Been through the desert on a horse with no name...

Thursday, March 30
9:28 pm
Ubari Camp, Libya

Three more days. Then the journey home begins. So excited, I can taste it.

The past 24 hours have been rather taxing, on mind, body and spirit. We spent a total of 8 hours driving today to visit ONE site for an hour plus lunch. The drive was arduous, the terrain unforgiving. Fumes, kicked up dust and sand, broiling hot. A quarter of the drive took us over a minefield of scattered shattered rocks, a landscape Herodotus appropriately referred to as "the end of the world" and is now known as the Ocean of Stone. My driver for today, Mohammed, ably navigated the protruding obstacles, but not without jolting my back and stomach in every direction. It was a drive that led me to thinking, what in the hell are we doing out here?



The rocks littering the flat flat FLAT ground are black like lava on top, earthen red on bottom. Not sure what the story is on that, but I snagged a few specimens to ask those that might. Our epic trek came to a bumping halt at lunchtime, high noon, at which point it was decided to forego the meal and go straight to the site, under the sizzling sun. Animals incised in the rock face. Yay. I love me some giraffes, I do, and it's cool they're here and they're 8,000 years old and well-executed. But, I and my 2,000 parts did not deem it worthy of 8 hours of vehicular hell, enhanced ever more by the voracious flies.



The enterprising Tuaregs (the nomads of the Sahara) made sure to set up shop just beside our picnic table. I swear, they must have a secret smoke signal or something because they have materialized out of thin air to sell their wares at just about every stop we've made, including the gas station! Persistent bunch, they are. Most speak French, too, so I've had reasonable success on the bargaining table.



Came back to the camp, exhausted, deflated, sand-ridden. Had a little drama with a sick traveler. French chef asked for my telephone number (??) after dinner. Ugh. I wrote a whole entry about that situation in my head in the car today. It'll find it's way onto paper soon enough. For the first time on this entire trip, I was scared.

Bon soir.