11 Apr The lost oasis of Zerzura

One of the places that blows my effervescent imagination, one of many..., is the Libyan desert, whose sands stretch as far as Egypt and Sudan.

Over the centuries, the only ones who dared to venture into the vastness of those empty spaces were the slave traders, who travelled in large caravans along the so-called Route of the 40 Days or Dar el Arba'in. Many legends arose from this route, which linked the Nile with the slave market of El Fasher in Sudan, some of which were collected in the book "The Hidden Pearls". They told stories of three drifting oases, lost in that immense sea of sand, in one of which was the white, walled city of Zerzura, which treasured enormous riches.

These legends were corroborated back in 1835 when a camel herder, who had a beautiful daughter named Zoraida, but that is beside the point, cute as she was, told the Egyptologist John Wilkinson about the existence of these three mysterious oases, and in particular one called Zerzura, which was located at the confluence of three valleys on the Gilf el Kebir plateau.

Subsequent explorations by Prince Kemal the Din and other adventurers succeeded in locating the oases of Uweinat and Arkenu, but the oasis of Zerzura remained a mystery.

Those legends of oases, cities and lost treasures struck a deep chord with adventurers, madmen and desert lovers whom Providence brought together in 1930 at the Greek Bar in the Sudanese town of Wadi Halfa. There, after quenching with beer the enormous thirst accumulated on their journeys through the desert, they conspired to find the last oasis, the lost oasis of Zerzura. Crazy wannabees of non-existent treasures...

And so began the last great adventure of African exploration, with a few beers, a few legends and a great desire for adventure.

They used the distant southern oases as a base for their expeditions. They travelled through the Black Desert of the Bahariya oasis and the White Desert of Farafra as far south as the ancient caravan centre of Dakhla, where the red dunes of Gilf el Kebir rise. They rested in great palm groves or under the faint shade of solitary acacia trees, camped in nameless places or beside the ruins of the Valley of the Golden Mummies, and traversed sun-scorched desert plains. Always trying to unlock the secrets of this dead, lost and hidden land. When the writer Edward Lear, whom I imagine you have read (unlike me), wrote that Egypt is a land to learn from colour, I am sure it was because he travelled through this very area.

There, along with the White Desert, they also searched for another legend, the lost Army of Cambyses, the 50,000 Persians who lie forever buried by the Harmattan, that unrelenting hot, dry wind called Khamsin here. It is said that the djinns, the evil spirits of the desert, transformed them into these strange formations that give this area an appearance as unreal as it is fantastic. You have to go and see it.

They continued to search for it for years until the outbreak of World War II caused the group to split up and fight in the same area but on different sides, abandoning the search for the oasis for better times. Thus, the British Ralph Bagnold and Patrick Clayton created the Long Range Desert Group, a unit charged with spying and stopping Rommel's advance on Cairo, while Count Almasy (the protagonist of The English Patient) became a spy for the Third Reich.

Thank goodness that time would bring them together again in the desert, life, which is full of twists and turns?

Despite all subsequent expeditions, the location of the oasis remains a mystery and like Timbuktu, they symbolise the ideal of exploration, the romantic spirit of adventure.

But there is no need to go to Wadi Halfa to start the great adventure of life, any place will do, just a good wine and a best friend (no madness started by drinking pennyroyal mint) to let out the young man who will always remain in each of us. Because our adventurous spirit is like the acheb, those seeds that remain buried for years under the desert sand and bloom quickly with the slightest downpour, we just need to water it.

I have never stopped searching for the lost oasis of Zerzura. Nor would it be the first time that one thing has led to another, and a few gin and tonics have led me to stroll through the palm grove of Dakhla, watch the sunset in the white desert of Farafra or sleep under the black dunes of Bahariya...

This time I will say goodbye with the epitaph found on the tomb of Tutan Khamon: May your spirit live and remain for millions of years, sitting with your face to the north wind and your eyes full of happiness.