Off the Couch and On the Road

On the first night in Cairo, whilst I and one other caught up on sleep, the rest of the group ate at a local Egyptian restaurant and arrived in reception the next morning with their hands clutching their chests, claiming they were in love. With juice.

Apparently the range and quality of the juice (lemon and mint, mango, strawberry… the list was endless) was so exceptional it was beyond description. My roomate and I looked at each other with raised eyebrows and shrugged with a, ‘Um, ok, we’ll take your word for it’. But it had begun - every restaurant, cafe, street stall and city was judged on its juice, to the point where the boys would drink three before a meal and two during, and our table was always filled with empty glasses with no room for food.

The enthusiasm was contagious, and soon we were all in on the game - a mango juice wasn’t good enough unless all you were doing was consciously trying to suck up chunks of mango through a straw, and failing. The strawberry had to be fresh and tart but not bitter, and of course size and presentation mattered.

The waiters always had a twinkle in their eye when we confirmed the juice order - was it so unusual? Did we discover a hidden jewel of Egypt? Or just catching on to what everyone else already knew? No matter, we had fallen in love, and it’s hard to think straight when you have 10 choices of heaven on the menu. Food was an afterthought.

True, Egypt had exceeded all expectations to date, but who would have though our tour leader would say, ‘Our next stop is Dahab, you will love it!’ to be met with a chorus of polite smiles and nods, before saying,’And they have the most amazing juices!’ preceeding the kind of palpable excitement reserved for teenage girls at a Justin Timberlake concert.

Love just doesn’t make sense.

-Sarah

We had a 5am wake-up call and a brief river crossing by boat before meeting our sprightly donkeys for the hour ride to the Valley of the Kings the next morning. The donkeys were a hell of a lot more comfortable than the camels were (although a sports bra would have been nice) and had sudden spurts of energy that seemed to come from nowhere, causing all the donkeys in the group to lurch forward, as though they couldn’t bear the thought of arriving last.

Our guide, Adlle, bought us our entry tickets and, upon looking at the queue of hundreds trying to enter the site past the armed guards, winked and told us we would ‘find a way to get around this’. He then walked straight to the front of the queue and started asking tourists for tickets, to which a new queue formed and he collacted a few tickets before collecting ours, hence we were all at the tomb of Ramses IV in under 2 minutes. Only in Egypt.

We saw the tombs of Ramses IV, IX and XVI that morning, the most vivid of all the tombs in the valley, all piled near each other, sometimes actually on top of each other as was the case of King Tutankhamon, which is why it was left untouched for so many centuries (Ramses IX tomb was built on top).

King Tutankhamon (who died at 19 of a gangrenous leg, discovered only recently. Random fact for your next dinner party conversation!) is probably the most famous Pharoah in modern times, but was actually a bit of a nobody in his time, so we spared the money to see the tiny tomb and instead spent the time in awe of the other tombs. As I said to one in my group, ‘just when i think I can’t possibly be more amazed, I am. Amazing.’

The vivid paintings (not carvings) on the stone stood out after more than 3000 years in clear whites, blues, reds, yellows and browns, every inch of the walls and roof covered, from the tall narrow entrance, down the long corridor to the coffin room at the end. Amazing.

We travelled by bus several hours later to Dier al-Madina (tombs of the workers) where the workers who built the Pharoahs tombs were buried. On their days off they spent their time carving and painting their own tombs, smaller and brighter than the King’s tombs with unusual details in the paintings such as hair and muscle tone we hadn’t seen previously. ‘Perhaps they borrowed the paints and tools from the Pharoahs tombs to create their own?’ Adlle suggested, the first office stationery thieving maybe? The tombs were grouped in lots of 60, the teams of workers used to build the Pharoahs tombs scattered across the sandy hillside. The valley was stunning and although only 63 tombs have been fully excavated, experts predict there are hundreds more to be discovered.

We walked to dinner that evening and ate traditional Egyptian food overlooking Luxor temple beautifully lit up, the Nile, and in the distance, the tombs of anicent idols. I didn’t think I could be any more amazed, but I was. Amazing.

-Sarah

After the quick bus ride to Luxor, we ate a very western meal of bugers and fries at a neaby cafe and a few hours later travelled by horse-drawn carriages to Karnak temple, where we met our local guide, Adlle ... [Continue reading this entry]

There are few things better that laying on a cushion-covered open-air deck of a wooden Felucca, with its tall white sail gently steering you silently down the Nile. Except maybe doing it for three days. It was a magical three days, ... [Continue reading this entry]

It seemed I had only just shut my eyes when the 3.30am wake up call stirred me to stumble out of bed, grab my daypack and meet the rest of the group down in reception for the 4-hour bus journey ... [Continue reading this entry]

After a shower to recover from the neverending train journey, we head out to the Old Cataract Hotel where many of the rich and famous have stayed, including Agatha Christie, who allegedly wrote 'Death on the Nile' during her stay. ... [Continue reading this entry]

I met my group on Saturday night before we head off on a day tour of Cairo the following day. The group was tiny - 5 plus myself (all Australian bar one Swiss) and our British tour leader Cheryl, which ... [Continue reading this entry]

I did nothing but read and sit in the hotel the rest of the week. It was a long week. -Sarah

My saviour came in the form of a man called Ahmed. I walked up to the Sheraton Hotel for a real coffee that morning, deciding to get a taxi from that hotel where they understood english words like 'museum' and ... [Continue reading this entry]

The traffic in Asia is insane. Mad. Nobody stops, instead swerving around all obstacles (read: people, cars, chickens, pigs) like a choreographed performance. So the best way to tackle a road crossing is to stare down each bycicle, car or ... [Continue reading this entry]