TDA - Days 5 and 6

I have learned the names of a lot more people now. I've made friends and got to talk with a few more people.

After a camp right on the Red Sea beach in Safaga we hit the road again towards Luxor. The break in the little town of Safaga was welcomed by everybody for all it had to offer: cold drinks, ice cream, cold showers and ... the barbers.
I got a haircut. Given the combination of heat, sweat and dust it was becoming an urgent matter.
It was much warmer here and I enjoyed sleeping under the stars and saving the tent pitching effort.

From here on we crossed the desert to the West. We followed the road meandering through the mountains. Red, bare, dry and dusty hills and mountains in beautiful contrast with the sky. The scenery reminded a bit of Tibet or the American Southwest. It was a scenic ride up from the sea level to about 720m and back to about 280m.
The night in the desert was cold again but sunset and sunrise were extremely spectacular. The colour of the dunes and the sand in the warm sunrise light was fantastic.
Too bad we had little time to explore. I could have easily spent a week just running around collecting rocks and scouting for more pictures. The rocks were very interesting with surfaces showing different patterns. Some looked like elephant skin, others like dried acrylic paint. Of course, everybody teased me when I returned to camp with my pockets full of rocks to show them around :-)

The closer we got to the Nile the scenery started to change. We passed through the town of Qina first through some really bad traffic, but soon found ourselves riding along a canal more or less parallel to the Nile. Green vegetable gardens and small sugar cane plantations dotted with numerous palm trees were lined up along the road. From time to time we rode through a village and the children were welcoming us with a chorus of "Hello"s.

That was fun. Children were welcoming us.


My bum has "disappeared", ie the pain is gone. I could ride 12 hours a day. Just slower...