Egypt
Guardian Unlimited (review by Toby Lichtig)
See the above page for the rest of the review.
- The True Story Of Desert Explorer Laszlo Almasy
Spiegel Online (By Matthias Schulz. Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan) Thanks Kat! I have a real fascination with the exploration activities of the Zerzura Club and the work of the Long Range Desert Group which followed. Almasy was a member...
- Gilf Kebir - Join The Club
Gulf Life (Richard Hoath) The Gilf Kebir, on the south-western corner of Egypt’s Western Desert – remote, uninhabited, virtually rainless – holds a particular place in desert lore. Named and mapped only as recently as 1926 by Prince Kamal Al-Din,...
- Natural Glass In The Desert
New Stuff (Robert Twigger) Robert Twigger, who wrote The Lost Oasis has been posting some interesting pieces on the above blog recently. This one concerns the 29 million year old glass found at the borders of Egypt and Libya (known as Libyan or silica...
- Book Review: The Hunt For Zerzura
The Spectator (review by Justin Marozzi) The Hunt for Zerzura: The Lost Oasis and the Desert War, by Saul Kelly. This review dates to 2002 but I've only just stumbled across it. It is less a review than a very short summary of the main themes covered...
- Egyptian Rock Art
http://travel.independent.co.uk/africa/northern/story.jsp?story=641863 In an article entitled "In the footsteps of Count Laszlo" a trip into the Western (Libyan) Desert is described by writer and poet Robert Twigger. The destination is the Gilf Kebir,...
Egypt
Book review: Lost Oasis - In Search of Paradise
Guardian Unlimited (review by Toby Lichtig)
Robert Twigger's latest travel odyssey is a search for a fabled oasis in the Egyptian Sahara. As in Voyageur, which mirrored the 18th-century Scottish explorer Alexander Mackenzie on his journey across North America, Twigger is following in famous footsteps: the search for 'Zerzura', he tells us, 'drove the exploration of the eastern Sahara'. Harding King, Ralph Bagnold and Count Almasy (of English Patient fame) all pursued it, though none found it. Twigger realises that it probably doesn't exist, but Zerzura is just a pretext. His real fascination is with the desert itself. He and his family have abandoned suburban Oxfordshire for Cairo; now, he simply seeks 'vastness in the face of human confusion and brain fatigue'.Unusually for a travel book, not a huge amount happens in Lost Oasis. Twigger goes on a few expeditions into the Sahara. He builds a special trolley for his baggage. He has trouble getting hold of maps and becomes enmeshed in the Egyptian bribery system. He meets a host of colourful characters, including megalomaniac tour guides and Dutch explorer Arita Baaijens.
See the above page for the rest of the review.
- The True Story Of Desert Explorer Laszlo Almasy
Spiegel Online (By Matthias Schulz. Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan) Thanks Kat! I have a real fascination with the exploration activities of the Zerzura Club and the work of the Long Range Desert Group which followed. Almasy was a member...
- Gilf Kebir - Join The Club
Gulf Life (Richard Hoath) The Gilf Kebir, on the south-western corner of Egypt’s Western Desert – remote, uninhabited, virtually rainless – holds a particular place in desert lore. Named and mapped only as recently as 1926 by Prince Kamal Al-Din,...
- Natural Glass In The Desert
New Stuff (Robert Twigger) Robert Twigger, who wrote The Lost Oasis has been posting some interesting pieces on the above blog recently. This one concerns the 29 million year old glass found at the borders of Egypt and Libya (known as Libyan or silica...
- Book Review: The Hunt For Zerzura
The Spectator (review by Justin Marozzi) The Hunt for Zerzura: The Lost Oasis and the Desert War, by Saul Kelly. This review dates to 2002 but I've only just stumbled across it. It is less a review than a very short summary of the main themes covered...
- Egyptian Rock Art
http://travel.independent.co.uk/africa/northern/story.jsp?story=641863 In an article entitled "In the footsteps of Count Laszlo" a trip into the Western (Libyan) Desert is described by writer and poet Robert Twigger. The destination is the Gilf Kebir,...