Western Desert Trip - Black and White Deserts

The (New) White Desert

It was just as well that no one told me beforehand that this trip would entail getting up every morning at 0530 so that we could leave at 0600. I might have opted out. As it was, even if it was painful to do, the whole experience was definitely worth it.

I’m not sure at what point our routines became obvious, but there was also the routine of eating breakfast in the car, sometimes without having appropriate utensils (fortunately, Joke had brought a knife, which turned out to be invaluable). Lunch (pre-ordered, in a restaurant or someone’s house) would be chicken, potatoes in tomato sauce, bread, salad. The first time they brought this out, I unwittingly said “oh yum, chicken! I could eat that every day.” Then we had the exact same thing (pre-ordered, in another restaurant) for dinner. And the same thing the following day for lunch. And then for dinner. And so on. For the first time in my life, I had five days not eating chicken when I finally got back.

Anyway, now it was on to the black and white deserts. It probably took around four hours driving in the morning to get to the black desert (hence the early start). It was astonishing how you’d see mosques in the middle of nowhere or a bus stop in the middle of the road that you’d been traveling along with no soul in sight for hours. The roads had sand piling up either side and spreading over onto the asphalt/concrete. Apparently, these do get cleared from time to time.

Sand Coming Over Onto Road

We weren’t allowed to go out into the black desert much, but basically the whole area used to be active volcanoes millennia ago, but is now just a vast expanse of basalt and the remains of extinct volcanoes. It was quite eerie as I could imagine dinosaurs roaming around and smoke coming out of the many black mountains. I have no idea if the timing is correct, but that was the fantasy I had in my head.

Black Desert Mountains

Someone Had Fun?

Demonstration of Scale!

The plan was to camp overnight in the white desert. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to no toilets and roughing it, but actually all the toilets from here on were basically like holes in the ground and I got used to it (and using the great outdoors) more easily than I thought.

Anyway, before we got to the white desert, we stopped off to see a natural hot spring (there seem to be quite a few around Egypt, since we saw them in Siwa as well), and then off to see quartz mountain. This was just before the white desert and it’s famous for being made of quartz. Actually, the area around had many different colours – red, yellow, white, and blue rocks.

Quartz Close Up

Joke Among Red, Yellow, and Blue Rocks

After that, it was into the car again and our first overview of the “old” white desert. The old white desert isn’t necessarily older than the new white desert, but it’s made of limestone, which makes it seem faded compared to the stark white of the so-called new desert that’s made of chalk. When you think of desert, you always think of golden sand, but there are many different types of desert. Anyway, we were taken to an amazing viewpoint where you could see the remaining boulders of limestone still jutting out in a vast landscape, all shaped and smoothed over by the wind and sand.

Old White Desert Viewpoint

Deeper into the white desert, the landscape changed from limestone to chalk. Here, the area is famous for the chalk boulders being shaped naturally by the sand and wind into various figures – the chicken under the tree, the rabbit, the camel, the mushroom…. If you see photos, at first it looks as if there’s been snow in the desert, but it’s not snow; it’s chalk.

Chicken Under The Tree

Rabbit

It's not really allowed to camp in the white desert, but apparently the police will turn a blind eye on certain days. Consequently, we were told, it’s not always easy to book to do this. Tents were set up, a bonfire was lit, the chicken and potatoes in tomato sauce etc were cooked over the fire, and a good time was had by all. The stars came out in their multitude as you can only get in the middle of nowhere, but my camera couldn’t capture it, unfortunately.

Dining in the Desert

Sleeping overnight in a tent in the desert was cold! It was pleasantly warm during the day, but only around nine degrees at night. I had a camel blanket, doubled-over, but I was still a bit on the chilly side. Nevertheless, I slept quite well, considering, probably because I was tired after the early start.

Our Tents

The desert actually looked its prettiest early in the morning, so I took some additional photos before we set off for the next part of our trip.