Wadi El-Hitan (Desert Camping)

First:  An apology. This post contains more photos than I have ever slapped up onto the internet before in a single post.  But the pictures are worth looking at, you know?

Second, MERRY CHRISTMAS!  We totally miss you.  A lot.  xoxo

Hanh asked me shortly after I bought our plane tickets to Cairo if we would all like to go desert camping.  I believe that I asked if we would have to cook our own meals and when she said no way, I said that we would indeed be interested.

So on Saturday morning, we gathered our things and met our guides by Hanh's friend's parked car.  We borrowed the car because her Volvo wagon wouldn't work so well in the desert, she said.  Interestingly, this did not make me wonder what the hell we were driving over to get to our campsite. I mean, most people at this juncture may have given some consideration to this.  Also noteworthy is that the night before we left, we had mulled wine at Hanh's friend's house and she said that we should definitely put the kids in car seats when we were driving in the desert.  Interesting, I thought, but we always put our kids in car seats so what's the big deal.

We drove out of Cairo on the Ring Road (our tour guide the first two days in Cairo said that you needed a brave heart to drive on the Ring Road), following the two guides in a fully loaded Toyota Landcruiser and we in a 2001 Mitsubishi of some sort, with big tires.  We drove a while on perfectly good roads and then pulled off onto the desert to see some petrified wood.  They referred to it as a petrified forest, but while it may have been a forest at some point today it certainly does not qualify.  We went with a friend of Hanh's and Tommy told him confidently that 'wood always turns to rock' and refused to believe Rob or anyone else that this is not normally the case.

This is when the trip got really interesting.  From the road, we turned left and drove onto the desert.  It was bumpy, and our guides drove FAST.  Like, at least 60 km/hr.  Over bumpy sand.  And so that you all know, the desert isn't flat.  It has dunes and some rock formations and is, well, really tricky to drive on.  Hanh was driving our car and she did amazingly well.  But at this early point, I was solely focused on the following:

- how will anyone find us if we become lost?
- what will happen if one of the cars breaks down or is totally stuck or rolls over?
- what kind of mother am I to bring my children to the middle of nowhere in Egypt with two guides I don't know at all and with no working mobile phone or any other type of safety precautions (like extra gasoline)?

So we stopped for lunch and Eli talked me out of my anxiety.  He said that the desert camping was clearly going to be the most fun for the kids of all the things we do in Cairo and that I should focus on having fun with everybody and stop worrying so much.  (Hanh says that we are a good balance but I think I actually worry more than necessary to truly balance things out, you know?)  Anyway, he pretty much told me to buck up, and then the guides made our first meal (very good) and I perked up.  Also, as we went down more and more hills that felt like they were at 90-degree angles, I got more and more used to the driving and it was clear that Hanh was doing a good job.

 (Eli really enjoyed playing in the sand.  Lulu really enjoyed making sand angels.)

We arrived at our campsite after seeing some whale fossils (this was totally beyond my children ability to understand and I know they just thought we were idiots:  obviously whales never lived here, this is the desert guys).

Here is one of the driving over a cliff (called dune bashing):

 Our campsite was possibly the most beautiful place I have ever been in my life and that is a big freaking statement from this Washington state girl who knows about beautiful places.  Behold: