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.

Nearing the end

Saturday, April 1
10:12 pm
Acacus Camp, Libya

Though technically we will be here for another full night, this feels like our last night in Libya, and thus the trip. Crazy. We spend all day into night traveling tomorrow, first driving from the desert to Sabha (thankfully no hotel stay there...), then a night flight to Tripoli, then the first leg of our voyage home begins at 4am, if not sooner. There will be no sleeping tomorrow night in the cushy Corinthia bed. I'll never get up.

Today was spent on the road, again. Scenery was, for the most part, jaw dropping. Temperature, idly scorching. (The thermometer in the car read 42 degrees C. That's about 110 F.) We were traveling into the depths of the Acacus Mountain range to see some ancient rock paintings. We've been seeing these images on paper and reproduced in museums throughout the trip, so it was coming full circle to see them in situ. With the end of today, I officially retire my "archaeological shoes". Thanks, Onitsuka Tiger!







A part of me is sad, and maybe even not quite ready to be leaving. This past week in the camps has been really fun, and I've grown quite fond of the boys driving us silly folks around to these remote locations at the end of the world to look at rock scribbles. It's a familial atmosphere, still a boys club by all means, but they're good-natured kids doing the best and making the best of what they've got. (And given that they're all about my age, they're a welcome respite from the incessant talk of ailments, medication, and grandchildren among my group...) I'm going to miss them all, each one having such distinct personality traits. Salem and Abrahem were my homeboys to joke around with, Khalim's like the Libyan Justin Timberlake with a thousand-watt smile, Khalid's the wildchild, Abdullah and Mohammed have this quiet, dark intensity that melts when music plays, Awad is the reluctant leader of the pack. None of them spoke English, but we still managed to communicate in broken Arabinglish. My Arabic vocabulary is in the double digits now. Yala bina!


Some of the boys: Khalid, Awad, and Abrahem