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Libya & Tunisia
January 2010 By Linda Thalman
We booked a real deal off-season package to Djerba Tunisia which included
flight, hotel and breakfast for a week.
Only spending three nights at the Djerba hotel was the plan as we'd also
booked a 4-night 5-day stay in Libya.
Leaving Paris and its zero degree centigrade temperatures was fine and it
was beautifully sunny though only cool to warm in Tunisia in mid-January.
This was not swim in the Med or dive in the pool weather although the hotel
pool was very tempting.
While having been several times to Tunisia we've never visited Houmt-Souk,
the largest town on Djerba or Jerba Island.
We did a quick tour of the souk, a pleasant stroll to the marina,
lunch in the sun on the patio of a local restaurant and headed back to our hotel.
We packed again minus the books we'd already read and on Saturday early afternoon
we headed for Libya with our marvellous driver and guide Salem.
The landscape is flat as far as the eye can see in Tunisia along the coast.
It's a seamless transition between Tunisia and Libya geography-wise.
Border formalities with Tunisia and Libya took about 45 minutes...
perfectly normal and it could have been a whole lot worse... [like our 14 HOUR wait
at the Estonian/Russian border in June 2009!]
Dusk approaches and we hit the city traffic in central Tripoli. Lights,
zig-zagging cars, pickups, vans and pedestrians dodging the traffic.
Skyscrapers, top-class hotels, dozens and dozens of shops, one
after the other selling shoes, shirts, handbags, fancy dresses, telephones,
fruit and vegetables, restaurants, sports clothes, furniture, appliances, toys...
Sunday: 9 in the morning we start with an exceptional visit of the National
Museum - Jamahiriya Museum - with our English-speaking guide, Mohammed. The
museum is also known as the Red Castle Museum or Assaraya Alhamra Museum and it
is top notch and worth having a guide with you as most of the information is in
Arabic.
Mohammed knows every piece in the museum, the history, the archeology, the Greek and Roman references, stories and
references from literature and poetry and more. Impressive.
A stroll around the souk on our own and we picked up beautiful fabric for
cushions and soaked up the atmosphere.
Merchants are friendly but never imposing. There's none of the "come see my carpet"
with arm pulling or pressure to buy. Prices are basically fixed though one could
bargin a little bit if you're buying a lot I imagine.
It was the souk ambiance without the pressure to buy, much like in Musquat Oman,
and our visit was ever so nice.
A further stroll around the old town to see the Marcus Aurelius Arch,
a mosque, a church and a building that housed the French Consulate
completed our morning with Mohammed.
Lunch was in a 'typical' restaurant decorated with traditional art objects.
Wandering up and down the main drag of Tripoli in the coolish afternoon,
we did some shopping. I needed a sweater and picked up a modestly priced one,
made, of course, in China...
One thing we noticed in the capital city was the dearth of large public transport
buses... there are smaller vans Salem told us. Nor did we see hardly one
motorbike... but lots of cars, pickups and trucks.
Dinner was at a pleasant Turkish restaurant.
Monday: Leptis Magna. This was, for me, the absolute highlight of our trip.
400 hectares of Roman ruins with marble, columns, amphitheater, hippodrome,
market place, baths, mosaics. It's right up there in the top Roman ruins
we've seen around the world.
This UNESCO site is worth the trip to Libya all on its own.
The superlatives are needed: splendid, magnificent, outstanding.
Our guide Soliman was so precious. As a young boy he played on the ruins of
Lepnis, became a fisherman and about 15 years ago became a guide at this
grandious site. He knows it inside and out believe you me!
The sand blew across the highway and as we stepped out of the car to
start our visit it whipped my scarf around, perfect kite flying weather
in fact.
We were the only visitors to Qasr al Haj, a beautiful fortified grainery.
Salem had to call the person who had the key to let us in -
the phone number was on the door.
If we'd been on our own we could have made the call, but it would have been a stretch
to ask for the key in a grammatically correct sentence.
However, we could manage "Key please, thank you very much."
We seemed to melt back in time, admired the architecture, huddled in a niche from
the wind and snapped photos like mad.
Inhabited up until the late 1950s but now left to the wind and sand and
sun, it was a beautiful and magic place.
We had a quick visit by car around Jadu and were privileged to visit two
private homes.
We visited one of Salem's sisters for tea and fresh baked bread.
Then we had lunch at another sister's home and met her three daughters.
Esri, age 13, pulled out her English book and we went through a few chapters covering
ecology, geography, science, history and more. I asked if she liked English and
she broke into a big smile and said "I love English, it's so beautiful."
As a teacher of English as a Foreign Language, I was impressed with Esri's enthusiasm and
her modern text book.
After lunch we stopped at at a couple of the many, many pottery shops
along the road and made a few purchases. We also were able to see the pottery
makers, ovens, hand painting and storage of thousands of pottery pieces.
Our final destination of the day trip was Gharyand to visit a troglodyte house and have
dinner in a traditional setting. Splendid.
The Tree of Life mosaic is the highlight of the small but lovely museum.
Blue skies, the sea as a background and Roman ruins all around... just amazing.
Our last lunch of the trip with soup, salad, main course and dates, accompanied by
non-alcoholic beer was perfect.
The border crossing leaving Libya and entering Tunisia was easy and
the drive back to the hotel, stopping for a real and cool beer before saying
good-bye to Salem went quickly.
The 3:15 am wake-up call was not too fun but our plane left at 7 am and on time
and back we were at 10 am in Paris... it was 3 degrees but not snowing.
Tunisia and Libya in January and February are perfect for sightseeing and you
really do avoid the crowds. Fabulous trip!
Our Travel Contact was: Sherwes Travel
Note: Sherwes Travel was able to take care of our visa as we scanned and sent
them all the pages in our passports. The process takes at least 10 days and the visa
cost is not included in their package prices.
Absolutely perfectly organized, outstanding guides, everything went on schedule and
we discovered the most amazing heritage in our short stay.
See also the UNESCO sites in Libya
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It's been ten years since we've wanted to visit Libya and we've
finally done it.
But how nice it is to have a choice of pool chairs, the beach to yourself,
no need to reserve for the speciality restaurants at the hotel. January is
most definitely off season in Tunisia.
Left turn, right turn and we're at our hotel the "Four Seasons", a Libyan
3-star hotel that is really nice. OK, no balcony or view, but we're not on the
sea and we're away all day every day and just fall into bed each night on
this trip.
Tuesday: Jebel Nafusa... the mountains southwest of Tripoli, home to the
Berbers of Libya.
Then on to Tormeisea which is an abandoned small village perched on the edge of a cliff with view
that reminded me of the Grand Canyon.
Wednesday: Sabratha is yet another wonderful Roman site with a gorgeous theater, mosaics in the
museum and in the site.
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Linda Thalman
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Email – Linda@wfi.fr
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