The Lost Oases

One of the great classics of desert exploration is back in print. In "The Lost Oases", Egyptian diplomat Ahmed Hassanein tells how he set out by camel from Egypt's Mediterranean coast west of Mersa Matruh, heading for the oases of Siwa and Kufra and into the unknown reaches of the Libyan Desert. This perilous eight-month, 2200-mile journey in 1923 took him around the western edges of the Great Sand Sea to El Obeid in the Sudan, and led to his discovery of the lost oases of Arkenu and Uweinat. Hassanein was deep in the trackless desert, but what he had found was evidence of a flourishing human existence ten thousand years ago, and proof that the Sahara was once green. Hassanein's discovery excited the imaginations of later European explorers, such as Ralph Bagnold and Ladislaus Almasy, the model for the eponymous character in "The English Patient". But Hassanein was there first, traveling by camel with Bedouin guides, encountering the mysterious Senussi brotherhood in Libya, and confirming the existence of the long-forgotten oases.
Long out of print, "The Lost Oases" is now available for another generation of readers in this new edition, which includes a foreword by author Michael Haag on Hassanein, his life, and his accomplishments. Copiously illustrated with Hassanein's own photographs, this is a gripping travel narrative by one of Egypt's most important explorers.