Travel from Cairo to Siwa Oasis which is one of the most isolated places in Egypt, it is considered a depression below the sea level which is between the Qattara Depression and the Egyptian Great Sand Sea in the Western Desert, and it is near the Libyan frontier and has about 200 springs, it’s ancient name is Sekht-am which means (palm land).
Siwa Oasis from Cairo takes about 8 hours direct drive, you can drive to Marsa Matrouh and then take the Siwa-Matrouh road which will take about 4 hours and a half.
About 35 thousand people inhabit Siwa. The people in Siwa are Berber tribes mainly from Syria and Lybia, and their customs and traditions are distinctive and very different from the rest of Egypt because of its isolation, that’s why the Siwan’s people customs and traditions haven’t changed all over the years.
The official religion in Siwa is the Islamic Religion, only from the year 1150 A.D and the people are more conservative due to their isolation and being not influenced by any modern corruption.
The Siwan people speak the Amazhigi language, which is a barbarian language that no one can understand it except them, only after Islam became the common religion in Siwa, they used the Arabic language beside their main Berber language They speak Berber to each other and Arabic with any Arab guest, as well as most of them, speak very good English because of their interactions with many tourists, most of the people there work either in agriculture or tourism.
Their main agriculture source is dates, they generate about 25,000 tons of dates per year which is about 2% of Egypt’s date production and they also produce olives with a yearly output of 27,500 tons.
And here are some sightseeing’s that you might see in the Siwa Oasis Desert Safari that Siwa is famous for
1-Gebel el Mawta the Arabic meaning of the (mountain of the dead):
The mountain of the dead, is cone-shaped, it contains thousands of graves excavated in the rocks, where the inscriptions helped to date the oldest graves in it. According to the site of the Ministry of Antiquities in Egypt, the burial continued in this cemetery, tombs, until the late Roman era it contains two of the most important tombs, the tomb of Si Amun and the tomb of the crocodile.
2-The Temple of the Oracle:
The Temple of the Oracle is the temple to which the religions of the Pharaohs belong, and was inhabited by the highest priests, and was visited by a lot of kings, which is also called the temple of the (prophecies). It was built during the 26th dynasty on the rock aghourmy. It consists of three parts, the main temple and the Governor’s Palace and the ward of the guards and has many attachments, as the scared well where the feet were washed and cleaned to consult the Oracle.
3-Cleopatra’s spring:
Also called (the eye of the sun) and its name dates back to the fifth century BC, where the historian (Herodotus) named it, It is one of the natural springs in Siwa Oasis, and is considered the most famous tourist attractions in Siwa.it is said that the Egyptian queen (Cleopatra) swam in herself during her visit to Siwa. Some people described it that it feels like the temperature of their water in winter is so warm that their water evaporates in the morning as if boiling, and in summer it feels cold.
-Si-Amun Tomb4
It is the largest of the tombs in “Gebel el Mawta”, and one of the most important tombs in the Egyptian oases. The views of the tomb represent a combination between the Egyptian and the Greek art, It appears that the owner of the cemetery is of a Greek origin, and married an Egyptian, so he was keen to combine the Egyptian and Greek traditions in features and dress code and others. The tomb dates back from the 3rd to 4th centuries BCE, One of the most important scenes there is the court of Ozer and Si Amun, where he is worshipping a group of gods and goddesse.
5-Bir Wahed:
Also called the “Great Sand Sea Well”, the hot sulfuric spring is located within 10 kilometers from the oasis near the Libyan border in the heart of the Great Sand Sea.Bir Wahed a very breathtaking place, in the heart of the sand dunes, that is 90 meters high. It is not just an ordinary water well, but you can call it a river of water that is flowing strongly from the inside of the land and they discovered wells of oil next to it and around it.
Trips from Cairo to Siwa Oasis mostly starts at 6:00 AM in case of clear weather, and if it is foggy you can travel from Cairo to Siwa Oasis at 8:00 AM.
Comments