makthar daddy

Mactaris (the modern Makthar) is another of these sites that's an hour away from Le Kef. It's up very high (3000' or so) and was the only place I felt chilly in Tunisia.

I visited from Kef, as a stop on my way to Kairouan. My bright idea was to take the first bus there... which left at 5:30 AM. I took it, and arrived at 7:10, almost an hour before the site opened. Such an eager beaver, I am.

I was hoping for some nice morning light, but as it turned out, I just missed the rain. Here's the forum with its monumental arch of Trajan at one end:



One of the bath complexes at the site:



This is the schola iuvenum, a building I've seen alternately described as a place for educating young men in Romanness, and as a "paramilitary headquarters". Take your pick:



And finally, the other baths in Mactaris. I'm pretty sure that they haven't been fully excavated; this big arch should be a lot higher than it is:



The modern town of Makthar is pretty grim, and I wasn't too eager to stick around any longer than I had to. Unfortunately, after an hour or so at the site, I'd missed the next louage out of town and the next bus wasn't until midafternoon. But I persuaded another louage driver to drop me off in Kairouan: he charged me 8 dinars (about $6), which made everybody standing around snicker about how the American was getting ripped off...