Day 5: Trekking

Camels coming through!
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Getting up and packed away for the 07:30 breakfast was tough today.  The damp,lurking below the dry sand last night, had seeped up overnight, leaving us damp and cold.  Not sure about anyone else, but I was definately grouchy this morning!

But breakfast in the warmth of the rising sun, made everything look so much better.  And eventually we were raring to go.

Entertaining the locals!

Our route this morning took us across a stony & rocky landscape of an ancient sea bed. It was an utterly amazing landscape, and quite bizarre to think this was once ocean. With no paths to follow, picking our way across the lumps of rock was hard work, placing demands on our legs and our concentration.  Sometimes you just had to stop & look around, so you didn't miss the wonderful sights of this vast sea bed, and the surrounding mountains.

Mostafa and camels on the canyon plain
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We stopped to tuck into a huge bag of trail mix, which would appear each day from Mostafa's (our guide) rucksack, and watched our camel train go past.

Back on the trail, the sea bed ended, and we entered a fertile plain, complete with local nomads and camels.  Fertile means water, and water means mud.  For a good couple of hours we slithered across a never ending plain of wet ground, under the watchful eyes of the nomad children, and sometimes the adults.  At lunch we had an audience of little people; it seems westerners eating lunch is a fascinating spectator sport for the local kids.

Our Berber tent at sundown
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After some more mud-sliding, and the sight of our first mirage - a beautiful long blue lake, with the trees reflected in it (or not...)- the land became harder, and a new challenge presented itself.  The hard plain was riddled with ditches, resembling a kind of mini Grand Canyon.  We had to pick/jump/pole vault our way through this to get to our camp.

On the other side, we were met by a large number of children, appearing from nowhere, including one on a BMX bike, which surprised us.  They followed us to camp, which was just outside their village.  Fortunately we had perfected our tent-erecting technique, so didn't disgrace ourselves as they all sat and watched us putting up our camp!  However, I think they preferred the encore - watching two of us filter well water out of a bucket into our water bottles.  Totally bemused by what on earth we were doing with this rather strange contraption, we had them enthralled with this performance!

One of the most beautiful parts of the day is watching the sunset once you have pitched camp.  The hard work of trekking and putting up tents is over, and a relaxed atmosphere sets in before our well-earned dinner.  In the backdrop of a different desert landscape each night, the effect of the golden sun, and the reds and oranges of the sky and land is breathtaking.