As we wait for our ride up the gorge, a rubbish truck drives past with its horn blasting, which continues all the way up the road. Apparently they do that to let the hotel staff know that they're here and to make sure they get all their rubbish out before he comes back down the road.
We get dropped off about a 10 minute drive through the gorge. Murad (pronounced Moo-rad), is our guide for the trek and he explains that we're around 1,300m above sea level at the bottom and will be around 1,800m above sea level at the top.
It's around 8:00am when we got dropped off and it's already pretty warm. By the time we got to the top it's hot! We walked at a nice steady pace and a steady rate of ascent.
The scenery is stunning - sheer cliff faces and rocky outcrops everywhere. There's not much vegetation and anything that does grow is a shade of brown - no greenery here. The vegetation is all different variations of prickly, some of it quite like gorse, and nothing grows very tall at all.
At one point, Cindy was trying to remember if the name Murad was the name of one of the princes from a Disney movie. Kumi, our travelling companion from Japan (who doesn't speak much English) was saying that Murad looked like Penis - at least that's what it sounded like. She kept saying ape is, penis, penis which left the rest us iin hysterics. It took us a few minutes to figure out that she meant was that he looked like Venus - Venus de Milo. The upshot from that, was that Murad would be called Penis for the rest of the day.
We came across a large herd of goats being driven down the hill towards the river at the bottom. Surad tells us that the nomads can drive them down to the river and back up the top again up to four or five times a day. We were puffing just climbing up once!!
Further up the hill we stop to look at two big black bugs that are hanging out on a prickly bush. They look sort of like wetas, except they're dark black. Murad reckons they're not dangerous so picks one up by the leg and then puts it in my hand. It's legs feel just like a weta as well, as it grips into the palm of my hand.
We slowly made our way to the top, stopping for the odd photo along the way. At the top we started walking along the ridge line then dropped around the side of a hill to find a nomad camp.
The camp is home to one family - mother and father and their six children and their two grandchildren, Abeisha (7)and Fatima (3). Mr Ahmed, who we're told is 65 but looks about 85, is the father and was there with the two grandchildren while everyone else was out working, including his 10 year old son who we had just past taking the donkey somewhere.
It's hard to imagine living the way they do. However, that's all they know, so I guess it's just normal. They have the communal open-sided tent, which is used for cooking and living as well as sleeping. They have dug out three caves which they use for sleeping, keeping food in and also keeping their goats and sheep when it gets too cold.
When it's time for them to move on, as nomads do, they simply put some sort of door (maybe just a few stones in front of the entranceway) and leave. Any other nomad families that may pass through will recognise the caves as 'belonging' to another family and won't use them. There's certainly some sort of code that they live by.
We sat with the family to have the ridiculously sweet mint tea that they drink. However, Mr Ahmed didn't have any mint, so instead he made us ridiculously sweet thyme tea. Thyme grows wild up in the hills, in tiny little bushes. After one glass I already prefer ridiculously sweet thyme tea to mint tea!
The two little girls decide we're ok and came over to play with Cindy. They have no toys, so there's nothing to share. When we arrived they were playing with their baby goats - you've got to make the most of what you've got! They also like to play a game of 'which hand is the stone in'? Hands behind their back, they would then bring them round the front closed and get Cindy to guess which hand the stone was in. When Cindy got it wrong, this was met with howls of delight.
We learn that the children will most likely never go to school and most likely never leave the nomadic lifestyle or the family. It's so remarkable and foreign to think that in the world we live in today, with modern communication being what it is, that this the only life they will ever know. Perhaps ignorance is bliss?
After sitting around drinking tea, talking with Mr Ahmed (with Murad translating of course) and playing with the kids for half an hour it was time to go and meet up with the rest of our group. Only four of us went on the morning walk, with the rest opting for a lie in and a shorter walk up to our meeting place for lunch.
The walk down was certainly a lot quicker than the walk up. At one point Murad stops and throws a large rock down in the valley below. The sound is so cool as it bounces it's way down the rock face and echoes all the way down to the bottom. We like it so much we throw some more rocks and start shouting to hear our own echoes.
We get to the bottom and walk along the side of the river, which is so vital to the village. Several run off's have been built which feeds the crops that grow alongside as well as providing water to the village.
Lunch today was at another Kasbah, which is also home to a carpet making business. After an excellent lunch of bean soup, Berber pizza (round flat bread with some tomato, onion and some other unrecognisable ingredients), salad (pieces of beetroot, tomato, olives, potato) and watermelon, it was time for looking at carpets. Arghhh I do not want to sit around and try to be sold stuff that I don't want.
About 30 mins or so later, we finally get to leave and head back to our hotel for the rest of the day. The plan is get back there, put on togs and hang by the pool.
Murphy's law - as soon as we get back to our hotel the cloud rolls in and the sun disappears. Bloody carpets!!!! No matter, it was just nice to hang by the pool, do a bit of writing, reading and drink a couple of nice cold beers.
After a couple of hours relaxing by the pool, Cindy went and watched six of the other girls in the group get henna tattoos. The artist was brilliant and created beautiful work on their hands and arms.
Once that was finished it was dinner time, which felt a lot more relaxed tonight after yesterday's challenges. The food here is really good and, being here a second night, it's nice to know what to order.
Tonight is also Peters birthday. Peter is English, but lives in Cyprus these days. He's a bloody top bloke and very popular with our group. He's probably the oldest in our group and we asked how old turned today? His partner, Nat from Indonesia answered "he is a very good number. Not a significant birthday, but a very good number!!!" That caused much laughter in the group - clearly a bunch of similarly filthy minded individuals!
We ended the night with the hotel workers getting the drums out and playing a few songs, that we were dragged up to dance to. We also had a crack at playing some of their drums which turned out to be a lot harder than it would appear.
A good day and a good night to finish it off!
No comments:
Post a Comment