Circumnavigating the Western Desert: Part One-About the Western Desert.

Images of White Desert in the heart of Western Desert have always enticed me. The mushroom shaped white rock, and passing references of the places by wanderers as something truly off the beaten track and unique- always gave my imagination a wing and ambition a thirst. For months and months together, I made and remade plans to see it, for once before I leave Egypt. But alas all my plans hit a roadblock, as everybody told me that I need to hire a four wheel drive and go there and it may cost almost 500 US Dollars to do that, quite a money for me. I realized therefore, that any such effort has to be a cooperative effort of at least 5-6 like minded people. But...... where to find those 5-6.

Then I saw some American groups going over there, and quite frankly I tried to gatecrash in them- although half heartedly, but they were dedicated travel groups, almost self sufficient and opaque, and therefore they regretted my pleas (no offence meant, as a traveler who like to travel alone or in a comfortable like minded company, I understand what they meant- any attempt to hitch on to a rag-tag group or form one, always meets a disaster)

And then suddenly last winters, I said to myself- why not do it the way I always travel, alone without a plan and with a measly budget. (I have done it earlier in Konkan, Spiti, West Bengal, Uttaranchal and lately in Sinai….and promise to update my blog with all those travelogues)

Traveling alone and on a low budget has many virtues… Traveling alone means that you draw your own plan and schedule and therefore do not have to waste a lot of time building consensus. Building consensus always involves compromise, and traveling if pursued as a stress buster and a hobby should be kept out of this grueling 'sine qua non'. And then traveling on a low budget involves finding new ways of traveling, off beat methods of surviving and that actually make half the fun and adventure. I have always maintained that trying to arrive at a place is much livelier an exercise than arriving at a place.

So with these thoughts crisscrossing my mind, I consulted the idea with my wife. And as she always is, she was most understanding; I had to travel alone as my son, at that time of one year age wise, could not have taken the roughing of the desert travel. Therefore she needed to stay back to take care of him, quite male chauvinistic- I must say, I am.

Western Desert, called so because of its geographical position, being West of Nile, is one of the least visited and sparsely populated places in Egypt. It is only inhabited in parts, the oasis. And there are 7 oases in the Western Desert- Kharga, Dakhla, Farafra, Baharaiyya, Siwa and little known Qara and Baris (actually named Paris, almost romantically, but Arabs pronounce P as B). Earlier, of course, I had visited Siwa, famous for its distinct culture synthesizing Libyan and Algerian way of life with the Egyptian Bedouin life.

I sat down with a Lonely Planet and a Rough Guide and realized that if I want to do a circumnavigate the Western Desert, the best route will be going to Kharga, Dakhla, Farafra and Baharaiyya in the order, clockwise or counter clockwise- letting go Baris, Siwa and Qara. Baris, for instance is south of Kharga and is rarely visited, and if at all visited, then as a stand alone site than a part of the circuit… and as one person told me in Al Qasr, that magical village in Dakhla, it does not even have a hotel…and I have to depend on the ever welcoming villagers of the place for a night halt. Then Qara is again rarely visited and is close to Siwa, far from the circuit –flunged by a treacherous desert which engulfed an entire army of Cambyses, years ago… and much beyond the scope of the circuit.

The choice of the route then boiled down to choosing the route of my circumnavigation, clockwise or counterclockwise.

I argued, and it proved to be right, that the navigation should build over gradually with a wonderful climax (pardon my innuendo, if at all). The climax being the Shangri-La, I dreamt of – "White Desert". It being tucked somewhere in between Farafra and Baharaiyya meant that I must choose clockwise route so as to delay its arrival almost till the very end. The idea sounded fine. In fact, when I took a Nile Cruise from Luxor to Aswan, one of my friends remarked that I should have had done it other way round… Luxor, being the best Upper Egypt has to show, if done earlier, ruins the awe of other sites, for they largely pale in comparison of Luxor. And therefore, one is not able to relish their stand alone beauty.

However, the climax, was a bit premature- in a way, at Al Qasr, when I saw a village so simple and yet so beautiful, that I would love to visit over and over again. So in a sense, Al Qasr was a bonus and yet much more than that.