Egypt - January 2009

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It felt that no sooner had we semi-settled back into a routine after saying goodbye to Jaimee and returning from Scotland, we were off again to Egypt for a couple of weeks!

We boarded our flight to Cairo and all went smoothly and we arrived to beautiful balmy weather! We had some dramas initially after we disembarked the plane as we had to buy visas on arrival, we both attempted to get money out of the ATM and it declined for both of us. Luckily another of our cards worked and we got out enough money to get the visas and get us to our hotel. Turned out our bank shut down both of our accounts because we were accessing from abroad without telling them! It took us many phone calls and almost £50 to get them re-opened, what a hassle! In future I will be telling the bank everywhere I am going!

We settled into the hotel and got an early night as the next day was going to be very busy. We set the alarm but it obviously didn’t work as next thing I know Rob was waking me up saying we were meant to meet everyone downstairs in 10 minutes! So we shoved everything in our bags, missed breakfast and ran downstairs to meet the rest of the group. There were 13 people on our tour including us and 10 of them were Australian. It was a really good mix of people and there was another ‘Di’ from Melbourne as well which was a coincidence!

The driving in Cairo, it’s almost a life changing experience. Every time we set foot into a vehicle I think everyone said a little prayer for their safety! On major roads there seemed to be 3 marked lanes, but nobody takes any notices of lanes and usually there were 4 cars abreast across the road at any one time, not to mention the lack of indicating or any general sense of road order! Anyone who considers hiring a car in Cairo is absolutely crazy! So we held on for dear life and made our way to our first destination which was the oldest pyramid, the step pyramid in Saqqara which is over 4000 years old!

We then made our way to a perfume shop where we also stopped off for lunch. It was amazing to find out that most of the brand name perfumes buy their oils from places like Egypt and then place all the chemicals in them. We bought some Lotus flower perfume which is an important flower within Egyptian history. After that we made our way to Giza to see the 3 pyramids and the Sphinx which was breathtaking. On the first pyramid we were actually allowed to climb onto around the 8th level which I wasn’t expecting. The pictures (when Rob uploads them!) pretty much speak for themselves!

After we made our way back into Cairo we had a few hours to kill (and time to have a shower and eat!) so we went for a bite to eat with some of the group. We had only just sat down when all of a sudden the front of an air conditioning unit sitting above Rob, Stacey & Abby fell on top of their heads! From where I could see it felt like it was in slow motion and slightly surreal and thankfully they were all okay, albeit a bit bruised and shocked! You would think an incident such as this would also warrant some sort of compensation (free meal, drinks, discount…) but that wasn’t even offered!

After the meal experience we headed back to the hotel to pick up our bags before making our way to the train station to catch the first of 2 overnight trains for the trip! The trip from Cairo to Aswan was 900km on the train and took an uncomfortable 16 hours! Neither of us got much sleep and everyone was itching to get off the train by the end! We then made our way to our hotel which was right next to the Nile with beautiful views. After a quick shower we went for lunch and had McDonalds, Egyptian Style! The menu was quite interesting with burgers such as the McArabia and the Big Mac Chicken! After lunch we went and saw the unfinished obelisk and then onto the High Dam which was built in the 1960’s with the help of the Soviet Union. The dam was impressive, but it was the other temples and monuments that had to be moved before the dam was built that was the unbelievable part. We then went and caught a boat over the Philae temple which was one of the temples moved from one island to another. After visiting the temple we then went to a Papyrus shop and saw how it is made before heading back to the hotel. We then had the option of visiting a Nubian village that evening for dinner in a local family’s own home which we thought would be an experience and it was. We took a boat across the Nile to the village and ate a delicious dinner and Rob got to hold a baby crocodile!

After dinner we got back to the hotel and got all of 5 hours sleep before we got up at 3am to get ready to drive down to Abu Simbel, near Sudan. Because of previous terrorist attacks within Egypt all tourists must travel in a military guarded convoy at a certain time for safety. I think there must have been 200 buses in the convoy which took around 3 hours to reach the destination. We arrived to see the sun rise and then we saw the temple, again the pictures speak for themselves! What’s amazing is that the whole mountain was moved to higher ground for fear of flooding, it took 20 years to move the mountain and put it all back together! After spending a couple of hours exploring both temples we then got back on the bus for the convoy back to Aswan.

No sooner had we arrived back at the hotel we grabbed our bags and got back on the bus to then go and board the Felucca for the next 2 days. The next 2 days were spent relaxing and doing absolutely nothing, and it was one of the highlights of the trip! We sailed during the day and then docked on an island during the evening where we would have a bonfire and lots of beer!

We finished our felucca trip at Kom Ombo and then drove to the Kom Ombo temple where we saw mummified crocodiles! Crocodiles were once rife around the area and the people worshipped them in fear of the crocodiles attacking them! We then made our way to another temple in Edfu before driving another 100kms to Luxor! We were treated to a beautiful hotel again on the Nile and spent the afternoon relaxing. That evening we were picked up and went to Luxor Temple which was incredible, I think seeing it at night made it more amazing as well. After spending some time looking around we headed for dinner at an Irish Pub near our hotel before retiring for the evening.

We awoke and headed down for a buffet breakfast before jumping on the bus and heading to the west bank of Luxor to see the Valley of the Kings. Our ticket included entrance into 3 tombs of our choice, and our tour guide advised us which ones were the most spectacular. Unfortunately photography was forbidden inside the temples but the paintwork inside the tombs is still so vivid and bright. We then drove to Karnak temple which was close by before heading to the Colossi of Memnon.

After a traditional Egyptian lunch we had several hours to kill before heading to the train station to catch the dreaded overnight train, so we headed to the Irish Pub again! This time around we decided to take a sleeping tablet along with having a couple of drinks and after boarding the train the next thing we know we were being woken up 15 minutes away from Cairo, it was brilliant!

Today was spent visiting the Egyptian Museum along with mosque of Muhammad Ali before we hit the Cairo Markets for some shopping time! By the evening we were exhausted and everyone had an early night.

The next morning we started packing in preparation for the flight back to London (and the death defying car ride to the airport) at which point I realised my camera was missing, and unfortunately was never to be seen again. Thankfully Rob took just as many photos as I did so we weren’t caught short, but still disappointed. We went and had lunch at the Hard Rock Café before our transfer to the airport and we said our goodbyes to Egypt!

All in all an amazing trip! Back to the daily grind now! Next trip planned ahead is Sofia, Bulgaria in March.

Rob & Di

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