We woke up Tuesday morning and ate a breakfast of fly-encrusted French bread with jam. You really wouldn't believe how many flies live in southern Tunisia. Millions and millions. I think about half of them landed on my sliced bread that morning. I was trying to just time my bites so as not to eat any of them.
Soon after, we went to the front desk of the hotel in order to go on our next Land Cruiser tour... this time to the three oasis towns of Chebika, Mides, and Tamerza. An online description of the tour says:
"An attractive excursion from Tozeur, through beautiful scenery, is into the hills of Djebel en Negueb (900m/2,950ft), an offshoot of the Atlas Mountains running from east to west. In this area, in which the Romans built a series of forts as the outworks of their defensive line, the Limes Tripolitanus, are the three little upland oases of Chebika, Tamerza and Midès. These oases owe their fertility to the numerous little mountain streams whose water seeps into the ground and to the ground-water which is tapped by wells of varying depth."
One other couple joined us on the trip, a young French pair named Clementine and Achilles, who were also staying at our hotel. Our driver, unfortunately, kind of sucked. He had no personality -- and after our experience with the Amazing Taha the day before, we found him totally lacking in charisma. The French couple was really cool however.
Our first stop was Chebika, about an hour north of Tozeur, which was really amazing, although rather overrun with fat European tourists. We were all a bit disappointed with the number of tourists crowding the place, which is only accessible by Land Cruiser. Hundreds of them crowded the parking lot. I took the picture below upon arrival at the souvenir/bathroom/drink area. It shows the drivers waiting around for their tour groups to come back -- the guy on the bottom right had a wicked mustache, which I tried to capture through the camera, but I think I might have failed:
You can hike up around the old village, which isn't inhabited anymore because floods and mudslides destroyed much of it...
Here we headed up to the top of the peak:
The views into the canyon were pretty cool:
Miguel got accosted by some kids panhandling. He got mad at ME because he said that I instigated it by giving one of them an old pencil. Then they started yelling "Boom boom! Chewing gum! We want boom boom!" At that point, I ran, but Miguel got caught in the thick of it and ended up handing out all his gum to the little ragamuffins, who practically tried to rip his arm off to try and get more. It was a very aggressive and agitated scene, which I coyly watched from afar...
After traipsing around the top of the hill, we ventured down into the canyon where the stream and waterfalls were located:
It was a pretty hot day so Miguel got the idea to go wading in the water...
And he got stuck! The mud acted much like quicksand, sucking his flip flops off his feet and pulling him down -- this is a photo of him trying to get out of there:
Once he pulled free, we got this shot together:
Our next stop was the gorge at Mides, located right on the Algerian border. Although it's illegal, I begged the driver to slow down so I could take a surreptitious picture of the border outpost, which I thought looked a lot like an evil and dangerous castle:
The gorge at Mides is kind of like a mini Grand Canyon with palm trees. Lots of striation in the rock and the requisite souvenir shanties:
Next and final stop? About 30 minutes away at the village of Tamerza, known for its famous waterfalls and canyon vistas...
You can walk down into the canyon and stand right next to the water and waterfall..
Here I am with Clementine:
The coolest thing at Tamerza was the local diver that jumped off the top of the cliffs doing amazing flips and dives into the water. I was so psyched that I was able to catch him mid-air in this shot...
He was incredibly strong... here he is climbing up the cliff wall with no assistance at all, like Spiderman:
Then sunning himself after a dive:
Then the non-divers struck a pose...
On the drive back to Tozeur, we came to a vista that looked out over the whole desert and palm oasis area...
A snap with Achilles and then with Clementine too...
Miguel liked these signs...
We then drove through one of the salt lakes in the area...
Once we were almost back into town, we came up behind this truck, taking camels to the meat market. Camel steaks are a delicacy in Tunisia... awww, poor guys -- goodbye.
We asked our driver to drop us off at La Fontana restaurant for more Italian dining (no camel for us, thanks). Here I am enjoying a delicious pasta dish:
We got a farewell photo with the Italian owner, Roberta, who is from Rome, and her husband the chef. This place was sooooo good, and they were soooo nice...
You might be able to see that Roberta has a postcard collection on the wall behind us. She told me that she didn't have any cards from the US and asked if I would send one -- which I did when I got back.
We also said goodbye to Yahya, our favorite local grocer and postage stamp seller. He spoke great English and Arabic and liked to try to correct my Arabic speaking skills everytime we talked to him...
Miguel wanted to go back into the downtown area to buy a scarf/turban "like Taha had." Then we had to go straight to the airport to get our flight back to Tunis (we opted to fly instead of taking a bus back due to time limitations).
We checked out of our hotel and, of course, could find no taxis at mid-day. Luckily our hotel was located across from a horse and cart meeting point so we arranged to get one for the same price as a taxi. We had a very enthusiastic driver with a lot of personality, who informed us that his outfit cost nearly $500USD because it was handmade and handspun cloth...
We said goodbye outside a scarf shop:
I was loaded down like a pack mule:
Our driver even let Miguel pretend to take the reins...
Once inside, Miguel got a demonstration of how to properly wrap the scarf around his head, should he ever head back out to the desert again...
We needed a "real" taxi to get all the way out to the airport, and we were able to finally flag one down and get back on the road out of town...
The only airline that flies to Tozeur is "Sevenair," which operates tiny planes -- the type you read about crashing in remote locations and killing all onboard...
The funny story here is the speed by which we got out of Tozeur... because we were the only airplane at the airport, they got about 25 of us on the jet in lightning speed, and then we proceeded to get in our seats. No sooner had my butt cheeks touched the leather on the seat, then we were wheeling out to the runway. Miguel was like, "Oh my god, we're already moving?" They don't mess around at Sevenair. They gave the safety talk while we were driving full speed to the runway. I'll bet we boarded, got seated, and took off within five minutes.
The flight was actually very smooth, except for the landing (during which the pilot literally sat the plane down without any semblance of smoothness, and I felt certain a wheel might explode). I took a number of pictures from my window:
View of Tozeur...
Look how big the palmerie is (where we rode bikes)!!!!...
The great salt lake (Chott al Jarid):
Relaxing in style...
Once we arrived in Tunis, we said goodbye to a friend we'd made at the airport in Tozeur, named Muhammad Ali. I actually had initially tried to talk to him in Arabic asking for directions about check-in, and he replied in British English. It's rare to find English speakers in Tunisia so we gravitated to each other and spent an hour over coffee while waiting for our flight...
A Tunisian guy I worked with had recommended a downtown hotel in Tunis and made a reservation for us. It was a lovely place and a really nice, quiet, and clean room. Very nice after the scrappy places we'd been staying in...
This hotel was located right across from the zoo and a local park and cafe. We cleaned up and headed across the street to enjoy a cup of coffee and our re-entry into civilization...
I think Miguel felt the same way:
Around the corner was a delicious French bakery and Italian gelato shop. I had to treat myself to something sweet...
One of the dilemmas of speaking Arabic as an American woman is that you are the equivalent of a two-headed Siamese twin in your level of freakishness to local people. Most people in Tunisia assumed I was French and would start speaking French to me. Since I speak nary a word of French, I would reply back in Arabic telling them I didn't speak French. This was like dropping a bomb on people, and they loved it. They always had the same questions for me... "Where did you learn Arabic?" and "Is Arabic a difficult language?" Poor Miguel would just stand there watching the charade, as I would be peppered with question after question. What should have been a simple exchange, with me asking a question such as "Where is the closest post office?" would end up being a 10-20 minute, inescapable banter of interested questions and my attempted replies.
The photo below captures one such exchange, during which we were just trying to buy some bread and cheese for dinner in our hotel room. These guys were so excited to hear Arabic that they invited us to hang out and have coffee with them at a cafe. We politely refused but did get this picture together:
The exact same thing happened with this guy when I tried to buy stamps from him:
We finally got free of conversation (about an hour after we intended to go back to the hotel), much to both of our relief. I was getting exhausted by trying to think of conjugations and vocabulary words that had faded into the far recesses of my memory.
Miguel spotted this sign for a lawyer's office and took a picture because he liked the name:
We had to get up early to get our flight back to the US the next morning so we hit the hay right away.
The next morning, Miguel made a very unusual breakfast selection of rice and peas. Hmmm...
This is our last photo of Tunis, which Miguel took from our taxi en route to the airport:
Until our next exciting journey, ma'a salama!
You might be able to see that Roberta has a postcard collection on the wall behind us. She told me that she didn't have any cards from the US and asked if I would send one -- which I did when I got back.
We also said goodbye to Yahya, our favorite local grocer and postage stamp seller. He spoke great English and Arabic and liked to try to correct my Arabic speaking skills everytime we talked to him...
Miguel wanted to go back into the downtown area to buy a scarf/turban "like Taha had." Then we had to go straight to the airport to get our flight back to Tunis (we opted to fly instead of taking a bus back due to time limitations).
We checked out of our hotel and, of course, could find no taxis at mid-day. Luckily our hotel was located across from a horse and cart meeting point so we arranged to get one for the same price as a taxi. We had a very enthusiastic driver with a lot of personality, who informed us that his outfit cost nearly $500USD because it was handmade and handspun cloth...
We said goodbye outside a scarf shop:
I was loaded down like a pack mule:
Our driver even let Miguel pretend to take the reins...
Once inside, Miguel got a demonstration of how to properly wrap the scarf around his head, should he ever head back out to the desert again...
We needed a "real" taxi to get all the way out to the airport, and we were able to finally flag one down and get back on the road out of town...
The only airline that flies to Tozeur is "Sevenair," which operates tiny planes -- the type you read about crashing in remote locations and killing all onboard...
The funny story here is the speed by which we got out of Tozeur... because we were the only airplane at the airport, they got about 25 of us on the jet in lightning speed, and then we proceeded to get in our seats. No sooner had my butt cheeks touched the leather on the seat, then we were wheeling out to the runway. Miguel was like, "Oh my god, we're already moving?" They don't mess around at Sevenair. They gave the safety talk while we were driving full speed to the runway. I'll bet we boarded, got seated, and took off within five minutes.
The flight was actually very smooth, except for the landing (during which the pilot literally sat the plane down without any semblance of smoothness, and I felt certain a wheel might explode). I took a number of pictures from my window:
View of Tozeur...
Look how big the palmerie is (where we rode bikes)!!!!...
The great salt lake (Chott al Jarid):
Relaxing in style...
Once we arrived in Tunis, we said goodbye to a friend we'd made at the airport in Tozeur, named Muhammad Ali. I actually had initially tried to talk to him in Arabic asking for directions about check-in, and he replied in British English. It's rare to find English speakers in Tunisia so we gravitated to each other and spent an hour over coffee while waiting for our flight...
A Tunisian guy I worked with had recommended a downtown hotel in Tunis and made a reservation for us. It was a lovely place and a really nice, quiet, and clean room. Very nice after the scrappy places we'd been staying in...
This hotel was located right across from the zoo and a local park and cafe. We cleaned up and headed across the street to enjoy a cup of coffee and our re-entry into civilization...
I just felt so happy to be clean after feeling perpetually dusty and dirty for days.
I think Miguel felt the same way:
Around the corner was a delicious French bakery and Italian gelato shop. I had to treat myself to something sweet...
One of the dilemmas of speaking Arabic as an American woman is that you are the equivalent of a two-headed Siamese twin in your level of freakishness to local people. Most people in Tunisia assumed I was French and would start speaking French to me. Since I speak nary a word of French, I would reply back in Arabic telling them I didn't speak French. This was like dropping a bomb on people, and they loved it. They always had the same questions for me... "Where did you learn Arabic?" and "Is Arabic a difficult language?" Poor Miguel would just stand there watching the charade, as I would be peppered with question after question. What should have been a simple exchange, with me asking a question such as "Where is the closest post office?" would end up being a 10-20 minute, inescapable banter of interested questions and my attempted replies.
The photo below captures one such exchange, during which we were just trying to buy some bread and cheese for dinner in our hotel room. These guys were so excited to hear Arabic that they invited us to hang out and have coffee with them at a cafe. We politely refused but did get this picture together:
The exact same thing happened with this guy when I tried to buy stamps from him:
We finally got free of conversation (about an hour after we intended to go back to the hotel), much to both of our relief. I was getting exhausted by trying to think of conjugations and vocabulary words that had faded into the far recesses of my memory.
Miguel spotted this sign for a lawyer's office and took a picture because he liked the name:
We had to get up early to get our flight back to the US the next morning so we hit the hay right away.
The next morning, Miguel made a very unusual breakfast selection of rice and peas. Hmmm...
This is our last photo of Tunis, which Miguel took from our taxi en route to the airport:
He says he took it because it was the same bus he took from the airport on the day he first arrived in Tunis. Therfore, a hello and a goodbye. And the trip came full circle...
Until our next exciting journey, ma'a salama!
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