Wadi Ramm and Bad Bob

Wednesday, December 19th


... I am sitting atop of Ronnie. Ronnie is tethered to Bob, who is being ridden by Marcus. Merryl is at the front of the troupe atop of her camel. She has neglected to name her mount, but we will find out a little later his name is Satang. I am doing my best to stay away from Bob as he is psychotic. He has already tried to bite Satang. He is currently screaming in Merryl's face. I have never seen a camel with anger management problems before. I am quite interested to see what he is going to do next. Our guide ushers our camels to their feet. They unfold like giant robotic creatures out of a sci-fi film, their double jointed knees extending and locking, propelling us into the air first forward and then counter-balancing as the rear catches up. Bob makes a swipe at a root in the sand and misses it completely as he is tethered to Ronnie. He turns around a roars in Ronnie's, and my, face. His breath could strip car primer. It is going to be a long day...

Today we took did a camel trek around the Wadi. Firstly we got a lift in a 4x4 to the little bridge. This is another natural bridge rock formation, in the shadow of the Jabal Khazali. The view, like every thing else in the Wadi, was superb. We climbed to the top and looked around and marvelled at the peace and majesty of the wadi. From here we met our guide and started our camel trek. We each had a camel. Marcus and I decided to name our camels. I was going to call mine Philippa, after an ex-girlfriend of mine, but on reflection my camel was actually quite cute-looking and friendly thing. So I decided to name it Ronnie. Marcus called his Bob. Our camels were tethered together in a queue. Merryl at the front, myself in the middle and myself taking the rear. This arrangement didn't last too long unfortunately as Bob turned out to be a psychotic dromedary. He attacked Satang and tried to bite Ronnie. Like all good owners - and parents for that matter - Marcus was under the delusion that Bob was just misunderstood. Merryl and I were under no such illusions. Bob was mad, bad, and dangerous to be within two metres of. Imagine my joy then, when our guide decided to tether him in the middle to try and help him behave himself.

... Marcus and I have got ourselves into a bit of a fix. We have climbed up into Khazali canyon. It is quite a stretch up into the narrow siq that leads deep into the crevasse of the Jabal. After realising we can go no further we decide to climb back down. This proves to be little more difficult than we anticipated. Currently I am hanging 20 odd feet in the air, suspended over some very painful looking rocks. Beneath us a group of tourists are desperately trying to negotiate foot, and hand, -holds for us. I have managed to get myself into a stable position but I am very tired. Marcus is five feet above me and trying to get through the narrow gap backwards. "Just put your hand here. Then your foot here. If you fall I've got you." I tell him. I don't know how I plan to achieve this statement because if he falls on me I am going to probably lose my grip also. He is sweating profusely and things are not looking good...


We trekked on with our camels chilled, deranged, and nonchalant, respectively through the morning desert sun. following the outside of Khar EL Arjarm. At this point, Bob had got so rowdy he had to have his mouth tied shut. Marcus looked like an unhappy parent. Merryl and I breathed several sighs of relief. We headed onward from here to the mountain - Khazali. Our guide left us to explore the natural tourist attraction Khazali canyon whilst he made lunch. The canyon was very beautiful and good fun to climb in. Marcus and I got a bit too adventurous though and climbed up a rock face and got stuck coming back down. We eventually managed it, thanks to some helpful Italian tourists but we were left shaked and absolutely knackered by the time we got down.

After lunch we stopped at another very large sand-dune and met Natasha doing her own camel trek. Marcus and I climbed the dune whilst Natasha and Merryl chatted. From here we spent the rest of the afternoon trekking back to our sunset camp. Even Bob seemed to perk up a little and had his muzzle removed. The trek back was my favourite part of the day. Bob had stopped attacking everything and we plodded through the desert under the eternally watchful eyes of the surrounding Jabals. The desert was very peaceful and very solitary and I loved it. It brought to mind the Arabic saying I had read in Egypt - "The further you go into the desert, the closer you get to God." - although we were barely out of a hugely overrun tourist container, I did begin to understand the lure of the nomadic life of the Bedouin. Maybe one day I'll get to explore this properly.

We reached camp with an hour or so to go before sunset. We said good-bye to our steeds and our erstwhile guides and watched them ride off into the sunset. I was not sad to see Bob's, irate, bony arse diseappearing into the distance. But I did get rather fond of Ronnie. Merryl went up into the rocks to read, whilst Marcus and I caned a large amount of the vanilla vodka - we were still shaken by the climbing incident. The evening was a very quiet one compared to the night before. Marcus and Merryl played cards, and I read my book. Tomorrow we are off to Aqabar on the coast of the Red Sea.