The road from Baharia to Farafra, traversed by Cailliaud in 1820,[26] and by Jordan in 1874[27], was taken by a party of the Geological Survey in proceeding to Farafra after surveying the west side of Baharia. The start was made from the same point as the return traverse to Minia, viz., the point of ascent of the Farafra road at the south scarp of Baharia (lat. 27° 48′ 13″ N., long. 28° 32′ 49″ E. of Greenwich), and the general course taken was in a direction 30°-40° west of south. A second, almost disused, road from Baharia to Farafra ascends the western escarpment from the depression 3½ kilometres further north, follows a narrow plateau at the base of the chalk escarpment and joins the main road some distance south of the extreme end of the oasis-depression. The main road after ascending the scarp at the extreme south end of the depression, at the point mentioned, proceeds at first in a direction about 30° west of south, over a limestone plateau, with sandstones and clays below. After 4 kilometres hard concretionary grey sandstones are noticed, and 3 kilometres further on a small hill of hard false-bedded grey sandstone is passed. The escarpment of the White Chalk now approaches within 2 kilometres of the road on the right hand, on the left being slightly further away. These escarpments run parallel with the road for some 5 kilometres, forming a large bay, until at 12½ kilometres the road passes through a narrow pass with the cliffs of white chalk quite close on either side. Almost immediately the cliffs again recede, forming a small bay opening into another still larger at 14½ kilometres. At this point an isolated chalk stack, with great masses of fibrous calcite at the base, is passed, and this hill makes a convenient point for a survey-station. Several more isolated hills are now passed and then the chalk scarps on either side close up and join, the road passing up the escarpment at the end of the bay and gaining the summit of the white chalk at 20½ kilometres. The beds forming the plateau between the end of the oasis-depression and this escarpment of white chalk belong to the middle series of the Upper Cretaceous, the “variegated clays and sandstones,” fully described in Chapter V. From the top of the white chalk escarpment the road continues in a well-maintained direction of about 40° west of south, over a more or less level gravelly plain with outcrops of hard crystalline limestone or chalk. Another, less used, road to Farafra, via the bay to the north-east of Ain el Wadi (in Farafra Oasis), probably branches off about this point. At 35 kilometres a small hill of siliceous limestone is passed and the chalk forms a slight escarpment a little way to the left.