From Cairo I flew across the Sinai Peninsula to the southern end. I'll write more about my visit to the scenic town of Sharm el Shiek at a later time. The focus of this article will be the Sinai desert itself.
I flew Air Cairo across the entire peninsula. I will say the area is not as I had pictured from the Bible accounts of the Israelite exodus across this region. My imagination painted a picture of a place more vast and less filled with hills. But then no place ever fits the image I have in my head.
While visiting the desert I rented a small dune buggy to transport me through this desolate place. This was the best way to get personal with the desert without enduring a more arduous camel ride (I personally found no pleasure in my previous camel encounters).
Pictures of the desert:
The desert is quite deserted as the name implies. Unlike the desert in Jordan I saw no large established communities. Probably because this place is too isolated to truck in the water as they do in Wadi Rum, Jordan.
The paths for dune buggy exploration are well established. There is no free roaming that I saw taking place. The roads are smooth over the sands only, so no rocky mountain climbing.
The rocky hills were what fascinated me the most in this desert. I would have thought the winds across this desert with no trees to hinder would have eroded them away over time. But then I'm no geologist.
I was trying to imagine an Israelite exodus across the desert. All I could think was why not just stick to the coast and head north? At ten miles per day you can reach Jerusalem in a month!
I only spent a few hours driving around the desert. It's the kind of experience that is amazing at first but gets very boring fast. I can't imagine wandering around this place for 40 years!
Looks like fun to me.😊👍🙏