Siwa Oasis, Egypt, 60 miles from the Libyan border

Welcome to Siwa.

There are at least as many donkey carts as cars here. Located 400 miles from Cairo, Siwa is an oasis town where life moves at a slower pace and the dates are the sweetest in all of Egypt. It is the seat of an ancient oracle, and it is also the gateway to the Great Sand Sea where moving 300 ft sand dunes stretch for hundreds of miles, and only camel or 4WD trucks dare to enter. We chose the latter.

Unable to find coffee the first morning at our hotel, my travel partner and I stumbled over to an old mud-built hotel down the road and woke this poor chap. He had been up late, as it was Ramadan, but after a few minutes he was happy to brew us up some Turkish coffee.

Siwa is the type of town where 6 year old boys were allowed to drive donkey carts through the town, but women were fully covered in a "chador" and sat in the back of the cart. Photo of woman not included to preserve the life of the photograhper.

The best restaurant in town. Unfortunately we visited during Ramadan so beers were out of the question.

Many have visited the Oracle at Amun. Xerxes sent his army of 50,000 Persians to destroy it and they were lost in the desert and never heard from again. Alexander the Great was declared a god here by the Oracle himself. So we decided to pay a little visit ourselves.

The trusty Toyota has been - thus far - a very reliable vehicle. This trip included about 900 miles of driving in intense heat over over desert trails, and she is none the worse for wear.