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Took a (4)hr flight from Dubai to Cairo via Emirates Airlines. The flight provided some serious entertainment; firstly, Emirate's in flight entertainment is awesome offering some 500+ movies, cds, games etc - just awesome. Secondly, the air waitresses and waiters had no control over the passengers. The mili-second the wheels touched down the people jumped out of their seats and starting opening the overhead compartments - what a scene. The entire time we taxied down the runway people were falling over each other, and luggage doing the same. We just sat quietly and shook our heads as the uncivilized world looked at us as if we were from another planet - apparently we are!

Before coming to Egypt we had spoken to several people and read many blogs regarding their experiences. The overwhelming consensus was that Egypt is a frustrating place to travel independently - so on that note we decided to book a (15) day tour. We are definitely not tour types but what the heck, a chance to sit back and relax!!!

Our tour began the moment we arrived in the Cairo airport when we were greeted by Pacho #1 (greeting host ) who insists on taking $30 US from us for our Visa - this was scam #1, which we later got reimbursed for, but would be a theme for our first (5) days of our tour. In summary our first (5) days can be characterized by unenthusiastic guides, lack of communication and very little knowledge of the English language. For us independent travelers, it proved to be a rather painful and frustrating experience. Who needs someone to check them in at the airport especially when they don’t understand or want to listen to simple instructions as “Window and Aisle Please”. To say tourism is important to the country of Egypt is a huge understatement - it accounts for 80% of the employment in Egypt. However, that number is extremely inflated due to the number of “tokens” that are employed for minimal tasks. Every time we went somewhere we were meet by another Pacho, tour representative, their task was to say hi and then leave?

Having done some previous research on Egypt it was obvious that touts were an annoyance to everyone, along with the expectation of being tipped. Our view and mindset was and continues to be - done India, therefore we can survive anything that is thrown our way! Egypt however is light years behind India and is extremely primitive - lacking the basic services which was shocking. The exception to this was Sharm El Sheikh.

The most lasting memory of Egypt will definitely be the tipping situation. In the world of sports it is referred to as “Tennis Elbow” - usually caused from the overuse of the elbow, which in most cases is due to using the incorrect grip. In Egypt it is caused from the continuous - never ever stopping motion - of the open palm and arm being raised to the shoulder and back down to the hip. No shit - it is if they have robotic arms that once the button is pushed, the motion starts at sunrise and doesn’t stop until the lights go out. Joking aside, the sad part of Egyptian tourism is the fact that the majority of the tourists, including us, do tours. This unfortunately results in very little currency ever changing hands outside of the tour - locals don’t see the effects of the tourist dollar - thus they need tips to get anything from the tourist.

There is no doubt that the money from the tour operators does not flow down the pipeline of workers. We personally experienced this when our guide asked us for $16 dollars for purposes of tipping himself and the staff on the cruise boat - this money for certain would not have seen the light of day once he got his hands on it. As a result, he never received a dime from us and we discretely tipped those staff deserving of a tip - the look on their faces when they received the money was that of over joy - it proved what we had thought.

Having arrived in Cairo at 10:00pm the night before we were up the next morning at 3:00am to fly to Abu Simbel to see The Great Temples of Rameses II. Won’t bore you with its history per se, but what is so incredible about this site is in the 1960’s when the High Dam was constructed to create Lake Nasser the resulting effect was to flood 100’s of kms of desert. However, parts of the desert that would be flooded where home to great temples, of which it was decided (3) would be dissembled and reassembled on higher ground during the construction phase of the Dam. This monumental task of dicing and slicing Ramses II was an absolutely an amazing feet.

On day (3) of our tour we started our (3) nights cruise up the Nile, which was really nice. It is just incredible to see everyday life on the Nile and how it services as the main artery to the country. It cannot be overstated as to how important the Nile is to Egypt - without it there would be no arable land in the entire country. It is weird to see the lush banks of the Nile that are so arable and then just further a field the desert begins for hundreds of miles.

These are just a few thoughts on Egypt. We will be sending out (3) more blogs on Egypt of which (2) will only contain pictures, thus no banter will be included!!!!!!!!

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