The classic straight road to? somewhere? nowhere?
The morning
starts with a bit of a novelty - a shower. It feels good to have such luxury
available to you after three nights of bush camping. The breakfast is not all
that great though - the bread is not getting any younger and in the morning
there is no soup to help the consistency of the bread you will actually have to
try to chew it all by yourself.
We drive of
it is gonna be a short drive to the next town today it is the first short day
we have had this entire trip so far. We drive down the road to the lunch stop
where the cook start to prepare lunch - then our tourist police get some bad
news - his mother has just pasted away this morning. His usual smile disappears
and he just wants to get home to his family. But it is a bit of a problem we
are in the extreme south of Libya
almost 1000k from Tripoli - and his family lives
in Benghazi another 1200k from Tripoli.
The remains of the old mud buildings in the old historic town of Germa
Our drivers have a quick lunch and
then get him to the next town where he can hopefully get a taxi to Sebha and a
plane to Tripoli from where the tour company will
make sure he can get on the late plane to Benghazi.
It does not turn out that way he will have to get a taxi all the way to Tripoli and we never know
whether or not he actually makes it home in time to his mother's funeral.
For the
rest of us the tour goes on - we await the return of our drivers before we set
off to Germa to visit the museum of the area which explains some stuff of the
old Garamatian culture which 1000 years ago made the dessert bloom using
underground water. This great civilization disappeared because of the water
supply being depleted by over using the underground water.
Old town of Germa - the old mud houses still standing up a bit
This is actually a
very interesting because the biggest infrastructure project in Libya in the last decade is a giant manmade river
pumping underground water in the south of Libya and transporting it all the
way to the north. This project can be a success but it can also drain the
entire central Sahara region from underground
water leading to the oasis to disappear and Libyan running out of water for the
population within the next 50 years. And it has happened before - one giant
Libyan civilization overextending its water supply and disappearing.
After the stop
at the museum we got a much more important stop - the local grocery shop - we
need supplies like chocolate, cookies and beers.
Palms behind the old Town of Germa
Unfortunately he seems to be
out of beers so we have to settle with chocolate and cookies.
After this
it is of to the old town of Germa
which is a town build of mud. Even though it hardly ever rains in this part of
the world the old houses is in a pitiful condition and almost destroyed by the random
rain and the wind all that remains is some ruins. Around the old town is some
date palms this is a sort of palms that really can't be used to produce dates
you can eat - but they are used to make palm wine. The production of palm wine
has been illegal for more than 30 years hence the palm tree is not well kept -
but palm wine. New Year is coming up and with our beer situation palm wine
could be and idea - anybody knows how to produce palm wine?
We leave
the old town and drive to the huts we stayed in Christmas Eve - the nice huts
which actually got room enough inside them for two beds.
Old town of Germa
The huts which got no
other tourist than us which means there is plenty of showers and toilets. We
get the dinner in the small bar and the cook has managed to get some fresh
bread. Fresh bread you can actually chew without being afraid of breaking your teeth.
For the main we have been promised a change from camel to chicken. And the main
course is the chef special - camel and rice. I guess you can't have too much
camel after all.
