It's too bad, the camel has been part of our lives for 3,000 years. Now the romance is over. As a means of transportation, the camel is finished.
-Mansour Fares Hussein, Dept. of Agriculture, King Saud University, quoted in The New York Times, “Desert Sun Sets on the Camel’s Glory Days”, April 10, 1989
By our second trip together in 1988, the Darb was already feeling past its prime. Maybe old Bilal was retiring at the top of its run, and maybe KhairAllah was entering the sheep trade just at the right time. In Egypt, camels were in demand less and less for transport and traction, and mutton more and more for roasting and stewing.