Sahara Desert Day 2

Day two in the Sahara started out by watching the sunrise on Salt Flats. The Salt Flats looked just like the Bonnevile Salt Flats in Utah. I wasn't too impressed since I grew up by Salt Flats. BUT, I was impressed with the salt statue. Look for it in the slide show below. We also took a ride in a Land Cruiser through the desert. We saw some of the BIGGEST sand dunes I've ever seen. We also saw another setting for Star Wars. You might recognize it from Star Wars Espisode 1. The kids could careless about the star wars stuff, they were so excited to get out and roll around in the sand. The sand was so soft. It felt like powdered sugar. We filled up three water bottles of it to bring home. Bailee was really lucky and found a sand crystal in the sand while she was digging.

Along our drive we saw real Shepards watching their flocks. Perfect for this time of year. We saw Nomads living in huts. We also saw wild camels. They were everywhere. In fact, I would dare say we saw as many camels as we did buffalo in Yellowstone last year. There was even a road sign that said "Camel Crossing". Our driver thought we were crazy to get so excited over camels. Little background of our driver. He is Tunisian. When we hopped in to the Land Cruiser we started speaking English with him and he said, "No English". He proceeded to ask if we spoke Tunisian, Arabic or French. Of course we said no. He then said "Spanish?" Jon jumped all over that one and said "Si!" It was so weird hearing Jon speaking to this man in Spanish. He would carry on the conversations and then translate for the kids and I. See, missions do pay off!!!

From the Star Wars scene we rode over to a little village called Chebika. Chebika is famous for a little waterfall with beautiful scenery. It seriously was breathtaking. The movie The English Patient was filmed here. (I'm beginning to think only movies are filmed in Tunisia!). Jon bartered with the village folk selling souvenirs and got a steal of a deal on a rock with purple crystals inside. Don't know what we are going to do with the rock but hey, it was a good deal!

After Chebika we made a long bus ride back to the resort to enjoy our last day in the sun. When we went to the airport we found out you aren't allowed to take any Tunisian money out of Tunisia. We went on a major spending spree to try and use the 40 dinars we had left. After arriving home and starting the mounds of laundry, I found 1 dinar left in my pocket. Oops! I guess you can say it's a rare coin since you can't find it only in Tunisia so I'm willing to sell it to the highest bidder!

We loved Tunisia and would go back in a heart beat! Enjoy the pictures of our last day in the Sahara.