"Ladies we are in Africa!!" I shout as we walk off the plane at 8:30pm. We are excited, a new continent and a new country to add to our travel list. The difference with this trip - we are staying at a all inclusive resort for some much needed R&R.
We actually check our bags this time, so we make our way to the baggage claim. There was a moment of truth for us here... the baggage carriage stopped moving and the man said "No more! No more!" We all looked at eachother with worried looks on our faces... none of our bags had come out. I really wasn't too worried because only my liquids were checked in a bag, my clothes still remained safely secured in my backpack which came with me on the plane. This was not the same case for Mel and Katie. I calmly walk down the airport and check the other baggage carousels... nothing. We wait for a bit, Mel enjoys her cigarette INSIDE the airport!! Clearly there is no smoking ban in Tunisia quite yet! Suddenly the girls yell out, our bags have made it out. Situation dealt with. The travelling Canadian Threesome stayed calm... for once.
We find our bus which is to take us to our hotel resort. There is a group of us that the driver drops off along the way... Now at this point we're thinking we have about an hour or two on the bus - we know we're the last to be dropped off... SO 4 hours later we make it to OUR RESORT!! Yes fellow Albertans you could have drove from Morinville to Calgary in the exact amount of time it took us to get from the Tunis Airport to our El Mouradi Hotel in Mahdia! There were moments when Mel, Katie and I would give eachother worried glances... where exactly are we going? Each town either looked dilapidated and worn or just plain old abandoned. We weren't sure if many of them were being re-built, deconstructed or if they were just really old. Later events in the daylight revealed it's a little of both - Re-consructing AND old. Needless to say, we were out in the boonies. Mahdia is a fishing town, but it's right on the Mediterranean Sea. That's all that mattered. At one point while we were on our long trek to the hotel I was staring out the window reading all the signs as we went past... "Um, Mel... Did you read that sign??" I question. Mel looks at me and says "No, which one??" I tell her to hold on to see if another one goes by... We wait. Another goes by... Mel turns at me with huge eyes "Did that say Baghdad? That's not near here though!?" I laugh and now we are truly wondering what on earth we got ourselves into. Upon closer inspection we discover the sign really reads 'BAGDHADI'... They may want to reconsider the name of their town! ha ha
We FINALLY get to our hotel. It looks dark... "Hello? Is anyone here?" I mock. Mel goes up to the doors and there is a single light over the reception desk... it's 12:30am now. The clerk is awaiting our arrival. After much mockery and teasing by the clerk at the desk (which eventually turned into us getting annoyed because the guy couldn't give a straight answer about anything!!) we head on our way to our room... well first we get a little confused (clearly) and the clerk comes after us and shows us the direction to the elevator... which only came for Mel ONCE the whole trip. We walked to the 5th floor instead.
Room 542. GREAT VIEW of the sea and the pool! We were now so excited! Our tiredness wore off and we decided to explore the hotel. After running outside and screaming out of excitement we get a couple of drinks and head into the disco... which was pretty dead, minus this one guy who was clearly shattered. He was on the dance floor wearing a bowler hat doing "tricks" with it... needless to say he was horrible and we laughed at him the entire time!
The next morning we get up and enjoy our first breakfast at the resort... which didn't change much from day to day... I don't think I'll eat another bread product again! We were told before we left to avoid dairy products, fruit and any uncooked vegetables... That meant a lot of bread, pasta and pizza! ugh!
Our first day we laid out by the pool. The weather was nice enough... Mel and Katie were much more brave and sported thier suits... I did for about 10 seconds and then put my hoodie back on and was wrapped in my towel... this shouldn't be a suprise to anyone... especially those of you who see me mowing grass in the summer back home in a winter jacket!
Being young Canadian girls (and some of the only young people there) the waiter staff took a liking to us. It was no problem to get whatever we wanted whenever we wanted. I think we were invited to a disco off the resort a dozen times the first couple of days.... we kindly said no... considering we hadn't really seen any Tunisian women since we had arrived!!
That night we had met some guys from England- Andy, Gareth and Nath. We all partied in the disco until 2am... I am sure the DJ loved us... we were the only people in there and we kept requesting music he did not have. I am sure if we had left early he could have gone home early... but when you combine the Canadians and English together, we love to get our drink on!
Andy was a HUGE fan of Britney Spears and Rhiana... Needless to say I wouldn't be disappointed if I never hear thier music again! We were all sitting down taking a break and having a drink when Britney Spears came on over the speakers. "Britney is above us ladies, we must dance!" cries Andy. So off we go to the dancefloor where Andy sports some music-video worthy dance moves on the stage!! As we all chat and get to know eachother it is revealed that Andy did not want to get to know us in the beginning. It was Gareth that had decided to come over and chat with us. Apparently Andy had thought us to be Gobby. What does this mean you ask? Well do not worry, we did not know what this meant either. It means we are loud and talk too much... basically it was an accurate description... only we're nice to boot, so that makes up for it all! This word "Gobby" ended up describing us for the remainder of the trip... not only as a running joke, but the German visitors seemed to feel this as well ( yes ladies and gentlemen we were shushed.... MANY TIMES by the Germans. We were even shushed OUTSIDE! My goodness we are just so gobby!)
The second day we walked 4km on the beach to the town centre of Mahdia. We walked forever and couldn't figure out how to get to the main street... so we made our own path and hopped a fence onto the pavement. How typical! It didn't take long for us to discover how much of a novelty we were in the predominantely male town. Moped bikes, taxis, cars, and walkers would slow down as they passed us. Men would yell out hello in random languages to see which one we responded to: "Hello, Bonjour, Ola?" they would rattle off... "English, En Francais, Dutch, German?" all to figure out how they can speak to us. Some would just string random words together, which in turn made us burst out laughing "Hello, yes what?" one man said as we walked past. We were called sisters, spice girls (which often was referred to me), Shakira (this apparently was Mel's name) and even Cheeky Booger Monkey... which a guy tried to claim meant we were lovely... not buying it buddy! We checked out some of the shops, which resembled the markets in Mexico to me. There wasn't anything too extraordinary to purchase, just your typical tourist junk. As we walked in and out of the shops men would ask "Why you go in his shop and not mine?". We could only laugh to ourselves "because that guy isn't creepy and he isn't claiming that everything is FREE!". In one shop we had a crazy man twirl us and dance with us as Mel picked out a t-shirt for her dad. Every time he would show her one he would bow then with his sweaty hands, grab Katie or me and twirl us... He had to have been smoking that hooka pipe way too much!
We decided to go to the indoor pool at the hotel one day because the outdoor was way too cold to go in (Mel, Katie and Nath decided to jump in and test it out first!). Us girls were somehow suckered in to doing the water aerobics with the crazy hotel entertainment guy named Rico. Let's just say we were SHUSHED once again and told "There is no speaking during water aerobics!" The guy didn't even play MUSIC while we exersized! I could have put together a better routine! At a couple of points Mel and I couldn't see OR hear (let alone understand because he wasn't speaking English) what he was doing so we moved a little to get a closer look. Yet again he yelled at us and told us to "LOOK LOOK! NO TALKING!". Finally I yelled back at him "We can't see what you're doing! I am a teacher and you are BAD at this!" This is when we got to know our other new friends Lynn and Nigel. They are an older couple from England and they're A BLAST! Lynn was standing poolside laughing her butt off at us and taking pictures!!
Okay, now for the COOL part! Mel, Katie and I went on a 2 day safari in the SAHARA DESERT!!
We left early in the morning on Thursday and headed to El Jem. A Roman Coliseum where they used to have gladiator fights (just like in the movie Gladiator). It is one of the most well preserved Coliseum's in the world. We were able to go underneath to where the slaves/gladiators were kept and where they kept the lions and animals before the battles. VERY COOL! We then drove through Sfax and headed towards Matmata. There was lots of time spent on the bus, and I have discovered I have narcolepsy on busses! It doesn't matter HOW much sleep I get, I fall asleep the second the bus starts moving! I think it's from all the years Dad would make us drive for 14hours and I would dread thinking about how long it would take and trained myself to sleep through it!
ANYWAYS. For the time I did stay awake it was neat to see the vast landscape and all the little huts and homes that people lived in. It's crazy to think people still live in such primitive ways. But I guess they do not know any different... and much can be said for living the simple life. We drove through Berber villages (people who still live in caves within the mountains) on our way up to Matmata. Matmata is where Star Wars was filmed! The mountains and terrain here looked SO COOL! And if I had ever seen Star Wars, it may have been even more amazing! ha ha. But the landscape was awesome! We stopped for lunch in the nearby village and ate in what looked like a cave. There were tables set up along the walls and 2 single bulbs hanging from the ceiling. We were fed traditional Tunisian dishes: fried egg thing, couscous, veggies and chicken. I avoided the chicken after the man had put the dish down and said "Chicken NOT camel!". To be quite honest sir I didn't think it was camel until you just said that! Now I am thinking it IS camel!! We made our way deep into the sahara where we rode camels through the desert for 1hour.
STORY TIME:
I originally had a white camel named Jerry. I noticed when I got on it that he had more flies on him than the others... Of course I get the tainted camel! We were all hooked together in a group of 4 camels and our guide walked ahead. My camel kept rubbing his head on Doretta's leg who was ahead of me. She didn't like this very much! I wondered why he kept doing it, then I noticed the lovely open sores on his head... Which is where the FLIES were coming from!! Well lucky me, the guide decided me and Doretta needed to switch camels... So now I was on HER camel up front. His name was Tommy and he was quite flatulent! (good thing I wasn't down wind anymore!). BUT now my old camel Jerry was rubbing his scabby head on ME! I was only wearing capri's so is was absolutely disgusting! Mel and Katie were killing themselves laughing at me as I was trying to avoid Jerry by putting my feet up as high on the camel's back as possible. "You're going to be riding side saddle soon Katie!" The girls laughed. Finally I kept complaining enough to the guide that I didn't want this camel's scabby diseased head to touch me anymore that he adjusted the reigns so that Jerry was further behind... But here's the catch: The guide didn't quite understand me. He thought I was afraid that Jerry was going to bite me... that was of no concern. So the guide muzzled Jerry (which I felt bad about and tried to protest with no avail) and tied him to the back of Tommy's flatulent butt. Well one would think the problem was solved. But now instead of having Jerry rub his head on me, he has taken to sniffing my rear end the ENTIRE ride! All I had was hot camel breath on my backside and thigh for the entire ride through the sahara. Mel and Katie had a great laugh. Mel's camel Jimmy liked to try and run ahead because he was a racing camel and Katie's camel kept making wierd noises with his mouth that resembled water going down a drain. His tongue would then blow up like a balloon out his mouth and then deflate back inside. Truly odd. The desert was quite hot and the sand was orange and felt as soft as flour. I didn't get to take any back with me as I didn't bring anything to collect it in... Boo hoo I guess.
We then stayed 1 night in another hotel resort in the Sahara. Our first room was quite the sight! We walked in to the room and the first thing we noticed is the gaping hole above our heads! I then walk in a little further and all the beds are standing upright against the wall... Unmade! The windows were all open and the place basically looked like it had been ransacked! We slowly backed out of the shady looking room and headed back downstairs. "Um, excuse me? We're not normally picky people, but our room doesn't look ready for guests and we were wondering if we could have another?" we cautiously ask. They thow us a key like it's nothing out of the ordinary and we cross our fingers for the next room. It was quite big with 1 double bed and 3 singles. Yes, we slept in the 3 singles which were lined up beside one another. Aren't we cute.
The next day we headed to Chott El Jerid - the salt sea. It is where there was once water and it has been evaporated and all this salt has been left behind. We were there to see the beautiful sunrise - it was truly gorgeous. I of course collected some salt (being the teacher that I am). We then had the long trek up to Tozeur where we got a horse and buggy ride to the artificial oasis. This is a forest of palm trees and other plant life that is farmed by the locals. They grow dates here. After almost getting hit by a truck (it was truly a close one! Burned rubber and screaching tires as the truck stopped inches from our carriage!) we went and saw a local climb the palm tree with his hands and bare feet... he must have some lovely calluses on those bad boys! We then took 4x4 trucks up into the Chebika mountain range to the Mountain Oasis. A part of the Atlas mountains. It was gorgeous here, with a waterfall and pools of turquois water and streams. We hiked up the mountain and down through to the waterfalls and streams, it was gorgeous. A local decided that he wanted to talk to me and began following us on our way out. Arm and arm Mel and I avoided him... He approached me and professed "I love you". I looked and him and said "No you don't!" We continued walking and he continued to walk with us... "I love you, may I have one kiss?" he cooed. I again avoid eye contact and say "No you can't have a kiss are you crazy?" He laughs and says "Okay 2 kisses!" Now I can't help but laugh and cry out "NO KISSES FOR YOU!" and Mel and I escape back to the truck. From the mountains we have a long trek to the world renound mosque in Kairouan. We are not allowed in as it is Friday the holy day for the Muslims. So we watch a video in a museum and walk around the outside of the mosque. We then make it back to the hotel in Mahdia for dinner.
EVERYONE MISSED US! Lynn and Nigel tell us how quiet it was without us. Another couple from Wales tells us the same. We are so happy we were missed so much! Our final days are spent with Lynn and Nigel and another couple, Gina and Peter?. They are great fun. We have a birthday dinner with Nigel on our last night there. Us girls decided we had to run into the Sea on our last day. The water wasn't near as cold as we thought it would be! We then did an exeperiment: Is the sea water colder or warmer than the outdoor pool water? Conclusion: The pool water is MUCH colder!
This is the basics of our trip. So much happened I cannot fit it all in to this journal entry. So you're just going to have to ask me about it! It was a very unique experience and one that I will not soon forget!
Following that dream....
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