On the Road Again.... Egypt

Wednesday, June 16 – We were off on the last leg of our grand journey....Africa. First stop – Egypt. Our journey started with a bus ride to Logan, a short flight from Logan to JFK and then an overnight flight from JFK to Rome.

Thursday, June 17 – We arrived in Rome in the morning, had a brief layover and then were off on a 3 hour flight from Rome to Cairo. We arrived in Cairo late in the afternoon and checked into our hotel. Our hotel was a fabulous “compound”with 8 different restaurants, a beautiful pool, a fitness center and a casino – a great place to spend a couple of days recuperating.

Friday, June 18 – Today was a lazy day. We slept in, sat by the pool, watched some movies and basically did nothing. It was wonderful!

Saturday, June 19 – Today was much of a repeat of the day before only Keith and I managed to make it to the gym and much of Keith's evening was spent at the casino where he was able to triple his money – yeah!

Sunday, June 20 – Happy Father's Day!! Today was a hot one in Cairo where the temperature hit 116 degrees. Fortunately the heat in Cairo is a dry heat, so I don't mind it that much (I think Keith may mind it a little bit more). We spent the morning by the pool then checked out to head over to Giza, where we would be meeting up with our tour. We had booked a 11 night/12 day tour that would take us to a number of places in Egypt. Our taxi ride over to Giza was a memorable one. We had the SLOWEST taxi driver ever who drove so slowly that he kept his hazards on for most of the ride. In addition, despite calling the hotel directly, he had no idea where our hotel was and stopped no less than 15 times to ask different people. To boot, his car was filled with all different images of skulls. 1 ½ hours later we finally made it to our hotel. The only upside to our taxi ride was that we got to finally see a little bit of Cairo. Much of the city is very brown and dirty (95% of Egypt is desert), but other parts along the Nile are lush and green. The city is old and historic and being here is a bit surreal. In many ways the city and the society are extremely traditional with their dress, their religion, etc. but in other ways it seems very modern as there are nightclubs, McDonalds and a variety of other “western” influences. I find it fascinating to be surrounded by such a conflicted culture.... Anyway, we checked into our new hotel, sat by the pool for a bit and met up with our group. There are 8 of us total, 6 Americans and 2 Australian. After our “pre-departure” meeting, we headed out to a traditional Egyptian restaurant. Much of the food was stuff I had never seen or tried before and I was happy to report that much of it was quite good. After dinner and fighting the mad traffic back to our hotel, we called it a night.

Monday, June 21. Happy Birthday Charlie and Christine! We were up bright and early to see the Great Pyramids of Giza and they were just that, great. They are the only remaining wonder of the Seven Wonders of the World and were built over 4,000 years ago. We spent several hours wandering around the three pyramids, taking a camel ride and seeing the Sphinx. We even went inside one of the pyramids which, interestingly enough, are solid except for 2 or 3 burial rooms. They were grand and amazing. After having a local lunch, we went to the Egyptian museum where the highlight was seeing the treasures found in King Tut's tomb. It was fascinating seeing how developed a society the Egyptians were 3,000 years before Christ. After the museum we took a quick dip in the pool and then were off to see the sound and light show at the pyramids. They lit up the pyramids with various colored lights and using lasers and sounds told the story of the pyramids. It was fabulous way to spend an evening.

Tuesday, June 22. Today we were off to see the city of Alexandria – a three hour car ride away. Alexandria was at one time the most predominant city in Egypt, founded, of course, by Alexander the Great and the meeting point of the Nile and the Mediterranean Sea. It also was the location of Pharos lighthouse, one of the Seven Wonders of the World. Our first stop in Alexandria were the catacombs which supposedly held about 300 bodies. They dated back to 1,000 BC and were discovered in 1900 when a donkey feel into hole. From there we went to the sight of where the Pharos lighthouse once stood and then had a local lunch. We then checked into our hotel – a lovely spot right on the Mediterranean with it's own private beach. The rest of the day was spent lounging about in the beautiful sun.