02 Stopover in Djerba // Shopping // Beach camp

Stopover in Djerba // Shopping // Beach camp Who doesn't take the direct way to Libya, can upgrade the tour with a short side trip to Djerba. Along the direct way to the ferry is very little traffic. The ferries drive on a regular base and are very cheap. 0.8 TD (800 Dirham) per one way trip. This saves many kilometers! After reaching the island you are in Houmt Souk within a half hour. There I suggest you to stay in the hotel Lotos, across the entrance of the Marina. It's an old building without luxury but very charming. The service is extraordinary good and friendly, the food is very good, and the beer and the fig liquor are well cooled. The vehicles can be parked inside the safe, lockable courtyard. Also here you get with negotiation talent a double bed room with breakfast for around 40 Dinar. The WLAN is free. N33°53,055' - E10°51,388'. Who looks for exclusivity and luxury can stay in the hotel restaurant Arischa. The courtyard with pool is surrounded by arcades. The food is very good. The prices are very high. The location in the middle of the market area (see photos) is ideal, but there is no lockable courtyard for the vehicles. Walking the one kilometer towards the center, passing idyllic places with nice cafes and bars, you reach the market. The colorful life in this town is truly delightful and invites to stay. The enormous Sunday market with mainly locals and local youngsters fascinated us. We had luck. The dealers in the souks didn't try too hard to sell their goods. Maybe this was due to the fact that we travelled outside the high season. There were no other Europeans visiting the market. Along the beaches in the east are huge hotels made for the mass tourism during the high season. All of this would not suggest the charming experience we saw this time. In a small alley is a store protected by an rod fencing - N33°52,232' - E10°51,331' - behind the big "Sahara Comfort" supermarket we "refuel" our whine sources und bought very good, delicious homemade red wine for 5,80 TD per bottle. In the courtyard of our hotel we poured the bottles into our 24 liter canister. We used this location to load our win supplies at least for safety precautions against the authorities. After we found out that we don't need the ladder to get into the Autocamp AirTop on the roof, our hotel owner offered to store the ladder and the second set of summer sleeping bags in the hotel. Thanks! Now we had to fill the water tanks and we were ready to hit the road in order to meet the other Libya travelers. The most practical meeting point is at the beach near Ben Guerdane. Additionally many goods for the desert trip may be bought her. At the traffic circle in the civic center, go left to Djerba and at the big left turn with intersection, go right towards the beach, after a few kilometers you'll reach the camp site where the palms and fisher boats are located. N33°12,226' - E11°16,332'. On the following day we drove along the beach and then through olive nurseries off-road to Jamila, after 32 more kilometers we reached the border in Rass Ajdir.