On my flight from Jo'burg to Cairo I met an Egyptian man who took me in like I was his daughter! My dear friend now, Salah! He gave me his number and offered to show me Cairo, so after traveling to the oases I took him up on his offer. Salah drove me around Cairo and showed me where Anwar Sadat was assasinated and now laid to rest. My first trip to the pyramids was courtesy of Salah and it was great! We only had an hour and rushed to see all the pyramids and the scenic viewpoints as well as the sphinx! It was great that I had Salah to tell the tourist police that I just wanted one more picture!!! He was kind enough to take a few pictures of me in front of the great wonders of the world!! Thank you Salah!! We then moved on to his friend Meena's place. She moved to Cairo from Canada about three years ago! A lovely woman who fed us and entertained us with her stories of being cheated in the markets when she first moved to Cairo!! Now she's got a seafood guy she can trust! After a lovely meal, Salah showed me Cairo by night! All lit up in it's colorful beauty! We saw a couple that just got married standing on a bridge getting photos with an amazing backdrop of the Nile and Cairo Tower! Locals standing on statues near the opera house and the riverfront alive with couples and families and falafel vendors! Oh the smell of those tasty falafels!!! YUMMY!!!!!!!!!! So around midnight Salah and I finally said our sad goodbyes but not without him stopping for a tasty treat of peanuts for me!
Next morning I met my tour group of 10 and off we headed to the Egyptian Museum for an information session that blew my mind! This museum is overfilled with mummies, sarcophagi, jewelry, pottery, canopic jars and amazing stone carvings!! The archeology foundation is building another museum near Giza to house it all...but even that won't be enough because every month there is a new discovery! Next stop The Pyramids!! Even cooler the second time around! Listening to the history the discovery and the conservation made this time a different experience! The pyramids are really as amazing "AS SEEN ON TV"!! I even crawled inside one...didn't find any kings just a bunch of other tourists! It was incredibly cool to know on May 11th 2009 I was inside a pyramid!! After climbing out of a pyramid I climbed on it near the No Climbing sign...yes bad tourist I know...sorry! Off to see the Sphinx!!! I gave him a kiss and was in awe at the view! Head like a king and body of a lion with one of the pyramids in the background...look out Nat Geo have I got a picture for you!
After a stinky and scary camel ride our group was off to a perfume shop. Egypt is known for making essences. They've got all the labels but call them by different names like Essence of Nefertiti or 1000 Arabian Nights...I didn't buy any...I'm okay with Eau de Manali (not a word Maulik!) Next we stopped at a papyrus shop and there I did a little damage...thank goodness for Capital One! After a tasty lunch we headed for the train station and set off for Aswan!
In Aswan I saw the Philae Temple, had dinner in a Nubian village and bargained for a few souvenirs and my most favourite sight...Abu Simbel!! At Philae Temple my group and I had a lovely time acting out the story of Set, Osiris, Isis oh and uh...sorry Mannie and Wassim but I've forgotten the other woman's name...it was the heat that melted my brain! A great temple with stunning work and the size is the one thing that always fascinated me the most!! Just incredible!!! Abu Simbel was my favourite because of it's story...this monstrosity of a temple was relocated 65m higher and 200m back from the river after the river was dammed. An incredible feat! Ramses was a bit full of himself at this temple depicting himself so largely and carving his cartouches so deep! But the man was very smart!
Aswan is where the felucca trip began and it was the highlight of my time in Egypt. I know the temples are great, but sailing on the Nile without a motor, just a sail and relaxing and reading and swimming and sitting in the sun and getting browner and browner (sorry mom and dad) and listening to the sound of the water slap up against the boat...just heavenly!! We only spent two nights on there, but I could have spent an entire week! The nights were great as well as we docked along the bank of the Nile had a fire sang and danced and smoked a little shisha (flavored tobacco)! Sigh...those were the days...Our boat docked finally in Kom Ombo and off for more temple sightings!! Edfu Temple was brillant again with it's size and the depth of the carvings into the stone...patience is what these artists and engineers had the most.
Last temple stop...Luxor! It was blazing with heat and humidity here!! Stepping outside caused a puddle of perspiration to quickly pool at my feet!! In Luxor I eyed up the most stunning ring at a silver shop that I've ever seen!! Almond shaped, about an inch and a half long and half an inch wide with markecite and rubys...oh it was beautiful!! But if I wanted to return to the US I would need it to fly me home, so it was left there in the window longing for my finger...sigh. The next two temples were just as amazing as everything I saw from the beginning of this trip. Luxor Temple by night lit up with light orange bulbs against a clear midnight blue sky oh just incredible...when I thought I wouldn't need a tripod and this was the moment I did...oh guess I'll just have to come back one day...hopefully on Nat Geo's expense...a girl can dream can't she!? Final Temple...Karnak Temple which one day will be connected to Luxor Temple by a stone path 5km long lined on both sides with sphinxes (or is it sphinxi???). This temple is known for people walking around a statue of a scarab for good luck. So I circled it 10 times!! A scarab is a beetle...like the ones in the movie The Mummy, but none came to life!
My last destination in Egypt was Dahab...ahhhh...Dahab, a place of absolute bliss!!! Drinking freshly squeezed juices, eating seafood caught that morning, smoking shisha and listening to the waves of the Red Sea, diving in the Sea and witnessing an amazing reef of corals from colors that only computer imaging could create as well as spotting lion fish, snorkeling in the Blue Hole and feeling like you are in a world all your own (that is until a group of 50 Italians come talking with their hands through the water)...ahh...yes bliss...just heavenly bliss!!
Off to Jordan...although I was excited to see Petra I was sad to leave Egypt behind a place where I fell in love with the people and the culture...a place I will definitely return to in the future! Crossing into Jordan was a trying experience as our group needed to make our way via Eilat, Israel. At the border crossing I was grilled on my birth place, my religion and why I had a Dubai stamp in my passport. I politely answered all questions and was given access to pass through Israel to Jordan. I wasn't the only who was held up with a barrage of questions. My Kiwi friend Hayley was actually stopped and escorted to a security office secondary to having a stamp from Morrocco in her passport. After about 20 minutes or so she was also given permmission to cross the 20 minutes through Israel to Jordan. First destination...Wadi Rum. We spent the night at a cheesey but entertaining bedouin camp...no unusual suspects here, just good food and and dancing! A desert safari ride into Wadi Rum with quite an entertaining driver! The color of the sand and rock formations were absolutely fabulous! Knowing that we were riding through a desert that once was all under water was quite striking...global warming...sigh.
Second stop...PETRA!!!!!!!!!!!! A city 2000 years old carved out of a mountainside and eroded away by floods and wind to create an amazing landscape is a sight to see. My words or pictures can't even come close to depicting the beauty and size of this UNESCO World Heritage Site. The impressive Siq winding it's way and creating a narrow passageway to bestow upon the doe-eyed tourist a spectacular and quite sizeable building known as the Treasury! Now I saw Petra by night as well and this one mile corridor was lit with small white candles in brown paper bags to lead you in the darkness to the Treasury. The walk is completed in silence as to just to let your other senses take it all in and let you be surprised by the scene at the Treasury. More candles lit, people sitting on Jordanian designed mats all surrounding a sole bedouin man sitting in his white gallibiya, head dressed with a red and white checkered scarf and stabilized with a black ring waiting to dazzle your auditory sensors with music flowing from his oud (a violin like instrument). A magical experience! When I thought the show was over another sound mystified me as I tried to locate it's origin. From inside the Treasury a man was playing the flute and it rang through the area with a sweet melody! Again I can't tell you enough how amazing this sight was and one can only really experience it in all it's glory in person! Seeing only 10% of Petra by day was exhausting but really worth it...the guide on the other hand...not so much. Walking around Petra I wondered how it survived for so many years because when you enter in a tomb/cave and touch the walls the colors of sand just come right off onto your fingertips! It was like a painter's palette! And to think this was only my third day in Jordan...what more could be in store for my eyes!! THE DEAD SEA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The second highlight of Jordan! No lifevest needed here...you couldn't swim if you tried...and honestly I didn't try! I was content lying on my back and just floating and enjoying the feeling of absolute weightlessness! The water itself was oily and VERY salty which my eyes had the unfortunate first hand experience of feeling. The sign says just continue to lie on your back and the pain will pass...yeah that didn't happen for me so I felt my way to the shower and relieved my pain and then headed back to the sea for more floating, but not before getting muddy!! Now I'm not sure if the guy who coated me in mud was official or not, but I can tell you he got more than his one dinar's worth! At this point in our trip the seven of us were coated from face to feet with the Dead Sea mud and posed looking like really bad super heros for great photos and even better memories!!! Saying goodbye to the Dead Sea was hard to do but had to be done.
My trip ended in Madaba where I saw the oldest mosaic map containing the Dead Sea, Jerusalem, The Nile, Jericho, Mt Nebo and Gaza! Just incredibly beautiful!! This artist had patience as well. The mosaics are no more than a fingernail big and the colors are amazing!! In Madaba I found a lovely little coffee shop next to the Archealogical Park and enjoyed the loveliest hospitality in Jordan! The shop owner let me use his laptop for two hours while I sipped his refreshing latte and chomped quickly through a homemade chocolatechip cookie!! Later that same evening I enticed the rest of the group to hit up the shop for some lattes! This trip was absolutely fantastic!!! My dearest Egypt, I will be back for you!!!
