wasleys

We recently spent a month in Tunisia for the Roman stuff and to have a look at the country.

Pictures and notes about the trip are at: http://wasleys.org.uk/tunisia/

trebex

I like the pics. Thanks for posting.

thursdaysd

Thanks for the link. I had planned to go to Tunisia early 2011, but cancelled due to the political situation, so it is still on my list of places to visit. However, a car and driver is usually a bit too pricey for a solo traveler - did you form any opinion about the buses?

wasleys

I can't really give any reliable information about buses but would make the following entirely subjective comments.

We were surprised by the apparent absence of urban buses in big towns, even Tunis.

We did see a few buses in the countryside which were apparently on inter-urban routes but, somewhat bizarrely, operated with bendi-buses.

We got the impression that getting around by bus might not be easy (and certainly impossible to get to many of the places we went).

What we did see were lots and lots of louages. These vans (often without side windows so probably fairly claustrophobic inside) seem to cover a lot of routes. It appeared that they were a sort of shared taxi which ran to an approximate schedule. These do seem to provide good coverage to most villages from the nearest towns. However most seemed to be driven by maniacs with a death-wish and you wouldn't get me in one for a million quid.

An additional general comment about Travel Insurance. People may want to check where their insurance company thinks Tunisia is. With it being in Africa we had assumed we would need All World cover so renewed on that basis. Too late I found that Tunisia (along with some other Maghreb countries) was regarded by American Express as being in Europe. Pity - we could have saved quite a few spondoolicks if I'd though to check earlier.

ESW

More detailed trip reports of our stay in Tunisia can be read here:
http://www.slowtrav.com/tr/tripreport.asp?tripid=1992

http://www.slowtrav.com/tr/tripreport.asp?tripid=1993

Report 1992 covers the north and the Roman sites
Report 1993 covers the south and the desert.

turaj

ESW...Thanks for the links to your travelogs...you had quite a unique experience. It makes me want to return. We too stayed at the Dar el Medina and really enjoyed the medina of Tunis. Very much like those in Morocco but seemed far less touristic which was so appealing. Really hope that Tunisia can succeed after the revolution. The people are so kind and the country has so much to offer besides beaches.