April 7 - 8, 2008 CIRALI, Turkey We took a 1 ½ hour bus ride to the small beach town of Cirali on the Mediteranean coast of turkey. On first arriving we wondered why our travel company had sent us here as this is a very quiet resort town and most of the businesses were just opening for the season. We took a walk into the village for a late lunch and had a look at the very nice beach area. The next morning we spoke to the owner of the hotel ( a Turk who lived in Canada for a few years ), The Canada Hotel, about things to do in the area. We found out there is a very nice old ruins of an important ancient city called Olympos that is a good hike ... read more

April 3 - 4, 2008 CAPPADOCIA, Turkey. Wow !! What an interesting place. Cappadocia is roughly in the center of Turkey at some altitude in a hilly and mountainous region. The hills and mountains of this region are composed of a soft sandstone type of material and for thousands of years people have been digging into the hills creating caves to live in and for monasteries and religious sites. Even today the many of the caves are occupied by local families and many new caves have been created to store vegetables and other products as they provide a near perfect constant cool storage environment. Our hotel, Gamirasu Hotel, is part of one of these old cave settlements and the rooms, restaurant etc are all caves cut into the hills. Some rooms have been “improved” with additional ... read more

March 30 - 31 ALEXANDRIA, Egypt We got an early start today for the 3 hour drive through the countryside to Alexandria. This was a very enjoyable drive with a good look at the very productive agricultural area between Cairo and Alexandria. We were surprised to see the wide variety of crops. Vineyards, Olive groves, Fruit, Nuts, Palms, Wheat, animal feed and some very big banana plantations. Lots of small farms but some big operations as well. It’s amazing what you can do in a desert with a little water. I can’t imagine why there is a bread shortage here. On the way we noticed many tall cone / beehive shaped brick towers, all full of small holes, at many of the farms along the way. We had no idea what they were but were told ... read more

March 25 - 27, 2008. SHARM EL SHEIKH We arrived in Sharm El Sheikh, on the tip of the Sinai Peninsula, on Tuesday evening at the Savoy Resort after a short flight from Luxor. Looking forward to a couple of days of relaxing. Wednesday we spent the day at the resort with some scuba diving and a day relaxing at the pool and beach. I did 2 dives at the reef very close to the resort. The dive site I visited is just a short walk out on a jetty, into the water and presto you are at the reef. This is a nice reef with decent coral and a fair amount of fish. We covered both ends of the reef and the start of a large canyon that goes down into the Red Sea. ... read more

March 21, 22, 23, 2008 ASWAN / LUXOR, Egypt We arrived early Friday morning ( Good Friday - Not celebrated here in Egypt ) in Aswan from Cairo and went immediately to our ship, Ramadis I, that will take us to down the Nile River to Luxor via Edfu. This morning we took a small boat up the Nile River from Aswan to visit a local Nubian village and see the sights along the Nile near the old Aswan Dam Site. This was an interesting way to spent a few hours before checking into our room on the Ramadis I. The Nubian people of this part of Egypt were probably the most affected by the dams that were built as they lived on the river and had to be moved when the lakes were formed behind ... read more