Trouble in Tunisia ‘06

The time had come - it was off to Tunisia on the annual escapade with the usual suspects for more of the same in a different place. After a fantastic time in Mexico 05, what could possibly go wrong?

Saturday 11th March

“When the rhumba rhythm starts to flow..”

As this song was playing for the second time this morning courtesy of the bizarre and obviously standardised playlist of planes in the Alitalia fleet- I started to understand the situation that I was now faced with 5 minutes after landing in the capital of Tunisia, Tunis. I had caught the flight earlier in the morning from Heathrow after my two New Zealand travelling companions had been refused passage on the flight due to visa requirements, or more specifically their lack of one.

“.. makes me sweat..”

As I started to make my way off the plane towards the air bridge the predicament was becoming clearer. We had started organising this trip almost a year earlier, the event being an annual meeting of well travelled mates from opposite sides of the planet, two more were arriving Tunis later in the day. The previous night we’d been so organised – phoning mini cab companies to get the best deal for a ride to the airport, and had subsequently arrived there in plenty of time for our 6:00 flight, the first of the day. Now, after the initial shock of finding myself sans company, I also realised that Andy had been the one doing all the itinerary organisation and that I didn’t know a thing about my destination. I was going to have to wing it until Nick turned up in about 5 hours.

“..make me swing like only you know how”

After getting through customs, I wandered out onto African soil for the first time and after fighting off the taxi touts, caught a bus into the centre of town. On the bus, I met fellow travellers Megan and Chigra and with them I explored the Medina – old town, which consisted almost entirely of shops selling tourist tat. It was raining quite heavily and our wanderings were punctuated often with stops in market stalls to avoid the deluge.

Following the exploration where we found the main mosque, unfortunately closed to visitors and lots of rubbish – I made my way back to the airport to meet Nick who was arriving from Baltimore via France on a very tight connection. Fortunately, he made his connection and arrived more or less on time.

Sunday 12th March

The plan started to come together when as planned, Nick and I got out to pick up our rental van – not the MPV that we thought we had ordered over the internet, but with two less passengers it looked as though it would do the trick. We then headed on the short journey to Matt, Nick’s step brother’s place. After ringing a very sorry for himself Andy back in London with whom we made a plan to meet on Wednesday after he had arranged a visa at the embassy in London we went out with Matt for a couple of beers and a schwarma or two to La Marsa, about 10km from the Tunis town centre.

We visited a few bars and attempted to have a look at the beach, but the weather was appalling and the night time view of some angry water was far less appealing than the comfort of Matt’s car and a ride to the next bar. The rain cleared later in the evening and we even managed an outside seat at a bar where we met a Canadian with a large chip on his shoulder and a fair amount of alcohol in his belly. The resultant conversation was difficult to follow, but the general gist seemed to centre around the fact that he didn’t really like America. I would have suggested that the line of people who thought the same, forms to the left – but it was more fun to make fun of him and so I did that instead.

This morning we got up slowly and after a nice breakfast, managed to get on the road south towards El Jem where one of the largest Roman Coliseums in the world (certainly the largest in Africa) is located. We explored this and settled in for a lamb kebab for lunch just across from the entrance. It did take some time, as the restaurant had to start the barbeque to cook it on, and the employees seemingly we’re really adept at firestating! We watched a large group of deaf Tunisians walk past and couldn’t help but reflect on how trivial things to people with hearing were a real struggle for these guys. Especially in a country where people on scooters are whizzing past at regular intervals. After the very large lunch which would have been smaller if they had managed to start the fire, but their guilt seemed to mean that we kept getting plied with bread and soup and other non-kebab type food. It was still very pleasant sitting in the sun in front of some incredible ancient architecture.

Back on the road south from El Jem, we headed south through some very diverse country side, toward Matmata which was our final destination for the day. We were no sooner out of the car when a young lad approached us wanting to be our guide to Troglodyte homes – and after much hassle we relented, accompanying him about 20m up the hill to a home where we had a brief look around. He was most upset when we paid himTD5 (about 2.50) rather than the 10 each he was hoping for. For such a sullen and unenthusiastic young fellow I thought were very generous. To be fair, the short walk would have been immediately obvious to us if we had just got out of our car and looked to our left so I wouldn’t have felt any qualms giving him half that amount. We did however, see a magnificent sunset and our hotel, the Hotel Sidi Driss, also a troglodyte (subterranean) home was made famous as the set for Luke Skywalker’s home in the Star Wars films. We did note that in this area many of the people living in this part of Tunsia wear the long brown robes such as the java people wore in those films and that the town of Tatouine (a planet in the films) is situated to the south-east of here.

We had a coffee at the local café and returned to the hostel for dinner followed by a short walk and a tea before returning to the hostel and bed in anticipation of an early start. Matmata town isn’t the most happening spot on the planet – especially during off-seaon!

Monday 13th March

An early start from Luke Skywalker’s house and we were on the road to Douz where we arrived at 10:00 and had a look around for a place we could get a camel ride in the Sahara desert which the town sits on the border of. After throwing the Frisbee around a bit we eventually found some young guys and negotiated with them to do an hours ride on a camel for TD10 each. After a short time into our ride, another bloke on a far nicer looking camel along and we gave him some cash to photos etc before heading back over the dunes to our starting point. It was a beautiful clear blue skied day and the sun gave us an indication of the kind of heat it probably generates later in the season.

After getting back in the car we drove into town and had a look the souk where I purchased some plates with a ‘traditional’ design. In contrast to the markets of Tunis the transaction was a very civilised affair and I was happy with my purchase. We continued along the road north towards to Touzeur and left town to find ourselves in the middle of a sandstorm. The clouds of sand were such that on a straight desert road we had to slow to 70 km/h to be able to see where we were going and we were beginning to wonder how the car would handle all the grit that was going to get sucked into any intakes. Luckily after a while the storm dissipated and we found ourselves in the middle of a huge salt pan.

We stopped on the road running through the salt pan and took some photos and bought some tea from a stall seemingly situated in the middle of nowhere before continuing on to the oasis town of Tozeur where we found a place to stay for the entirely reasonably price of 24TD for both of us and breakfast the next morning. We then drove out to the palmerie, a huge grove of palm trees in the middle of the desert for some tea and a relaxing break before continuing on to the Belvidere Rocks overlooking the town and the salt plains and the desert which highlighted the extent and greenery of the palmerie we had just visited. We returned to the hotel Niffer and got organised before heading out for a meal of camel and couscous for dinner. We also took the opportunity to ring Matt in Tunis and discovered that Andy and Aaron would have to wait three weeks for a visa and wouldn’t be joining us for the remainder of the trip. We decided to commiserate this news with beers after dinner at a local tourist hotel bar, as alcohol sales anywhere else seemed to be a little thin on the ground. We got back to our hotel feeling happy that we’d done so.

Tuesday 14th March

This morning was the beginning of a long day which started from Tozeur heading towards _____ . We had intended to climb up Mt Chambi in the eponymously named national park but after missing a turn off and the appropriate road a couple of times we decided to try and climb the huge outcrop of rock that graces the skyline of the middle of Northern Tunisia, Jugurtha’s Table, instead. Once we had stopped for lunch we attempted to follow the directions from both the guide books we had, but kept getting lost and ended up stopping to ask a local bloke directions. He offered to get in the car with us and be our guide and even though he spoke no English, Salam and I managed to communicate well enough. He sent us up the wrong little pathway towards the village beneath Jugurtha’s table which was pretty tough on the bottom of Opel Turbo Tour TDi which scraped along the road a couple times during our ascent. After getting to the village, we found our way around the huge piece of rock and although we didn’t think the car would make it up the last bit – we left it and walked the 15mins to the stairs that after another 10 minute climb took us to the table top. The vistas from the top were spectacular and we were surprised to find ruins of an ancient village there- the only remaining house intact was that of the ‘spiritual leader’. We walked to the edge on each side and marvelled at the fantastic views that stretched into Albania and over the surrounding countryside. We then dropped Salam back to his village and continued to Le Kef or Le Kef depending if you are speaking French or Arabic.

When we arrived in town, we spent quite a while looking for the hotel we had picked out of the guide books – hotel Ramperts, eventually finding it after passing within a block of it on around three occasions. Luckily cold beers were available at the hotel bar and we got our hands on some before popping down the road for a schwarma from the local shop which fed us for 5TD before returning to the bar where we met Ridi, an English speaking guy we’d met at the schwarma shop followed us and chatted for a bit before taking us onto another average bar. Although he didn’t convince us to go out ‘fucking’ with him as he had proposed we popped back to the hotel for another quick drink before bed.

Wednesday 15th March

We got up and after thawing out – no thanks to the cold shower or breakfast of bread and jam, had a cuppa and wandered up to the high point of El Kef, the Kasbah. We found brilliant views over the surrounding area from the Byzintine, Ottoman, Roman, French and modern structures that comprise the old area of town. It is no wonder that the Tunisian President, Ben Ali has his presidential holiday home nearby. Our ‘guardian’ for the walk through the Kasbah, Aouaeli, was helpful and even through he didn’t speak English he made the visit enjoyable. Highlights of our visit were the incredible views out from the window the Immam used to preach from and the tiny prison cell once inhabited by a deposed president.

After the tour, we drove to Dougga, where there are some ancient Roman ruins we wanted to see, and also where we were to meet Josh – the other member of our party for the remaining portion of the trip. After waiting for him at the rather expensive restaurant there, we decided to start having a look around when the pre-arranged meeting time had come and gone only to find that there were two entrances to the ruins and Josh had been waiting for us at the other (main) entrance!

We had a good look around the impressive ruins for quite a while, and were amazed at the lasck of people amd the beautiful scenery. Certainly the Romans had found a good spot when they had decided to build the city. We had an encounter – as always, with a local sheep herder who wanted some money to show us around, but who didn’t speak English and seemingly knew very little about what he was trying to point out to us. We got the friz out and threw it around in the amphitheatre and enjoyed the lovely sunny day before returning towards El Kef where we had planned to visit the Hammam Mallek – some baths near a hot water spring. We missed the turnoff and after about 20km towards Algeria, we turned back and invariably found the dusty, gravely, steep road to our destination contained a very large number of potholes and ruts. We paused at one stage during our journey in front of a large puddle that covered the entire road but after looking at it and using sign language to discuss the way through with some local lads who seemed to think there would be no problem, I gunned the engines and raced through the water hazard without incident. As we continued, the quality of the road deteriated and we arrived, wondering how we were going to get back! This was compounded by the fact that it was now getting close to dusk, and we didn’t fancy a return to El Kef in the dark. It meant a 5 min dip in the baths, but we managed to get back and check into our accommodation for the night at hotel Venus where we arrived after dark.

A local restaurant provided us with a very expensive, but extensive dinner made even more of both when Nick ordered two main courses! We did manage to resist the lambs head – and left with a doggy bag and very stretched stomachs. A couple of beers later at hotel Ramperts later and it was time for home and bed.

Thursday 16th March

We got up and had breakfast at the hotel, before checking out and embarking on a quick tour of of the town with Josh, then hit the road towards Tarbarka , stopping on the way at he ruins of Bulla Rejia – a city built mostly underground by the Romans to escape the summer heat. The same reasons as the troglodyde houses at Matmata, but far more extensive, and lavish. Some of the mosaics from the below ground residences had been transported to the Bardo museum in Tunis, but some remained and they were quite incredible, situated in the corridors with arched ceilings two or three metres below ground.

After leaving Bulla Reijia, we got back on the road that winds up the coastal mountains through cork pine forests towards the northern seaside resort of Tarbarka. We got there to find an out-of-season town with little to interest us other than a fort situated on the hill overlooking the town. Josh drew many comparisons with the Turkish town of Cusidace, and later provided pictures to back up his claims. We climbed up to the fort which was under partial restoration and then drove out to Le Cap Blanche – the northern most point in Africa. Then it was back into the car with the intention of heading to a small town on the northern coast called ______. The road proved to be a bit of a struggle as there was road works for virtually the entire trip.

We did stop briefly at the town of Sejenane and saw the storks for which the town is famous – sitting on nests on top of the train station there. Continuing eastward, we stopped at the _____ National park containing a lake where there are Flamingos, water buffalo, and much other wildlife to see. Unfortunately heavy rain had meant that the road following the lakeside was flooded and we got to a point where there was no way to continue. We carried on to Bizerte where after a short look around, found a room at a beachside hotel for TD20 and went out to get something to eat. After returning from the town, where we had procured a schwarma for dinner we relaxed in the bar for a short time before hitting the sack.

Friday 15th March

With only the 1hour drive to Tunis planned for the day, we got up late and after breakfast, wandered down the beach next to our hotel, then stopped in town where we visited the Kasbah and were wandering along the waterside of the harbour when a little bloke approached us offering to show us around. We considered his offer (which meant eventually paying him) over tea at a nearby café and decided that we’d let him show us around the fish market.

Our new friend took us to and showed us around the fish market which turned out to be just across the road, and we wandered around choosing some swordfish and another untranslateable species for lunch. We were then escorted through some more, outdoor markets en route to the restaurant our guide had chosen for our purchase to be cooked at. The finished product, lightly fried in cumin and olive oil was beautiful and we left – not for the first time on this trip – totally stuffed.

In contrast to the previous day, tt was an easy drive south on the autoroute back to Tunis, and we arrived with plenty of time to explore the Medina before returning to Matt’s place. Second time around, the Medina (old town) area of Tunis was just as interesting – it is so expansive, I initially didn’t recognise anything from my visit six days prior, but after a while I got back into the groove and wandered around looking at all the usual market tat without feeling an inclination to buy anything. Most of the wares on store were in fact below the ‘standard’ of traditional market tat in any case.

We got back to Matt’s place only about 20 mins before he arrived home from work, so just enough time to get changed and have a couple of beers before heading out to the American embassy for some more drinks at their St Patricks day party. We then went out to two clubs ‘Odean’ and ‘Milk’ where the night ended after Nick got thrown out for bursting balloons!

Saturday 18th March

It was a very poorly Ryan who awoke after the previous nights entertainmentm and after breakfast I returned the rental car with Nick and left him at the airport. Then Matt picked me up and we continued after picking up Josh, to the Bardot museum to look at the mosaics from all over Tunisia for which it is famous. Many were three to four metres high and contained some amazing detail. We then continued to Sidi Bou Said where we saw the views out over the Med from its famous vantage point. Certainly that afternoon, or at least those three hours were the most people Id seen in one place for the entire week. My camera ran out of photos, but after a bit of deleting sunset shots, I managed to get everything I wanted recorded. We stopped by the schwarma shop on the way home and after we got home, we chilled out for the afternoon – finishing off with a steak dinner courtesy of our fantastic hosts. The sleep that followed was deep and long!

Sunday 19th March

The last day. I got up and finished off the very average ‘Angels and Demons’, the Dan Brown book I’d been reading throughout the week, then packed up and watched a little tv before Matt dropped me at the airport where I got stuck in queues- firstly for the bureau de change and then through airport security. Luckily my flight was delayed and I was London bound with 10 mins to spare!