The trip to Siwa oasis was a 7 hour non-stop drive from Alexandria across the Sahara.  (I used to say Sahara desert.  Now I find this is redundant because Sahara means desert in arabic.)   Most of the trip was on a 2 lane road where we saw very few other vehicles going in either direction.  Once we arrived in Siwa and got settled into our spacious accomodations, we went for a stroll around the main square. 
The scenery from Alexandria to Siwa.




Our room at the Shali Lodge in Siwa
Street scenes in Siwa
Chicken dinner
Local transport
Produce store
Giddi-up
Medicinal herbs
Alternative transportation
Load of ?
Shali Mountain
Taxi stand
Our second day in Siwa, we visited a couple of local industries.  First was the salt product factory.  Following that we went to a date processing plant.
Salt rocks - the raw product
Salt bricks
Salt lamps in process
Cut salt bricks



Inside the salt factory
We're off to the date processing plant.  The dates seen here are fed to the animals.  They are not the ones that are packaged for sale.
A couple of the finished products.


Granny's bedside lamp and ashtray.


The same lamp lit.
Dates drying in the field
Drying dates
More of the same
Granny holding a small measure of dates
Both the large measure and small measure baskets
Separating the date seed strands
Our last stop on this short excursion was behind the Shali Lodge.  This is Rahiam's father's property.  There we saw same date trees, olive trees, and another tree whose name is yet to be determined. 
Fruit from the unknown tree. 
Our Guides

Rahiam - Our guide from Shali Lodge



Tarek -  Our guide and driver from Casual Cairo
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