This desert is apparently the only land route leading into Egypt.
-Herodotus, Book III
That’s certainly what it looks like from the air when you fly into Cairo. Nothing but sand on all sides, even the Delta looks sandy, from all the poorly mixed concrete buildings. On the Darb al-’Arba’een we had a most practical introduction to this fact…forty days crossing nothing but raml, ramla, rimaal, armul, and araamil- as Lane gives their meaning…sand, a sandy place, sandy places (if many), sandy places (if few), and sandy placeses (the plural of a plural).