KHARGA:
Oasis of temples and castles
Kharga is clearly different from the image most people have of an oasis out in the desert. It has been the most important town in the development plans for the Western Oases, and has presently a population of more than 100,000 people. And when the architecture is totally dominated by concrete blocks and wide roads, the result is that few tourists use more time than necessary in town. During my oasis circuit of 2004 I met several Western travel guides telling me that they omitted Kharga all together, because there was nothing to see. That is totally wrong, Kharga has sights from 3 millenniums.
Traditionally keyhole shaped well, but with a modern pump helping as the pressure of the underground reservoirs has dropped in modern times.
Kharga means in Arabic "point of departure", in opposition to Dakhla, "point of entrance", which lies further to the west. The population of Kharga are Berbers with roots back to the time when the oasis was a station on the famous 40 Days Road between Sudan and Egypt — famous because of the merchandise; slaves.
Sunset over the desert near Qasr el-Ghweita.
