Bahariya Oasis, Egypt (Post #65)
Thursday, December 1st, 2005Hey – It’s December – although it feels like summer here in Egypt. Michele here…Mike is sitting next to me and we are back in Cairo after spending 3 days in the Bahariya Oasis in the Western desert of Egypt.
So, last time I blogged I mentioned that we were about to take a night train from Luxor to Cairo. One of the most unbelievable things Mike and I have seen on this trip is the Luxor train station. First, there were so many people at this small train station, it was a total zoo. We would have never figured out where to go if we weren’t with a guy who was to show us which car to get on (remember everything is in Arabic). We followed the mob of people through a run down building to the train platform that was nothing but dirt and garbage. There were also old appliances laying in the dirt, and large broken down cabinets (like old, rotting, china cabinets) and a few refrigerators. We watched the (non-backpacking) tourists with wheeled luggage wheeling their luggage through the dirt, only to continually get stuck because there was some piece of food or garbage caught under their luggage wheel.
Anyway, we got all cozy in our bunk beds in our private sleeper car after we boarded the train but for whatever reason, the train made very abrupt stops about every hour or two. I mean, the stops were so sudden that I was thrown against the railing on my upper bunk. The train guy knocked on our door for our wake up call at 5:00am. We got up and waited for our breakfast, which was supposed to be served at 5:45. We waited and we waited…finally, the train guy comes around the says the train is 1.5 hours late. Sigh. We could have really used those precious hours of sleep especially because there were no morning stops. Oh well.
After spending one night back at our hostel in Cairo, we left the next morning at 7:00am to get on the public bus to the Bahariya Oasis. This 5.5 hour bus ride would take us to the Western desert of Egypt. More specifically, we were going to stay in an “oasis hotel” (hmmm…should be interesting) outside a small village called Bawiti. Several thousand people live in Bawiti and the population is 100% Muslim. The women wear black from head to toe, including black gloves, and a black veil over their eyes so that no part of their skin is showing. We got a pick up at the village bus station and in about 10 minutes we arrived at our “oasis hotel” – see the photo below.
Michele Harmon