Egypt trip - Part 1

Ok, Will have to do this quick and nasty as it’s getting late…

First off, sorry if we haven’t called anyone since getting back (on Sat night)…our phone decided to die whilst we were away, and the BT man hasn’t come to make it all better yet.

Anyways,

Our trip to Egypt (in miniature!)

An auspicious start,

We were lucky and got good flight times, so weren’t due to leave our place till about midday on Saturday ….which of course meant that I didn’t have to start packing till that morning…

…after my drum lesson

…….that finished at 10:30 :) ….bah, how much do you really need for a 2 week trek around a strange country anyways?

If you take a page from my dad, not much!

Justin (my good mate who came along with us) managed to turn up to our place at 4:30 AM on Sat morning…and not after a restful pre-journey night in bed either….

So all and all a good start...me not really packed, Caren over packed, and Justin with a Hangover!

Still, off we set at 12pm on the dot, with plenty of time to get to Heathrow and fly our first leg, a 1.5 hour stint to Milan in Italy.

A quick 2 hours in the Milan airport (and some hastily eaten pasta) and we were off to Cairo (a 3.5 hour flight ish).

We landed about Midnight local time at the wonderfully modern and hospitable Cairo airport!

..modern that is if you live in the dark ages…

There was a brief struggle as we tried to work out where the immigration office was to get our Visa’s, only to finally figure out that you buy them from the Bank and stick them in your passport yourself!

With that dealt with, we were through “customs” and off to get a taxi to our Hotel.

It was at this point that we first really discovered what Egypt is all about….People trying to get you to buy their stuff!

Dozens of guys vying to get our attention (and fare) .. we finally settled on a guy and cut a deal for £8 Stirling to get from the airport to our Hotel, the mighty “Indiana” in Doki, Cairo….luckily that was about the right price (thanks to some last minute online research by Caren).

So in we hopped, and discovered the 2nd incontrovertible fact about Egypt (well Cairo in particular)…the drivers are friggen CRAZY! …

Here we are in a Combi-Van / Taxi, hurtling down the Cairo motorway, no lights on, weaving in and out of other hurtling vehicles with no lights on!

As it turns out, you don’t drive with your lights on anywhere in Egypt, they are only used for signalling other drivers.

The real tool that keeps everything in order on the road (day or night) is that multipurpose safety device, the horn!

The horn is used for everything, and I mean EVERYTHING! On the road..

Anyways,

We made it to our luxury hotel *cough* and got set up in our room.

Our first day was free before the tour started, so we slept in a bit, grabbed some breakfast from the hotel and struck out on the town.

I think we were all a bit culture shocked for the first few days…I know I was ultra paranoid about the food / water, terrified of getting sick…and justifiably, as most people get some sort of stomach trouble within a few days of being in Egypt…..it’s got to do with the Nile…you see….its not….very…….clean.

And yet, as they say in Egypt “the Nile IS life” .. Everything springs from it…everything is washed in it (including our food), and, undoubtedly, all toilets flow into it!...

With that in mind, we wandered around Central Cairo, constantly being badgered and accosted by “helpful” locals who happen to know a “friend” who owns a shop down the road that we might want to visit.

What we hadn’t picked up by this stage is

1) how to say anything in Arabic

2) its ok to just ignore, or say no straight to someone’s face

3) EVERYONE is trying to sell you something, no matter how “free” it is.

But we were soon getting the knack of it.

We stopped in at the Hotel Intercontinental for lunch (too scared to eat anything from any less than 5 star at this point!), and enjoyed the view from the restaurant.

(View of the Nile from the Hotel Intercontinental in Cairo)

We ended up spending a few hours lounging around in the cool, as it was about 38 degrees that day, and headed back to our Hotel.

There was a brief meeting that night with the Tour group, where we met all our travelling companions (by and large Aussies and Kiwi’s), paid up, and discussed the next few days activities.

The next morning was a leisurely 7am rise…..what we didn’t know was this was the latest we were going to get up for some time!

We met up with the tour people and our Local tour dude Rafiq (an Egyptian guy who lived in Cambletown, West Sydney for the last 7 years!), hopped in a Mini bus and headed for the Egyptian Museum.

Along with us was an Egyptologist to point out the interesting parts (which was basically all of it)…she was really really interesting / funny and intelligent, so made the visit to the Museum a lot more than it would have been.

I should mention that we were in Egypt for the end of the Holy month of Ramadan, where all Muslims fast during the daylight hours, and can only eat and drink after the Sun sets at 5:30.

Anyways, after the Museum we hoped back in the Mini bus and drove 45 mins out to Giza, the site of the most famous objects in Egypt, the Great Pyramid and the Sphinx..

(Caren, Me and Justin with the Great Pyrimid (and friends) in background)

We all had a good look around, and Caren and Justin went into one of the Pyramids’ (I was a wee bit too claustrophobic for that).

It was quite funny wandering around the Pyramids, as there is SO MUCH dodgy activity going on…dozens of guys trying to sell you “original” and “rare!” artefacts and souvenirs …guys trying to get to you take a Camel ride (well known for the trick of taking you out into the desert and refusing to take you back until you pay them more money!) , and the worst criminals of all, the armed “tourist police” guards….at once comical, and exceedingly dodgy!

Anyways, the Pyramids were of course awesome, as was the Sphinx, but before long we were back in the Mini bus and off for some lunch.

(Caren and Justin with one of the dodgy , good for nothing "tourist police" aka sanctioned petty criminals ..you better believe this photo cost us something..:)

Back to the Indiana to freshen up and grab some dinner, and then off to the Train station.

Yay…a 12 hour train ride down to Aswan!!!

It was every bit as bad as you imagine a 12 hour train ride might be!

Although , I must say, 12 hours in a reclining chair sure beats what the poor bastards in the 2nd class train had to put up with…17 hours of standing crammed like sardines!!

So, very little rest that night, and we saw our first (of several) sun rises

(Sunrise from the Train...only 5 hours to go!..)

Off the train and to our hotel in Aswan, the Basma Hotel.

This hotel was very very nice, and had a great swimming pool…we had a few hours to freshen up, and then we were off to Visit the Phillae Temple on the man made Lake.

This temple had been re-located because of the huge Dam at Aswan that caused a massive lake to form.

(Phillae Temple from our boat)

We had an Egyptologist to show us around the temple who was pretty funny (had a really weird southern Californian based Egyptian accent!).

An hour or so of that, and then back on the Boat and back to the Hotel for the afternoon relaxing in and around the pool, or down at the Aswan markets for the bold!.

Early to bed that night, as we had a 2AM rise the next morning to take a Land convoy to the famous Abu Simbel temple, a 4-5 hour drive to the south.

I should point out that it is illegal for any westerner to travel outside of a city un-escorted, so the majority of our land travel is in an armed convoy and with and armed guard in the vehicle with us.

There are checkpoints everywhere, ostensibly for the safety of tourists and convoys, but in reality they are just opportunities for armed guards to extract bribes from people to let them go by!

It’s just as well we were travelling with an Egyptian guide…you’d be screwed if you tried to do Egypt on your own! …talk about a different world!

Anyways,

Another Sunset under out belt and another 6+ hour transit through the desert:

(Yet another sunrise over the desert..this time from a Van!)

….and we were at the famous temple.

This Huge set of temples were also moved because of the massive lake formed from dam’ing the Nile, which is in itself an AMZING feat……these things are huge!

…needless to say, the Egyptian government somehow found a way to make other countries pay for it!

(Caren and I infront of the VERY impressive Abu Simbel temple of Ramses II)

These temples were built by Ramses II for himself and his wife, although as temples to worship the gods, not as tombs.

Back into the Convoy for the 5 – 6 hour journey back to Aswan.

Aswan itself is a great little city…and as we were getting the “hang” of dealing with the locals, we were quite comfortable having a look around the local bizarres and markets.

Aswan is on the Nile but is bordered by desert (just like every city in Egypt!) , and is very busy.

Especially with Ramadan on, there was a lot of loud Islamic prayer coming from loudspeakers around the city well into the night, but it really just added to the interesting and foreign flavour…we were definitely not in Kansas any more!

(Aswan, the Nile and the Sahara)

That night we took a small boat across the Nile to a small Nubian village.

The Nubian are an old race of people who have been struggling to live in Egypt for thousands of years, but are considered an underclass.

In this village, the income was 100% tourism, and the people survive by taking tourists on camel rides (non dodgy ones on the most part!), selling trinkets to tourists, and , as in our case, inviting tourists into their homes to eat.

We were welcomed into a Nubian families home and served some local food (very nice!) , and played with their baby crocodile’s and turtle!

(our group eating in a Nubian home)

Back to the Basma hotel, and up at the crack of dawn for a 6 hour Drive up to Luxor!

Luxor was once the capital of Egypt, and has a very high concentration of some of the most impressive Temples.

Luxor was probably my favourite city in Egypt (although I must admit Cairo did sort of grow on me a bit).

Anyways, we arrived at Luxor and bedded down for the evening…shock horror another early rise for what was to be our longest/busiest day on the tour.

**pic Luxor**

(The Nile and some of Luxor from the top of out hotel)

The next morning we met up with a new Egyptologist, and headed over to the West bank of the Nile to visit the most significant archaeological site in Egypt, the valley of the Kings.

I should explain the significance of the Nile to ancient Egyptian religion…the Sun rises (at exactly 5:30) in the East every morning, and sets at exactly 5:30PM every night on the west bank of the Nile.

There fore, all things relating to spiritual life and living are on the East bank, and everything relating to Death and the afterlife are on the west bank.

So, with that in mind we set out to the Valley of the kings, a huge Valley in the desert with more than 30 Pharaoh’s tombs hidden (and several undiscovered ones waiting for a lucky archaeologist to stumble across it!)

Our Egyptologist was going to show us through 3 significant tombs. Thutmoses III, Ramses II (same guy that built the Abu Simbel temples, known as the Great Pharoah) and Seti IV ….I won’t go into it here, but it was very very interesting.

**pic valley**

(The Valley of the Kings..note how that mountain looks like a Pyramid..very sneaky!)

After that we visited the Funeral Temple of Hatshepsut , just over the hill from the Valley of the Kings.

Hatshepsut was a female Pharaoh who pretended to be a man to stay in control.

(Me, Justin and car at the Temple of Hatshepsut)

That afternoon we crossed to the Eastern banks of Nile, and Visited 3 Temples…

The Temple of Karnak (Wow!) , the Temple of Luxor, and some other one I can’t remember the name of.

Trust me, by now even the most ardent Egypt fan is getting a bit temple’d out ;)

That night, it was Back to the Train station for a 9 hour overnight train ride Back up to Cairo

Joy!

After a 3hour delay to the train, we were under way!

…arrived in Cairo and straight on the Mini bus to visit, More Temples!! And some pyramids.

Today was the hardest day of the tour, as, even though we were all enthusiastic about seeing the sites, we were all very VERY tired.

Still, we soldiered on, and got through 2 temples, a Church in “old Cairo”, and the Saqqara stepped Pyramids!

The next day, Caren, Justin and I were off for the second part of our trip…a Week in Dahab on the red sea coast!

Once again, an early rise for another 9 hour Drive in an armed convoy to the Sinai peninsula, and the township of Dahab.

Dahab was great, but I think I’ll have to leave it for another night as it’s getting very later here now, and this took much longer than it should have!

To be continued…………….

(PS I’m too tired to proof read, so if this stops making sense, assume I’ll fix it up later!)