon. Our mission for the first day was to reach the coastal city of Mersa Matruh where we would spend the first night. That meant cutting through the Western Desert off the Cairo-Alexandria Highway at Wadi Natrun, where monasteries have sheltered Coptic monks for hundreds of years. This road hits the Mediterranean Coast at Al-Alamein. World War II cemeteries stand here to remind visitors of the gruesome battles that were one of the key turning points in favour of the Allies during the war. Our tight schedule prevented us from visiting either the monasteries or the war memorials. But nothing stands in the way of Mother Nature, and we were forced to make quite a few restroom stops -- the "restroom" being a discreet spot in the open desert. We were warned, however, not to wander far from the main road because an estimated 17.5 million mines remain hidden in the sands, left there from World War II. It was already dark when we reached Mersa Matruh. Dinner and a good night's sleep were the best we could get from the city, even though its beaches are renowned for their turquoise waters and pure shores. Early next morning we took the road south to Siwa. Alexander the Great followed this very same road in 331 BC. It took him eight days to cover the 300kms.: he got lost on the way. Legend has it that two snakes (some say crows) led him to Siwa, where the Oracle of Amun declared him a god. No such destiny awaited us, but we did get there in only four hours. The barren and flat desert scenery was unimpressive but herds of camels, sheep and goats as well as continuous mirages provided enough entertainment for the children. Our first glimpse of Siwa was, alas, defiled by an army outpost and other ugly modern buildings and electricity towers. Still, the sight of so many lush green date palms carpeting the brown sands was refreshing. In the distance one could also make out the blue waters of Lake Siwa and the smaller lakes. Siwa is, actually, floating over large quantities of water trapped in prehistoric aquifers. Some of the water spurts out naturally, forming enchanting springs. We had a picnic around one of them. Tiny bubbles race through the clear water from fissures in the rocks at the bottom of the pool. My son, Varouj, was the only one in the group brave enough to take a plunge. Later on it became a common practice to bathe in the springs that kept popping up all around us, including in the garden of our hotel. But before heading to the hotel, we took our first shot at a desert safari. The first thing we needed to do was deflate the wheels in order to reduce the risk of being stuck in sand. The second was to keep a safe distance from the car in front of us, but without losing sight of it. Harry was our designated driver for the whole trip, and at the end of the three days we declared him an expert desert driver. He and the children certainly got a kick out of the roller-coaster rides we took crossing the dunes. I was the only one who appreciated the scenery. Shades of brown intertwined with the elevations of the dunes, just like the shades of blue in a wavy sea. As sunset approached the shadows sculpted the desert into surreal shapes. After our successful test drive we went to the hotel, which was snuggled among the palm groves just off the main town square. It had an outdoor dining area with a BBQ and a traditional open furnace where fresh bread was baked at dinner time. The rooms were small with two rather narrow beds. Although there were air-conditioned rooms ours had a ceiling fan and an electric heater which we used once -- the desert can be very cold at night. The hot water in the bathroom came from the spring on the premises. Close to sunset Harry and I went to visit Shali, the abandoned mediaeval capital of Siwa. Its mud brick houses used to soar up to eight stories high. Today it looks like a sandcastle half washed away by the sea. In fact it was the chunks of salt used to reinforce the mud walls that eventually caused the destruction. They melted under rare but heavy rainfall. After a shattering rainstorm in 1982 Shali was abandoned, apart from a few mud brick houses at its outskirts. We climbed up the ruined houses to the top, from where we had a bird's-eye view of the whole oasis. It was breathtaking. The following day, as we toured other places of interest with a Siwan guide named Abu Bakr Ismail, I asked him why they had stopped building their houses in the traditional way. "No one knows how to anymore," he said, "It is very bad. In the 1970s when you first saw Siwa from the mountains you could see an extraordinary harmony between buildings and nature." In many places the harmony is still there. Gabal Al-Mawta is a mountain where the Ancient Egyptians buried their dead. Four tombs are open to visitors, and in one of them lay four mummies. The Tomb of Si-Amun was the only one with inscriptions and drawings on its walls. The others have been badly damaged, largely when Siwans used them as bomb shelters during World War II. Afterwards we visited Aghurmi. This is another abandoned, mud brick fortress town that hosts the Temple of the Oracle visited by Alexander the Great. Implausible as it may seem, Siwa had many famous visitors. Cleopatra bathed in one of its springs that still carries her name. German Field Marshal Rommel had tea with the tribal sheikhs in the palm groves. In the afternoon we took another drive in the desert. Our guide Mohamed Abdel-Aziz took us to a spot where the floor was covered with marine fossils. Environmentalists are concerned for the preservation of these natural treasures. Many areas here are designated as nature reserves. "But there is very little effective control because there are not enough rangers to scan these vast expanses of desert," Abdel-Aziz said. We were standing in what is known as The Great Sand Sea. My guidebook said this was "the biggest and most dangerous dune field in the world". Legend has it that entire armies were engulfed by its sands. Somewhere under all this a mythical oasis named Zerzura is waiting to be discovered. The children were unimpressed by all this. They were more excited about the dive we were about to make down a 60-metre-high sand dune. The Jeep's nose was up in the air. I closed my eyes and opened them only when the children's screams turned into laughter. It was time to relax. We went to watch a magical sunset from Fatnas Island in Lake Siwa. There are private palm and olive groves on the island, and one has to enter them to reach the shore facing the sunset. The owner sells tea and other drinks. A sign posted outside the garden asks visitors "to refrain from picking fruit because it is (my) livelihood". Most Siwans are olive and date farmers. They are descendants of Berber tribes from North Africa, speaking their own language -- although most have learned Arabic for official use. They retain strong ties with Libya, which lies 100kms to the west. Many of the hand-woven baskets and rugs sold in the town market, as well as the silver jewellery, are collected from the Bedouin who still roam the deserts along the border of the two countries. We ate the most delicious cous cous, a North African dish, on the terrace of a mud brick inn perched above the palm trees. Siwans are extremely conservative. In public, all married women wear a foot-length, bluish shawl and completely cover their faces with a black gauze. Foreign women are asked to dress modestly. On our fourth day we went out on our last safari. It was a day-long event. First we were taken to a small lake nestled in the middle of a grove of date palms. Without a guide's help one could never suspect that such a paradise was hiding behind the next sand dune. We all rushed to reserve a spot in the shade and drank a very strong mint tea prepared over a wood fire. For lunch we were guided to another spring and food was brought in huge casseroles from the hotel. We stayed there as long as we could, but had to leave shortly before sunset to avoid driving back in the dark. When we finished packing our scattered belongings in the cars the desert had gone back to its seemingly lifeless, yet enigmatic form. By the time we arrived back in Cairo the following day we had driven a total of 1,761kms. Most of it was our own journey of exploration, one that left us ready to go on another desert safari anytime. Practical information Hotels: We stayed at the Siwa Safari Paradise on the outskirts of Siwa. Double rooms with half-board LE200-290 for Egyptians and residents, and from LE220-320 for non- residents. Tel: (046) 460 2289/ 460 2290. E-mail: [email protected] www.siwaparadise.com Adrere Amellal: eco-lodge built in traditional Siwan style with rooms, lit by oil lamps and with excellent food fresh from the organic garden. The name means 'White Mountain' in Siwan. Expensive, but aficionados say it's worth it. Double room inclusive of full board, all facilities and desert excursions $260 for Egyptians and residents, $400 for non- residents. Tel: (02) 738 1327/ 736 7879. E-mail: [email protected] Tour organisers: Cairo Jeep Club. Tel: 010 151 3813. www.jeepclubegypt.com Abdullah Baghi: local guide with fluent English and a proud interpreter of Siwan culture. Tel: (046) 460 2115 or 2 010 524 4789 Image Rent A Car: specialises in 4x4 vehicles. Tel: (02) 336 2288. Suggested reading Islands of the Blest -- A Guide to the Oases and Western Desert of Egypt, Cassandra Vivian. International Publications Ltd, 2000. Egypt -- The Explorer Guide, Anthony Sattin and Sylvia Franquet. American University in Cairo Press, 2000.
