We arrived in Ghardaïa after midnight and drove to Beni Isguen Oasis. We stayed in a traditional guesthouse. The rooms were basic, yet had everything that was needed. Water in the shower was hot and no bugs of any kind. The group now consisted of 5 women. The rooms were double, so I had no roommate which did not upset me in the least.
On the following day, we were going to the desert to spend a night there. The group breakfasted, got in the bus and here it started again.
– Why are we going to the desert right away? Let’s go to the market first.
– We won’t be able to set up camp before the sunset if we go to the market.
– What about buying souvenirs? No, the market first and the desert later.
Rustam had enough of this. He finally found his authoritative male voice and firmly said that we were going to the desert, period. The women fell silent but not for long.
– Let’s stop to buy water.
– We have plenty of water.
– It is not enough. We need to go to a shop.
We drove to one shop to get water, then to another to buy fruit, then they needed a bathroom. Finally, we came to a place where we changed from the bus to four 4WD Toyota trucks. Rustam parted with us there, he was not going to the Sahara with us, for what he probably was secretly grateful. We started moving but when the time came for our drivers’ midday prayer. When all business was done, we got into our vehicles and drove down the Trans-Sahara Highway.
The road was excellent and we were flying along it. In a couple of hours, we suddenly left the highway and drove straight into the desert. It is a mystery to me why they turned at that exact point. There were no any signs where we turned. However, our drivers looked like they knew where they were going. We soon came to a well and stopped to get water. To me, a well in the desert is a tiny dot on the map. I do not know how one can find this dot if there are no roads or even tire marks in the sand but our drivers were confident as if they were in the city.
We soon came to sand dunes. Driving over them felt like being on a ship in a storm. The car climbed up the dunes with effort. If it was too steep, we did not make it and rolled back down and up the slope of the dune before it. The driver pressed the accelerator again and with a lot of noise we got to the dunetop, then over it and went down on the other slope of the dune listing to one side. This was not for the fainthearted. A couple of times, I felt pretty sure we were about to rollover.
We stopped at a second well, this was the place for our camp. The men unloaded the trucks. Their leader, Khasym, filled his fist with sand and let it slowly fall down to determine wind direction. He told the others where to park their trucks, dug a small hole on the sand and started a fire. Watching how Khasym did everything was a delight. His movements were precise and confident. In a calm voice, he gave directions to his men and they obeyed without questioning his authority.
We had tea with figs. Algerian figs must be the best in the world, so succulent and sweet that they replace sugar. Then the sun went down, the men prayed and only after that they began cooking dinner.
We were ravenous by then. We ate nothing since breakfast, only had tea. It turned out that making dinner was a serious matter. Algerian men like cooking and know how to cook. Our team was not going to knock up a quick meal. They brought boxes with vegetables and sat down to peel them. Sitting with nothing to do was boring. While the other women patiently waited, I joined the men, picked up a knife and started peeling too. At first, they tried to tell me that it was not my job, then laughed and accepted my help. They showed me what to do and gently corrected when I sliced potatoes too thickly. Potato slices were supposed to be paper thin. I probably failed a test for Algerian wives.
The complex dishes required several steps to prepare them. Pieces of lamb with herbs were fried over an open fire, we stewed potatoes, made fresh salad and meatballs with spices in a sauce. It took 3 hours to cook the dinner but it was great.
When everyone was full, the men put up a big tent for all five women to sleep in it together. Some men brought small individual tents for themselves; the rest settled down to sleep in the open on the rugs.