Rockin' The Casbah!!

We had an overnight flight from Johannesburg, South Africa to Cairo, Egypt and arrived at 5:40 AM. We were met by our guide, Hend Harb, and our driver. Due to the tense situation Americans still have in this part of the world, I felt that having a fully organized tour would be more enjoyable and less concerning. I was introduced to Hend through our Airtreks ticket agent, and she turned out to be a jewel. Not only did she provide great personal service, but she did a wonderful job in arraigning all the different activities, and staying in constant communication, even when she wasn’t with us. Instead of staying in a typical tourist hotel in Cairo, I had booked an apartment in the heart of Giza overlooking the Great Pyramids. We were the only non-Egyptians I saw in the neighborhood, and walking around really gave us a real cultural experience (or shock depending on the situation). We headed to the Great Pyramids and the Sphinx the first morning and spent about two hours walking around and learning about the history of the different dynasties. The highlight of the morning was our camel ride in the desert with the pyramids in the background. That evening we went back for the sound and light show at the Pyramids and then enjoyed an authentic Egyptian dinner, including stuffed pigeon!!!

Camping with Charlie-eb

The next morning we headed off for an overnight camping safari into the White Desert in the Bedouin Territory. I thought this was only going to be a short trip out of Cairo. Little did I know that it would end up being an eleven hour drive until we finally reached our camp, at which point we were in the middle of Egypt, halfway to Libya. We knew we were in a different land when we pulled up to the only “Rest Stop” which was located halfway into the desert. It was the only building in site, and it was quite the sight to be seen. It looked like everything else around it had been blown up and all the debris left on its property. Sally declared it the most “disgusting” place she has ever had to “rest” and vowed never to use Public Facilities again. The remote location was only the beginning of the adventure… After several hours, we reached the Bedouin Oasis where our taxi was to drop us off with our tour company. We were booked with a local Bedouin company who run these trips and don’t speak much English. My Arabic is pretty rusty (to say the least), but I did manage to figure out that I should have brought our passports with us. Being a naive American, I had left them safely in our apartment in Giza, not realizing we were going to be in another region and that Americans are considered very “important” here. We are supposed to have our locations tracked by the Tourism Police, in case we accidentally went missing!! Since we couldn’t give them our Passports to record, we had to take along a Tourism Police Officer, who would be our security escort for the next twenty-four hours. It was pretty funny to watch this guy casually walk out of the Tourism Office with a small backpack and a machine gun around his neck and pile into the vintage Land Cruiser with us and our Bedouin guides. The boys were pretty impressed that we had our own bodyguard and that he was packing a MP5K!! They kept trying to sneak a picture of his “heat” when he wasn’t looking. He didn’t speak English, so I couldn’t ask if he would pose with the boys and his gun.

About an hour outside of the Bedouin Oasis, we turned off the paved road and into the barren desert. We quickly felt like we were in the middle of nowhere and that we could easily come across folks that were not very happy to see Americans. Did I mention that we were halfway to Libya?? Luckily, everyone we met was very nice and enjoyed talking to us with whatever English they knew. We drove into the desert for about two hours and realized that our driver was the Bedouin version of Dale Earnhart, Jr. He only knew how to drive fast, no matter the situation. Whether it was overtaking other vehicles on the road going around blind curves at 90 MPH or racing down a sand dune that was over a hundred feet tall …, he went fast. The other guide and the bodyguard didn’t look worried, so I assumed he knew what he was doing. By the time we reached our camp site, it was almost dark and a ferocious sand storm had come up. It was as bad as any snow storm I have been in with visibility less than ten feet. As this point, I thought that sleeping out in the desert wasn’t going to be as fun as I first thought and was wandering how we were going to get dinner made, since we had no shelter. The Bedouins are a very resourceful bunch as it turns out. They arranged their vehicle with another one to form a wind break and then unrolled and secured their Bedouin rugs to form walls. This created a very nice shelter to eat and sleep in. Thankfully, the wind died off just before dinner and the night became beautiful with countless stars and no one else around. As you can see from these pictures, Charlie got into full Bedouin mode and spent all night hanging out with the guides (and bodyguard) around the fire, even trying their local tea. It turned out to be a very pleasant night of camping, and Sally was quite the trooper, since she was the only girl. The next morning we broke camp and did a slow drive out through all of the interesting formations that are in the White Desert. This area used to be under the ocean millions of years ago and the deposits that were left over from when the sea receded have formed very interesting pillars and outcroppings. From there it was a hair raising drive back to the Bedouin Oasis to drop off our body guard and switch to a regular van taxi and then another four hours back to Giza. That night we all enjoyed nice long showers, trying to remove the sand that had found its way into every imaginable crevice.

The next day we toured the historic churches, mosques, and synagogues. It is interesting to note that all three of these religions are still practiced in Egypt and that Christianity and Judaism predate Islam here. As the rest of the world still struggles to find a way for these three religions to get along, it is somewhat optimistic to see that they coexist here. OK, that’s my two cents worth on world politics and religion, now back to the story.

Later that day we toured the Egyptian National Museum and the largest collection of artifacts and mummies in the world. The most impressive section was King Tutankhamun’s jewlry display found in his burial chamber. It was staggering to see the amount of gold and precious stones that were assembled and crafted in the seventy days they had to plan his funeral. The entire room glowed because there was so much gold in there. P Diddy and the rest of the nouveau riche have nothing on the Egyptians when it comes to Bling!! The afternoon ended with a boat ride on the Nile river in a classic Egyptian Dow. For our last evening, we booked a Nile River Dinner Cruise. These are pretty touristy but the two hours were very fun, and we even made a new “Friend Along the Way”, Yeah Baby!! It was the first time we had seen classic Egyptian dancing and the whirling dervishes were almost as good as the belly-dancer.

We were all due to fly out the next morning, but only my brother made it out. Due to the world financial crisis, Greece is in deep debt and the government is being forced to make huge budget cuts in order to appease the rest of the Euronations. This means cuts to all public employees, so they decided to strike the day we were scheduled to fly into Athens. This shut down the airport, stranding anybody trying to come in or out of Greece. Luckily I found out about it the night before and was able to arrange another night in our apartment. It actually turned out for the best because we all needed one day to do nothing and go nowhere, because our next leg is going to be a month of training through Europe, stopping in nine countries. As much as I am looking forward to seeing Europe again, Africa has been the most incredible country and one that I can’t wait to get back to. I would like to thank my brother Chris for making the long journey to meet us here and we really enjoyed spending time with him. After spending three weeks with us, I am sure he is enjoying the quietness of being away from us!!!!! Next stop, the Old Country, Ciao Bella!!