Day three

Good news - Nicholas and Tunisia are now BFF!

That's the best thing about vacation I suppose, you never know when things will shift and everything will start going your way. It's just like in life only more intense.

We woke up today and set out early to check with excursion companies and see if our "friend" at the hotel was right and there were no trips to Ksar Ghilane. The first place we found said they could take us but it would be 500 dinar and wouldn't include camp or food. Despite Nicholas's extreme protest that we should take what we can get I insisted we try a few more companies. Right before I promised we'd turn around, we found Heart of the Desert excursions, who had come highly recommended. The owner spoke english and offered us 380 to get us to Gabes and then on a bus to Jerba - oh and that included food and camp. God, I love being right.

He told us to come back in a couple of hours so we went and took a tour of the palmerie in Tozeur and the medina, which was lovely. When we returned, he'd found us a guide that spoke some english, which was just icing on the cake.

We set out for Douz, considered the gateway to the sahara, and arrived around lunch. We had lunch and drove out into the desert to Ksar Ghilane where we would be staying the night. The drive itself was amazing (although I might have napped for a little bit). The landscape was beautiful and immense and we stopped several times to take pictures of rock formations, the big salt lake, and I kid you not - a camel crossing!

Once we arrived at the camp, we settled into our tent and then had drinks by the spring. At around 6:30, we set out on our sunset camel tour over the desert. The second we walked out behind the cafe the dunes took my breath away. They were different from the ones on the drive - vivid orange like something out of Lawrence of Arabia. We rode along with a very nice Italian couple and their son for about an hour and a half to the Roman ruins of Limes. We watched the sunset from there which was phenomenal. Watching the sun set over a sea of sand is truly something I will never forget.

Of course, I look over at Nicholas who is CHECKING HIS BLACKBERRY! He seemed to be more amazed by the fact that he had service then by his surroundings. :)

We rode back which was a little intense because of the increased wind and sand. Our bums were getting pretty sore by this point but even so it has to be one of the coolest things I have ever done.

We came back and had dinner at our camp and a well-deserved rest.

Tomorrow we set off back across the desert to Matmata - start humming the Imperial March now because this is where Uncle Owen's house in Star Wars was filmed. To say Nicholas is excited would be an understatement.