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Travel notes from Douz
Hi Everyone,
Firstly I must apologise for all the spelling errors as this being the Arab world; all the keys on the keyboard are in the wrong place.
Today I arrived in Douz in the south of Tunisia near the Chott el-Jerid, a large salt lake. It's a small oasis town near the edge of the Sahara, with a large palmerie and many package tourists.
I've been here a week now. Spent a day in Tunis before catching a train west to Jebdouba. I'll be back in Tunis a couple more times on this trip when I plan to visit the Bardo museum and do some shopping around the souqs. From Jendouba I took a taxi north into the Kroumirie Mountains and spent a couple of nights in Ain Draham. From there I did a day trip to the Roman ruins at Bulla Regia. The Romans here built their houses with one storey above ground and one below. There are still some very good mosaics in situ which always look far better than stuck behind glass in a museum.
After Ain Draham I continued west to El Kef near the Algerian border. It's a small provincial town well off the beaten track, where tourists are few and far between. While sitting outside the Kasbah chatting with the locals I finally met three other travellers. Tunisia is not a major travellers destination. Danielle, Manfred and Shaun from France, Germany and New Zealand, respectively, where all travelling alone and ran into each other on the road from Tunis. We all travelled the next day south to Touzeur to the west of the Chott el-Jerid near the Algerian border.
In Touzeur we rented bicycles for the day and went exploring the oasis, spending a lot of the time getting lost amongst the ten square kilometres of date palms. It is harvest time and nothing tastes better than dates freshly picked from the palm.
So that brings us back to today. We travelled by service taxi from Tozeur across the Chott el-Jerid to Douz. This afternoon we went walking through the palms to the sand dunes on the edge of the oasis and amused ourselves watching all the package tour groups trying to ride camels.
Tunisia is a rather tame country, far more Mediterranean than Arab. Being land locked between Algeria and Libya it's not on a traveller's route to anywhere, and is geared to the mass tourism market. The cuisine in the back woods was getting decidedly dodgy bringing back memories of Yemen, the restaurants only having two items on the menu. At least it doesn't take long to decide what to eat. Since reaching the more tourist frequented areas things have improved. The only thing I'm missing, for those who have travelled with me will know my plight, is bananas.
Tomorrow we head east to Gabes, from there I think are little group will split up and go in different directions. I will head to Houmt Souq on Jerba and then head south to the Berber Fortresses around Tataouine, and then head north back along the coast to Tunis to catch my flight to Casablanca.
Have fun everyone, what ever you are doing - time to go back to the desert.
Regards
Geoff.
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