The Many Faces of Eye-Turk

Oran is a state in Algeria that is surrounded by the Mediterranean sea. Especially in Eye-turk there are 5 or 6 beaches that we could choose from. I do not remember the names of the beaches bus i was given a tour on the whole Eye-turk last week. The sea views are breathless and magnificent. It's a pity that i didnt get to go down to the beach and have my legs buried in the sand or watered my feet with the water. From Eye-turk, it took us about 1 hour to tour the whole place. The sceneries changed profoundly as we drove.

The first beach we reached is the ever famous one for tourists. It reminds me of Bondi Beach in Australia, except that the shops are smaller here. There are tourists everywhere and both corners of the road were fully parked with cars. The stalls owners were so used to tourists snapping pictures everywhere that when i just wanted to snap a picture of a stall from inside the car, the owner saw me and gave me a big smile. So i snapped him in as well. I would say this is a great shot. Besides selling all the gaming stuffs for beach activities, there were also stalls selling fake Arabic and French cds, cigarettes, mineral water, beach towels, beach wears such as pants and bikinis! It is a bit unbelievable that they wear bikinis here since they are mostly Muslim but they do. The photo proves that the statement is a 100% genuine. As we drove, we got higher into the mountain and here are some shots of how merry and crowded some of the beaches were. People were setting up tents to spend the day and having fun in the water.

Then the sceneries changed to forests and bare fields. As we drove past all the various forests, we saw cars parked at the side or inside some of the forest. We saw kids riding ponies and horses, adults relaxing and sleeping on mats in the forests, families sitting and chatting and of course BBQ-ing. BBQ-ing is the one activity that is very popular during winter. However this year's summer is rather pleasant and sometimes chilly, hence the locals cant wait till winter to enjoy their favorite activity. When we drove higher into the mountain, we saw the agricultural side of Oran. I am not very good at identifying what they plant because all looked like dried grass to me. However, it is nice to come across animals such as mull, sheeps, donkeys, horses and cows standing there doing nothing or munching away grasses. There was once when i saw from the car, a mother with her daughter standing on top of a small hill. What amazed me is the little saw me and actually waved to me! Its a very touching gesture. From Eye-turk, if we were to continue to drive through the mountains, we will be arriving at the Morocco boarder. The locals used to travel via this mode but apparently there were some misunderstanding between both Algeria and Morocco government now and the boarder is now closed.

Looking at the photos that i took, the beautiful sceneries awed me. Sometimes the clouds looked so low that i thought if i climbed onto the tallest hill i will be able to touch it. It is not everyday we come so close to mother nature and this makes the whole 2 hours journey all worth it.