Crossing the Sinai by Benjamin Ergas

The sun was shining; the air was dry. Our chartered caravan of Bedouin guides and camels was off for a ten-day hike across the Sinaï Peninsula - that disputed stretch of land between Egypt and Israel, between the two fingers of the Red Sea. Our ten-day itinerary had planned for walks of fifteen kilometres per day, to be completed early morning and late afternoons when the heat was the least scorching.

Deserts have captured people's imagination and talents for centuries. Looking at vast expanses of sand dunes inexorably remind you of Lawrence of Arabia, Star Wars, The English Patient, Ansel Adams, Théodore Monod or the Paris-Dakar rally. They have all in one way or another cultivated the stunning features and ferocious spirit of the Sahara.

I had explored photographic possibilities in the desert on a number of occasions, including a memorable trip across the Namibian wilderness in August 2000. Its Dead Vlei - a hot and dry lake with dozens of dead trees (over 2,000 years old) clashing against the vivid orange dunes and the bright blue sky - and its Namib desert - famous for its undulating sand dunes that picked up changing patterns of light and shadow through a range of rust red to pale apricot tones - were both breath-taking subjects to photograph. Namibian wildlife (e.g. impalas, gemsboks) was sparse but striking.

For me, the Sinaï evinced a mood that sharply contrasted with what I had experienced in Namibia. The soothing and softening texture of sandy dunes, which would extend for miles as far as the eye could see in the Namib desert, were no where to be found here. Their sensuality and gracefulness was replaced stony wastelands and bare, harsh valleys, untouched by time. Abrupt rock formations and muddled boulders fostered an unsettling feeling of confusion and chaos - a sense of mineral hostility deeply destabilizing to the trekker below. Not that there will be any hope of wildlife to animate this setting and inject a welcoming dose of life: mammals, reptiles and even birds were decidedly more nocturnal so as to evade the scorching heat of the day. Unlike in Antarctica where penguins, seals or birds would greet us in their territory, we were left on our own here in the Sinaï.

Although well protected from the blistering sun - particularly with a Bedouin blue scarf wrapped around my head - health problems emerged one after another in this ruthless environment: sunburns on the exposed sides around my eyes, motion sickness from the camels (I would say inevitable after a few hours on them), blisters forming under my feet and a bit of asthma to top it off. Perhaps it is the price to be paid to experience the desert. I was lucky to have in my expedition a young pharmacist to treat at the very least the bad blisters - certainly my best advice for those treks is to ensure that beyond comfy clothing and good shoes you have a doctor or a nurse in your team.

On the trail, our lives revolved around two primary concerns: heat and water. The former was mitigated by walking during the cooler hours of the day and resting under the shades of palm trees at lunch time. It is well known, but worth reminding how remarkably colder the temperature became once the sun had set down. At night with temperatures close to freezing, we would sleep fully dressed, in warm sleeping bags. As for the water our professional guide gave us some comfort that we would never face serious shortage issues, though we were prudent in drinking slowly the water portions that we all carried. We made at times stops by wells, to please the camels and if no wells was close, the Bedouin guides would travel on camel back by night to fetch the needed water supply from a distant source.

A word has to be said about these camels, those "ships-of-the-deserts" which of course had inspired those giant Star Wars robots in Episode IV. To set the record straight, we were riding the Arabian Dromendary camel, the one with one hump; the Asia camel has two humps. But more straight to the point: if only camels could smell better! I don't know what stunk worse: the penguin rookeries in Antarctica orthose camels in the Sinaï. Both stenches contaminated equally my trousers, to the point that I had to leave them behind. In terms of personalities, penguins were a lot more docile and friendly: camels can be amazingly temperamental and obstinate. But at least they are very useful: camels can carry as much as 1,000 pounds. Bedouin nomads told us that in addition they would use camel hair (hopefully sanitized) for their rugs, tents and even clothes. The difficult bit for virgin Bedouins like me was to mount them without disgracefully tumbling in the rubbles - because they would inevitably get up before you are done throwing your leg to the other side. And when they start trotting at a gentle pace, you feel utterly helpless and vulnerable. But despite all those issues, our Bedouins loved them: these nomads owed to camels their total liberty and independence.

Silence resonates differently in the Sahara than it does in Antarctica. Whilst Antarctica's frozen wilderness was to me comfortably tranquil, the silence of the desert was chilling. Those are the kinds of sentiments which you have to experience first hand to be able to contrast. A sleep below the stars deep into the desert forces you to absorb a much more agonizing stillness, a heavy void that holds you firmly down - like Nature wrestling you to the ground. It was in the southern Moroccan desert, about 200 kilometers south-west from M'Hamid (near the Algerian border), in 1998, that I first remember feeling this sentiment of weightiness. A feeling very peculiar that I had not experienced in Antarctica. As Paul Bowles, the American author who settled in Tangier in the 1940s, once wrote, "This baptism of solitude is a unique sensation where nothing is left but your own breathing and the sound of your heart beating." My Bedouin cook in Morocco had once told me that this silence was so unbearable and distressing to one European woman in a previous trek that she had to quit her journey early.

In the Sinai, the only comforting view is up. Here, you do what you can to elevate yourself, to escape this dry and lithoic landscape. Your mind swiftly drifts to the immaterial. Out of this suffocating and almost claustrophobic physical realm arises a sense of the sacred, an ethereal impulse. You want to step on those rocks and hold on to a metaphysical presence.

I felt this particular sentiment strongly when hiking across this Sinaï desert under blazing heat, dealing with wound and shortage of food, surrounded by sandstone canyons and dry wadis. That agonizing silence, this stony landscape and our precarious conditions made me feel as uncomfortable as the sheperds of the ancient time probably did. I realized that it was inevitable one would feel the need for meta-physical calling and reassurance. Couldn't that contribute to explain the profound ties between the Sinaï desert and the Old Testament - and the fact that this bare, rugged region was the birthplace of our three monotheist religions: Christianity, Islam and Judaism?

At the end of this gruelling desert hike, we reached the Monastery of St. Katherine, built over 1400 years ago by the Roman Emperor Justinian. The complex remains the oldest functioning Christian monastery, and belongs now to the Greek Orthodox Church. My five years of studying ancient Greek were not particularly helpful in communicating with the monks there, but nonetheless the visit was deeply moving. The monastery is located near the base of Mount Moses, where Christians, Muslims & Jews alike believe that God delivered his ten commandments to Moses on its summit.

It was at the top of Mount Moses, 2,285 meters high, that I felt my closest encounter with God. We reached the top after a rather steep two-hour ascent, which began via a winding camel path and ended with 100 steps of repentance. Like any arduous, physical journey, this hike in itself represented to some an inner spiritual journey to cleanse mind and soul. We arrived at the top just on time for a spectacular sundown. Upon seeing layers of mountain crests unfolding into the depth of the desert, I could not help but think of The Traveller Above the Sea of Clouds, a painting by the German romantic Caspar Friedrich. Friedrich was a master in capturing the religious aura of nature, the majestic and mystical forces at play. And I felt that yes, there was something overwhelming on top of Mount Moses, a sense of the divine, of the absolute - where some say "heavens touch the earth". This sentiment of inner peace and stability contrasted with the agonizing feelings that had emerged in the dry, chaotic and lithoic landscape below.

And so the Sinaï was like this great multi-stoned diamond that we transcended to reach our aspiration - for some the divine, for others simply the precious prospects of Egypt or Israel! My crossing was not quite as memorable as that of the Israelites. But it had stimulated in me an unforgettable emotional response, had facilitated a striking series of desert pictures, and had made me realize why camels were, in this rugged environment, the nomads' most precious friends.