Day 3

On the last day of our travels into Tunisia, our first real location to be visited was Ksar Hedaha, where the slave quarters from episode 1 were filmed. But it was only a short detour to travel there by way of Tataouine, and of course this was too good an oppertunity to pass up. We approached Tataouine from the east (whereas Gus and Pamela took a northern approach). Coming from this direction, you not only get welcomed by the "Tataouine" sign, but right in the background is a rather big stadium. I wonder if they have podraces there...

Ksar Hedada is the town where the hotel is located that doubled as the slave quarters, and they make sure to remind you: in front of the hotel is a huge sign that explains that the hotel was used to create the town of Mos Espa in episode 1 (they apparently didn't revisit for episode 2?). I guess the Mos Espa set we visited the day before was the "phantom" part in "Phantom Menace"...

We were able to look around inside the hotel. The rooms are very simple and small, and stone ridges that are basically part of the building are the only pieces of furniture we were able to find. But the architecture of everything is magnificent. Due to the small scale of the rooms, the different wings of the hotel look more like small streets, so you feel like you are walking through a small town of its own. All the small stairscases everywhere that lead to the different levels enhance that feeling and makes the hotel feel a little like a maze.

Next to the functioning part of the hotel, there is also an old part which dates back a good 700 years (see the bottom-left tumbnail on the right)! And nothing much has changed in teh architecture since then. In the hotel part, some of the Star Wars dressing is still there. The dressing shows the camera angles used for the movie very well: the door openings are only partially dressed (see top-left thumbnail on the right), so they only look complete when viewed from the right direction (see top-right thumbnail on the right).

After some refreshments, we continued our way up north to the isle of Jerba, where the last three locations of our visit are located. We got to the island via the ferry which brings you to the port town of Ajim, which doubled for Mos Eisley two decades before.

In a residential area of Ajim to the south of the main road, is the building that formed the exterior of the Mos Eisley Cantina. It doesn't seem to have changed much in recent years since Gus and Pam visited. Several other scenes of A New Hope were shot nearby, such as the troopers halting Luke's speeder and questioning them about the droids.

As you can see, the building is actually located along the coast, and it can be spotted from the ferry as you approach the isle of Jerba (see top thumbnail on the left). The building is used for storage (although not much was there when we were there). Behind the building, someone was fishing, and as we were looking around, another couple also came to look (this close to the holiday resorts on Jerba, the location is probably visited a lot). They were kind enough to make a picture of us at the location (see bottom picture on the left), and we gave them directions to the next (and for us final) location: the Anchorhead mosque, to which we followed them a little later.

Around ten kilometers north from Ben's hovel is a mosque which served as several Anchorhead locations in deleted A New Hope scenes. It also doubled as the outskirts of Mos Eisley, where Luke and companions entered the town with their speeder. Amazing that one mosque and one little building to the side can be made to look like a whole town. And, like Ben's hovel, the mosque is located right along the coast, something which also doesn't show up on screen. There was actually a mass in progress as we were there, so we only looked around outside the building.

We then had a few hours left to further enjoy the isle of Jerba, and then we had to get back to the hotel to return our rental car. It had been a tiring three days, but well worth it (and we had a few days left at the hotel to rest). Tunisia is a wonderfull country to visit, and for a Star Wars fan the sights are especially impressive. Highly recommended!