From a distance, the sandstone pillars resembled a gathering of giants turned to stone by a displeased god. Our group of eight travelers had set out when the sun was at its zenith, and now, as it made its descent, we arrived at this place with air so pure it seemed to hold no scent. The only sound was the wind, as faint as breath. The rocks are called tassili, and some stand more than 300 feet high. They have been carved by this same disarmingly gentle wind over many thousands of years. This is what deep time feels like.
When I was a child, a teacher tried to give my class some sense of eternity. Imagine a rock 10,000 miles by 10,000 miles. Every 10,000 years a small bird comes and wipes its beak this way and that upon the rock. Deep time, Earth time, captures the entire process of erosion, until the rock is finally worn away.
The 15,000-square-mile Ennedi Massif, in northeastern Chad, is a plateau the size of Switzerland. Between 350 million and 500 million years ago, this part of the globe was an ocean. Then the ocean disappeared, leaving the sandstone floor exposed. The climate shifted from rain-soaked to arid. Sun, wind, and water sculpted the sandstone into a dramatic, desolate, unearthly landscape of gorges and valleys, inselbergs and stacks, towering tassili and natural arches. In the desert the delicate threads of life become apparent in trails of tiny footprints scattered across the sands: here, the tear-shaped tracks of a lizard; there, the dimpled prints of a gerbil.
I have traveled to many deserts, but as I lay in bed in the open air and gazed directly into the face of the moon, it was clear to me that the Ennedi was the emptiest landscape I had ever experienced.
Chad is not on most Westerners’ radars. A landlocked nation in north central Africa, it has long been at the cultural crossroads of North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa. Chad’s recent past is full of coups and rebellions, but today it is a safe haven, especially compared with neighbors like Niger and Sudan. In 2016 the Ennedi was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Two years later the Chadian government partnered with African Parks, a nonprofit that protects and manages reserves and parks across Africa, to create the 19,300-square-mile Ennedi Natural and Cultural Reserve.
We had reached the Ennedi via a three-hour private charter from N’Djamena, Chad’s capital, in a Cessna piloted by a Scot named Angus who swung low “to take a look at the landing strip” before dropping us neatly upon the dry riverbed. There we were met by our lead guide, Rocco Ravà, and loaded into a couple of Land Cruisers for the short drive to Warda Camp, the semipermanent base camp operated by our host, the Société de Voyages Sahariens, an adventure travel company owned and run by Rocco and his brother Tommaso Ravà. Our sleeping tents had been erected in a line at the base of the giant rocks. After an arrival lunch of salad and bresaola, we slept during the heat of the day and awoke at four to explore with Rocco and Tommaso. Everywhere I looked, the towering rock formations took on different shapes: an elephant, an ape. From the tops of the same cliffs, actual animals—pied crows and baboons—followed our progress.
