Star dunes in the Grand Erg Oriental on October 27, 2012 reflect the season east-west shift in wind direction, and the even more chaotic changes from local conditions and occasional storms.

Bob Payne travels by camel with Bedouins into the Grand Erg Oriental (Great Eastern Sand Sea), and describes an afternoon in the timeless Tunisian Sahara desert.

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The photo is from the Terra Earth-observing satellite, and shows these dunes over a vast expanse of Saharan Algeria called the Grand Erg Oriental.

This erg, called the Grand Erg Oriental, includes hundreds of bumpy dunes that cover a vast area of about 370 miles by 124 miles (600 by 200 km), the Earth Observatory reported.

These dunes are, as it were, the outposts of the Grand Erg Oriental. If we could go to El Oued you would see the great dunes - eight, nine hundred feet high. But that is an expedition.' ...

This erg, called the Grand Erg Oriental, includes hundreds of bumpy dunes that cover a vast area of about 370 miles by 124 miles (600 by 200 km), the Earth Observatory reported.