14-10-08 Today is our final day of our holiday. We plan to spend it laying around the pool till later this afternoon then we have to catch the shuttle bus back to Abu Dhabi for the last night. Our flight leaves at 10am tomorrow morning. Kevin, Sophie and I don't want to go home, Sophie has even written a list of the places she wants to go to 1. Greece 2. England 3 Germany 4 Mexico. Brianna though has had enough and wants to get home. We arrive back in Brisbane 8am Thursday, Sophie reckons she is going to school Friday, [View Full Entry]

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10-10-08 - 12-10-08 After a 3hr flight from Jordon we arrived at Abu Dahbi airport. It took quite a while to get through immigration, but we finally reach the luggage pickup area and grabbing our bags headed off to catch the curtist bus to Dubai. We reach the drop off point, and from there taxied to our hotel. The next day had nothing planned as this was our wind down before home. It's gone so fast, we want to head off to Greece and beyond but it can't be. We decided to book a desert safari tour for the afternoon. These [View Full Entry]

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12-10-08 to 14-10-08 This morning we slept in a little as we had only to check out, then find our way to our next stop the new Atlantis. It is located at the end of The Palm, and is an amazing site as you approach it. As with most things in Dubai this place is nothing but the best. It has only been open for 2 weeks, you could still smell the fresh paint on the walls. Atlantis has shops, restaurants, cafes, water park, beaches, pools, huge fish viewing aquariums in the hotel and a dolphin bay where you can swim [View Full Entry]

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04-10-08 Leaving the Nile this morning we joined the security convoy to travel 4 hours across the desert to the Red Sea city of Hurghada. The convoy is made up of cars, buses and vans which travel together with Police vehicles manned by police and security people with semi-automatic weapons. The convoy gathers at the starting point, each vehicle being security checked. Once underway the convoy moves very quickly past numerous intersections manned by more police and military personal. There is a short rest stop half way, then it's back on the road till you reach Hurghada. At this end securit [View Full Entry]

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05-10-08 With a rare free day, we decided to take a tour in a glass bottom catamaran to the coral reefs, just off shore. Brianna wasn't keen to go as she gets sea sick. We assured her it would be fine as the water was dead flat. We had to wait for the 2nd boat as we just missed the first one (not our fault the driver was late picking us up). While waiting we took a few photographs and Sandra almost got cast into the sea by a local fisherman who was fishing on the wharf. His hook almost [View Full Entry]

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06-10-08 We were picked up at 7am for 9am transfer by boat to Sharm El Sheikh, when on arrival at the boat harbour we discovered that the ferry had left at 4am, as our guide had not confirmed our departure time we missed the boat. No other boats were going today, so an alternative had to be found. If we couldn't get to Sham today, we would miss climbing Mt. Sinai to watch the sun rise, and miss visiting the Monastery of St. Catherine. Climbing Mt. Sinai was one of the highlights we really wanted to do. We also had to [View Full Entry]

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08-10-08 Today we awoke to a fine morning, as is normally the case in the desert, and to a spectacular view of the rugged mountains around Petra. We went and took some photos before breakfast, then headed down for a feed. After breakfast we packed once more, as after todays excursions we would head on to Amman. Or should say back to Amman as that is where we came from the night before. We were to spend the day in the lost city of Pertra. We thought it would be a long hot day, but the weather was quite pleasant. The [View Full Entry]

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09-10-08 We arrived at our hotel in Amman last night, and this morning we tour the city of Amman before making our way to Mt. Nebo and on to the Dead Sea. We visited the Citidal, and the Jordan Archaeological Museum located at the same site. The Citidal site contains examples of Roman, Byzantine and Islamic settlement. The Dead Sea Scrolls are located in the Archaeological Museum. These scrolls on the western shore of the Dead Sea. One of the metal scrolls tells of a large treasure located somewhere on the west bank of the Jordan River. It has not yet [View Full Entry]

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3/10/08 This morning we went to the West Bank to explore the buriel grounds in the Valley of the Kings and Queens. The remote, barren valley of the Kings was the the necropolis of the New Kingdom pharaohs. By digging their tombs deep into the Theban Hills, pharaohs had hoped that it would stop robbers stealing their priceless possessions buried with them. It was an unsuccessful strategy. Despite their hidden locations, every burial chamber was raided except for those of Yuya and Tuya and Tutankhamun. The terrain is mountainous desert. With our entry ticket we visited the tombs of Ra [View Full Entry]

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2/10/08 Today we're going to visit the temple of Horus. Being buried under sand and silt for nearly 2000 years, it is the largest and best preserved Egyptian temple. Construction of the temple began in 237BC and the main temple complex took 25 years to complete. It still amazes me to think that we are walking the same steps and touching the same walls that the early Egyptions have. After our temple visit we continued to sail up the Nile and passed through the Esna lock. [View Full Entry]

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