Trip to Tozeur (Part V, Finale)

Salt Lake and Douz

Venturing our way out from Tozeur to Douz, we made a quick stop at the giant salt lake of Chott el Jerid. We begun passing the villages, and things started to turn from green palm tree to white arid landscape, and here where I really understood the real meaning of word "FATA MORGANA" I saw it myself, and it's quite stunning how my eyes manipulated my senses. While we had our time to take pictures of the breathtaking landscape, some people risked their shoes by walking on the salt lake, well, I did too, but I was safe, not not everyone was so lucky. I knew a couple of people who had to deal with the disaster of the dirts all over their shoes and feet (details).

Then we arrived at Douz, a dusty village which claims itself as the gate to the desert of Tunisia. It's quite remarkable to see about 300 camels waiting to give us ride for our lunch. At the beginning, no one knew about special lunch transfer arranged by the Tunisian government, so I was one of those who refused to climb up on the back of those camel. I tried to argue with them that I prefered to walk around since my only interest was to take pictures, but then they gotten pushy by saying that's the only mean of transport to my lunch, unless I prefered to do my fasting :(

I had a very "nice" camel, which named Mustafa. He loved to take a short cut in front of other's, by climbing on the dune and went down in a sprint style. I quite freaked out by him, so...only way to reduced my fear was by shouting..."...arghhhhhhhhh". After 30 minutes ride, I think Mustafa now became a "deaf-camel" thanks to me hahahahahaha

-Mustafa-

Lunch is quite cool, we're eating, again, in the middle of the desert with not so great weather. But at least we got companied by the traditional dances and musics, and even more special, the menu of that day was "meat cooked in the sand" and salad with the "horse's cheese". Trust me, I wasn't so brave to stick my fork on them :(

But then, the end of the day approached us faster than we expected. That's the last day of our "fun" trip to Tozeur. We closed that day by having a gala-diner at one of the Chic-place at the center of Tozeur - great dinner (with lots of lamb's menu) with belly dancer and fashion shows.

It's quite a remarkable trips, even though there were sometimes things getting hard to digest (like camel meats, lambs everywhere while I am allergic to it). I wasn't sure if I would ever want to return to Tozeur, but at least, I have BEEN THERE, DONE THAT

See you at my next trip to....SURPRISE!!!!!!!!!!

Trip to Tozeur (Part I)

Since I am already back here, I think it's time for me to reveal what I visited during my 4-day trips to south of Tunisia, Tozeur.

First day, 19 November 2009, I left at 4.10 am to catch my plane at Geneva airport. After 30 mins ride on the trained, it announced that the train might be late to arrive at Geneva airport, couple of minutes later, it announced that we actually had to change train at Geneva due to the locomotive problem. Well, 5 minutes spare time wasn't bad at all.

Arriving at Geneva airport, I hurried up to check-in and met those unfamiliar eyes of my soon-to-be travel mates. But honestly, none of them looked very friendly to me, which I don't really care either. Got my seat, 4A, luggage checked, followed by a little visit at the airport. Wow....now they have Starbucks installed at the end of the 2nd floor which is awesome, I don't really think I could ever cure my addiction to Starbucks LOL, anyway, a wish of good luck for my trip with a cup of warm Caramel Machiatto :) With or without Starbucks, my luck wasn't close enough to me, the flight was 30 mins late than scheduled and I already desperate to get to the plane for my siesta.

Make the long story short, honestly I don't think any of you will interesting to hear how I got transported from Geneva Airport to Tozeur-Nefta Airport, it's quite a boring 2-hour so flight since I know nobody and the food they served were pretty stink, cold rolls and croissant, strange smell hot plate, none of the items on my tray was appetizing. Arrived at the Tunisia, the immigration person got very unfriendly with me, they hold me longer compare to other, what a shame. And worse, out from the airport, since I knew nobody, I just went to the main exit, and somebody put me straight away to the transport car with the destination of my hotel , Sofitel Palm Beach Tozeur. While I was entering the door, that's when I realized I got to the wrong car without any chance to change to the other car :( I was ended up sharing the car with 3 other Swiss-German people. Technically speaking, Swiss-German doesn't messing around with Swiss-French people, which is me, or versi versa.

The hotel itself wasn't too far from the airport, once got there, I looked for my room's key, and without patient, I went straight to it, skipped all the welcome cocktail and gathering. My room number is 343, located on the ground floor of the wing after the pool, to be exact, first room on the right after the enterance. It's a good-size room, with a quite standard 3/4 stars amenities, considering I am staying at the 5* hotel. My bathroom is big, but with now cold water, means, I couldn't even flushed my toilet, forgot about taking shower with a boiled water. The safety box was so tiny, I couldn't even put my whole camera inside. I gave up, just used it to put my ID cards, and 2 lenses. Worse of all, one of my window was unlockedable. Tell me if I was paranoid, luckily the minibar-tv cupboard was not too far from the window, I pushed it to right in front of the window, just in case someone tried to enter my room, he or she at least had to try to broke the TV first.

It was a huge lunch, with a big "local food" buffet, even so, I tried to be prudent with  my stomach. I skipped all fresh salad, eggs, and lambs (since I am allergic to it). When I came over a big BBQ place, I saw a big chuncked of meat, which looked very intriguing, when I asked for the name of the food, they told me, it was camel's leg, I was....hmmmm..., and that guy, I didn't know if he was tried to be nice or just being an idiot, he even reframed the phrase he told me earlier, "...it's not a big camel, it was actually baby camel". Basically, during that big lunch, only thing I ate was "BREAD", tell me how gourmet I was.

(To be continued...)