In the first cold weekend of December 2009, I hit the road with eight friends. We headed south in rented sedans, towards the desert. When our plans in Douz fell apart, I began telling the tale of the desert castle Ksar Ghilane. Soon, we were cutting south down the pipeline road towards it. Spare steel tubes for repairing the line lay on the sides of the blacktop. We passed an oil refinery, camels and innumerable security checkpoints. Pulling into the town midday, eager to hike, we asked for the directions. In Arabic and French, both answers came out: over there, north-westerly.
We then walked across the dunes for an hour and half. IThe gusts of wind chilled the day’s heat, but buffeted us around. We stopped on a small hill for some sandy antics and barefoot yoga. The wind made some prolonged poses very difficult. Our force split, and Byron, Derrick, Hana, Daniella and I pushed onwards. Hana spotted the castle, and we approached its crumbling walls with two hours of sunlight left. A small shack made from palm fronds and two-by-fours was empty and inviting. The fortification, orignally built by the Romans and then occupied by the Berbers, was now ours. Perched atop with mouths agape, we watched the sun fade in the west, the Milky Way spread above us, and then the moon rise in the west.
Our palm frond fire burned most of the night, and we beat the chill off with whiskey and revelry. The purity of place, the solitude and quiet, and the company is unforgettable.
The next day, for various reasons, we woke slowly. Even in winter, it was hot. Flies swarmed whenever one stilled. Derrick, Daniella and I walked to some tree stands in the dunes and discovered an old well. The wooden structure looked flimsy, but we were able to use a pulley and rope to raise a blue plastic sack of water. No one drank it. A creaky shelter stood nearby. Metal, wood and clothe walls housing broken jerry cans and tire rims strewn about next to empty soda bottles and unraveled rope. We shuffled back to our camp’s bounty: oranges, tuna, creamy cheese, stale bread and sweet sesame paste called halwa.
The rest of our group joined us for the last night. This time, a guitar provided the center of entertainment, as Cody played “Just the Two of Us,” other covers from Bill Withers, Tom Waits and Al Green alongside a few originals he had cowrote with his friend Hamsa. Again, the sun fell, the Milky Way sparkled, and the moon rose on the desert night.