|
 In
contrast to yesterday, this morning, the wind have shifted 180 degrees.
Presumably the gods decided to try to return what they took the day before back to its
rightful, original place – the sand
back to the desert – but in fact, in today's "clear air turbulence" the
wind was brisk but there were very few bits of the earth's
crust any place in the troposphere (i.e., the sand was where is should
be -- on the ground -- and not suspended in air pretending to be a gas).
So perhaps the reverse action was so that the metrological system could
recharge itself. The
up-shot is we had a steady and forceful tail wind for the ride which was
primarily crossing the chott (pronounced like "shot").
An additional benefit is east winds are cold and south and west winds
tend to be hot in this area, and this was an east wind.
 A chott is a
seasonal crystalline (salt) lake. This particular one, the Chott Djerid,
is about 40 kilometers wide, about 80 kilometers long,
perfectly flat and is said to be at an elevation 16 meters
below sea level--our GPS put it at closer to sea level. It is salty enough to
support a prosperous looking salt recovery operations.
To our right (east) we could see a ridge of mountains in the far distance, but
to the west the chott ran to the horizon without any feature
catching your gaze. About halfway across we came upon several cafes with
touristy items to stop the buses for a quick sale and snapshot
In times past, the
chott
could only be crossed seasonally. Even so it was traitorous because the
crystallized crust could give a false sense of stability, then crack and
dump man, beast and vehicles into a quicksand morass below, similar to falling through ice into a lake. It is
said that entire caravans were swallowed by the quicksand. In the 1980s a rock
and clay causeway was built across the chott. Crossing the
chott then became
accessible to most vehicles year around. It now has a very nice paved
road so that even
the largest tour buses and their passengers can now experience this once almost forbidden journey.
 With
the tailwind we went 51 kilometers in 90 minutes – that works out to 34
km per hour, or about 21 miles per hour, on a load mountain with knobby
tires. It might be said that we shot the
chott. But we didn’t shoot the uplands -- after the flat lake bed
the road climbs and our pace slowed considerably..
There
is an interesting formation before you get to the chott.
They are describe in some books as petrified sand dunes. I have my
doubts that the term "petrified" applies. In any case there is a
patch of compacted or crystallized sand dune gracefully sculptured by
the wide. The whole area is less than a
100 meters by 100 meters square. It is not apparent why it is where it is.
 The
west side of the chott is bounded by hills. Along the base of the hills is a ribbon of green
-- a series of oasis that stretches for more than a twenty kilometers.
Towards the east end of the line of oasis is Sidi Bouhel, with its
backdrop of rocky cliffs cut by canyons that were the location for a
number of Star Wars scenes, including the Sandcrawler Parking Lot.
Part of the surrounding area might look familiar because
in the drier upland area, past the oasis along the western edge, was the Lars Family homestead scenes in
several Star War movies were filmed and the craters created for the exterior location for Owen and Beru's
house in Star Wars: ANH.
Approaching Tozeur
one knows that they are
returning to a
tourist zone and the tourist culture long before you even saw the rugs
hanging from the eaves of the curios shops cheek to jowl along main street. Just as
we left the chott the adolescent boys along the roadside started
getting cheekier – nothing unmanageable, just a "C" change in attitude
that is pretty consistent for the last twenty kilometers to Tozeur.
If is very unfortunate because the is an otherwise very nice section
with interesting sights and views.
Tozeur, the oasis occupied by man, has been around for about since about 8,000 BC. Later is
was a Raman town and still later a stop on a caravan route across the
Sahara. Now-a-days it
has four parts: the old town, the commercial district, the oasis and the
tourist zone. The first two are know for the distinctive brickwork, the
third for the quality of its dates and the later maybe for its
ostentatiousness.
 The old town is
comprised of low-rise buildings
and narrow streets. Unlike the new part of town, the streets are
narrow enough and the walls are
high enough
that there is almost always a shadow to duck into to escape the intense
sun. The ambiance is made more intriguing by buildings that
extend over the streets, arched porticos and the
signature brick work
and doors. Many of the doors have three knockers, each with
a distinctive sounds. It is said that one is for men, one is for women and one is
for children -- an early version of distinctive ring tones so that you
know who is visiting.

It is very
pleasant to visit the compact ATP cultural museum stuck in an old house
in the oldest section of the old town – now heavily restored. It gives
you a bit of an idea how house are designed: you enter into a courtyard
through an entryway. The entryway always has a bend in it or the doors
are skewed so that you can see directly into the living area.
Every self-respecting courtyard in Tozeur has a palm tree. Off the
courtyard are the rooms; kitchen, bedrooms, bath, storage, etc. Unlike
most northern architecture which looks out, the architecture here looks
in. The courtyards will often have a garden and sometime statues, tiled
walls, a fountain or a cage with a song bird. The rooms of the museum
are now arranged as: a marriage room; a cooking, crafts and weapons
room; and a history room with the 100-year-old plan for water management
in the oasis. Our guide told us that the tourist hotels are consuming so
much water that they are hurting the very oasis that they hope will
attract tourists to their properties.
 Unlike
some of the traditional housing in southern Tunisia, the medina in
Tozeur is still lived in. The brick walls seem to make a good back
stop for practicing some soccer. The narrow lanes are ideal for bicycling but a bit treacherous because
the most
common two-wheeled vehicles are motor bikes that come racing
along. Fortunate they are load enough that you get plenty
of warning of their approach. Unfortunately they are very loud,
shattering the peace and tranquility of what the Tunisians would like declared a World
Heritage Site. If I had a vote, I would make the Tozeur government
ban motor vehicles
in old town before it could be declared a World Heritage Site.
 One of old towns claims to fame, at least by the locals, is it has been
the set for several movies, specifically Dar Trilla, the home (palace) of a former Bey (mayor under the Turkish-Ottoman Empire). Unlike some many
other locations in Tunisia they weren't Star War movies and the aren't
movies I had heard of or could remember the name of. One
apparently starred Omar Sherif.
 The
commercial district is dominated by cafes, restaurants, date stands and curio shops. Off to
the side is the vegetable
markets. Both
of the old town and commercial district are set apart by very distinctive and elegant brickwork.
There is an ongoing effort to preserver, restore and expand the presence
of traditional
brickwork. The brickwork provides both
insulation and decoration. Using the end, side and face of three bricks,
horizontally and vertically, there are over 700 patterns that can be
made with just three bricks. There are also some named patterns
like pendent, saw, snake, stairs and camel.
While this creates a pleasant ambiance it doesn’t seem like most of
the tourists make it this far.
The oasis is
similar to the others but impressive by its size and general healthiness. An exception is
the west end, known as the "belvedere," which now looks very unhealthy. The
story has it that this is where part of Star Wars was filmed. Since then it has
been half surrounded by a dozen fortress like tourist hotels. This is the "zone
tourist." It may be strangling the very element that drew them here
-- the oasis..
Tourism
development may be a text book example of loving something to death. A
dozen huge tourist fortress hotels line the western end of oasis.
Unfortunately, it takes a lot more water to keep a tourist happy than
the normal citizen of Tozeur. A consequence is the oasis is
starting to show new signs of stress. The conventional wisdom from
locals is that the tourist hotels are taking to much water.
For years there has been talk in Tozeur that the tourist hotels were
using an unsustainable amount of water. In a particularly ironic
twist, as the oasis turns into a desert, a golf
course is
being built on the edge of the oasis. While we visited in mid-afternoon
the sprinklers were going around and around. Given the mist and
low humidity (below 20%) it is doubtful that much of the water was
getting into the ground. It raise doubts about whether the golf course
developer is paying the real cost of water. We ended the day at
another museum, the Dar Chariot. This is a new, private museum, with modern displays and
elegant tile work and ornate ceiling. In large part the content is similar to the small
museum in town. It has a nice collection of pottery, clothing, copperware, and jewelry as well as
displays of everyday life in Tunisia, but the volume is greater, there are more descriptive labels and the
architectural examples are stunning. In their own ways both museums are worth the price of
admission. Connected to Dar Chariot is a Disneyland-esque children's theme park "1001 Arabian Nights."
We passed on this.
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Addendum Well
worth a visit is a in Tozeur old
town is Galerie Tozart. It is on the same street as the ATP Museum.
The featured artist
is Raoudha Bribech. She works in a variety of mediums, including
paint, metal and wood. She describes her current work
as cheerful - as is she.
An unfortunate new development in old
town is curio shops have set up shop at some of the most architectural
significant locations and covered the architecture with rug, blanks and
a thick layer of tourist crafts.
A new sign in Tunisia since 2002:
Another questionable
development in Tozeur is the addition of head
foams to the viewpoint in the Belevedere. All three are the face
of Abou El Kacem Chebbi (1934-1989), a celebrated Tozeurian poet. If they are suppose to
add to the esthetics of nature, they don't. If they are suppose to
attack more visitors and more money, I am skeptical. As much as I
am for celebrating the accomplishments of Tunisian artists, this
memorial doesn't seem to be well placed. |