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Updated: May 22, 2025
In front of the outpost line lay a great expanse of dry salt-lake, separated from the sea by a hundred yards or so of sand dune, and stretching away as far as the eye could reach, a sheet of greyish white. These dry lakes or marshes, Sabkhet, to give them their local name, are a feature of northern Sinai.
Further inland, smaller marshes were often met with, and a hole dug in them soon filled with bitter water, quite undrinkable, but valuable to wash away the sand. South of the great Sabkhet, the everlasting sand ridges began again, spotted with clumps and low bushes of scrub, and rising in the distance to pure yellow hills entirely without vegetation.
On December 4th we moved forward again to Salmana, three days later to Abu Tilul, and the next day to Bir el Mazar, twenty-five miles west of el Arish. Part of these mobiles lay over Sabkhet, where it was possible to keep step and the pipers attached to each company could amaze the desert rats with alien music.
It was at Salmana we received instructions issued by G.H.Q. and carefully passed on to battalions by the intermediate staffs to report immediately all submarines observed, stating time and direction proceeding. This put us on our mettle and the desert was carefully watched without success on our part, but a neighbouring unit was able to report a submarine moving north across Sabkhet Bardawil.
Ever since the worst heat of summer had departed, football had been played in the Battalion wherever a flat bit of Sabkhet could be found while the men were always glad to kick a ball about even in the heavy sand. Now with better opportunities the Battalion played several matches, defeating among others a battalion of the 42nd Division, while company and platoon matches were common.
The oasis consisted of a broad crescent of palm trees running for two or three miles round a sabkhet. Great clusters of dates hung from most of the trees but they were still unripe, not sour or bitter but very hard and with a curious stringent taste.
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