Well, after 23 hours of flying and a short drive home from Cincinnati, Lea, Frank and I made it home last night around 3:30 p.m. All the flights were F,F and E (fast, fun and easy)! The only hiccup was that Lea and Frank's checked luggage ended up being loaded on a later flight. Getting a delayed luggage claim filed, etc. took some extra time, but we were on the road to Lexington around 2:00. Bless Lillibeth's heart for coming to get us and for her patience. I couldn't get cell phone service in the airport. I received a voice mail from her once we landed, so I had coverage on the tarmac, but not inside the terminal. Anyway, it was all sorted out and we were on our way home tired, but happy.
Turns out that Martin was on the 3:30 flight that Lea and Frank's luggage was on. Apparently he saw their bags on the carousel and delivered them to our house last night! What an angel he is and what a gift it was to see them on our back porch last night around 9:30! That kind of thoughtfulness and generosity was experienced by us throughout our trip and we're so grateful to have friends and family who are so loving and considerate. We're truly blessed!
On our drive home from the Cincy airport, we were amazed at how green and hilly Kentucky now seems to us after 3-weeks in Egpyt!
We're, of course, jet lagged. Frank went to bed first. He's been fighting a cold that the group started sharing near the end of the cruise. Please send energy that Lea and I can avoid getting this. Thanks! Then Lea went to bed around 7:30 and I stayed up until 10:00. We all woke up this morning at 6:30 a.m.
Well, at this point, I think this will conclude my new entries for this Egypt Blog. If I think of something else to add, I will. I've already added some videos to previous posts, so if you get a chance, please feel free to go back and take a look at those. I could never get the videos to load properly while in Egpyt as the file size seemed to put me over my bandwidth limit. There are MANY things to be grateful for in being home, and true high-speed broadband is one of them (along with pups, soft tissues and thick toilet paper)!
Egypt is an amazing country and I highly recommend it as a destination for anyone wanting to have an adventure. The sites, temples, landscape, and Nile valley are magnificent and on a scale that no photo can do justice. However, Egypt's biggest treasure is her people. Egyptian hospitality knows no bounds and a visitor's comfort is of prime concern. As our dear friends Manal and Basem say, "Nothing is impossible." and that sums up the attitude and spirit of the Egyptian people. We're truly blessed to have visited Egypt again, and I hope to go back again some day!
Thanks for all those who visited my blog and who added comments along the way. I haven't had a chance to read them all, yet, but hope to later this morning. Knowing that you were following our journey with us motivated me to continue to post and I could feel you there in Egypt with us. Thanks for that support and for the love and energy you sent us--it made a HUGE difference. Please feel free to continue to comment. There's no reason we can't continue to discuss the highlights of the trip together in this blog by using the comments section. I hope that trip participants, most who weren't able to keep up with this blog while traveling, will add their comments and memories, too. This blog was written from my experiences only and there's so much more than any one person's perspective to share. I hope that the sharing and commenting continues. If not, this blog seems to have served it purpose by allowing me to share with you a little of what we experienced while in Egpyt. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did writing it.
I hope to see all of you again in person sometime soon. Until then, much love and gratitude,
Stuart
Saturday, October 3, 2009
Friday, October 2, 2009
2 Flights down, one more and a drive to go!
We just landed in Richmond after an uneventful flight from JFK and awaiting our next flight which departs around 11:30.
Going back to the trip, we left the Black Desert and arrived at our hotel in the Bahariya Oasis shortly before dark. Lea, Frank and I were disappointed that the new section they were building in January was still under construction. This was the most disappointing oasis hotel experience we had had on our Inspection Trip in January and, unfortunately, the hotel hadn't changed any since. One trip participant commented to Lea the following morning that the hotel was the example of what happens when men build, design, run and maintain a hotel without any input from women! He's probably correct. The hotel grounds and common areas are nice enough considering you're in very rural Egypt in the poorest oasis in the desert. But the rooms sorely lack any comforts--for instance, no shower curtains. Like our visit in January, we had low water pressure and could only get a trickle of water from our hand-held shower head. Lea was exhausted and after spending the night in the desert we both desperately wanted a nice hot shower, but none was to be found at this hotel. After several visits from maintenance, and a shower head replacement, we figured we had it as good as it was going to get and took our showers.
We went down to dinner hungry but for what turned out to be the poorest offerings we'd had all trip. There was little available to us other than salads. We sat around our table eating quietly looking every bit the travel-weary group we were. Many of us had been traveling together for three weeks which included a major Dragon energy working (and all that entails) with Samuel--we had good reason to be whipped. As Lea would say, we looked like we'd been "rode hard and put up wet." which is a phrase I think she picked up from Gwen back in her horseback riding days. Lea retired early, but I was concerned about going back to the room at 8:00 p.m. I knew that I should avoid going to bed that early if I wanted a full night's sleep.
So I joined another table and we chatted for a while. We left the dining room and as I was walking back to our room, I stumbled across a small group of ours sitting out in the garden chatting. The temperature was delightful, so I asked if I could join them. It was a delightful exchange of White Desert trip stories. Jeanean was sharing stories as only Jeanean can with Catherine S. egging her on every bit of the way! It was a hoot and I'm glad that our guide, Mena, was a part of this experience. He commented on how early we retired every night, especially when we had an early morning the next day. On this night he was able to see that not everyone was in bed by 10:00 p.m.
The following morning was a check out and a 9:00 a.m. departure. The tombs and museum of the Golden Mummies didn't open until 9:00. So, we made our brief visits and then stopped at a coffee shop under the guise of a bathroom stop for our group, but I think the real reason was that our drivers wanted to have a "shisha"--tobacco water pipe. After spending about 30-minutes there, they took us to a little oasis very near the hotel where we had spent the previous night. We walked back through some date palms and ended up having a delightful picnic in the shade of the trees consisting of: eggplant; tomatoes, olives and cucumbers; falafel; bananas, pears and dates collected from the trees we were sitting under for desert, and more.
There are many varieties of dates all of which can, and are, eaten at different times of the year. The picnic dates (as you can see) were yellow and tasted a little like caramel! Yum! At the restaurant in the Khan al Khalili market, we ate fresh red dates. These were sweet, had the texture of a crisp apple with a similar water contecnt, but were a little starchy. Apparently, these dates can be eaten once dried, as well, which must occur around Christmas time, as our guide referred to these as Christmas dates.
When we arrived at the picnic site, we walked past a donkey. Once we were settled in at our picnic area, Lea remembered we had an apple in our backpack and wanted to feed it to the donkey. When she was in college, she used to train donkeys for the Shriner Circus! She loves donkeys, and animals in general, so we went back so she could feed the apple to it.
We then loaded up in the Land Cruisers and headed towards Cairo. Shortly after we were on the main road one of the cruisers had a flat tire. We watched as they changed the tire and had us on the road again in less than 5-minutes. In watching at how efficiently this took place I assume this was a common occurrence in the desert. I was right. It happened again with another one of our vehicles later that afternoon. They must go through a lot of tires!
We made another unexpected stop enroute. Like the Black Desert stop, this wasn't something we had experienced in January and it was delightful. We went off road and up a steep sand dune for a photo op. The view was stunning!
Also stunning, was the fact that what we were standing on (had driven up) was a dune of compacted and crushed seabed shells.
What ended up happening was that every jeep had a photo taken with their driver. It all started rather spontaneously with jeep #1. Each vehicle "stole" their idea and wanted a photo with our fellow travelers and driver. After we did this, we agreed that we wanted a photo taken with everyone. To make a tri-pod, we attached Don's camera to a portable and flexible tri-pod I had brought with me. We then attached it to a hand-hold on one of the vehicles. Don set his camera to timer mode so he could join the frame. Thanks, Don, for catching this Kodak moment for us all and for emailing the photo to me so quickly so I could post it.
We had climbed up the dune in the Land Cruisers following a switch-back style path. However, we went straight down the steep side of the dune on our departure!
We hit the outskirts of Cairo around 5:30 p.m. Friday is the Islamic holy day of the week, so Thursday afternoon traffic is like our Friday afternoon rush hour traffic (but since it's Cairo you can multiply it by 100!). Traffic was bumper to bumper and moved at a snails pace! We didn't arrive at our hotel until 7:10 p.m. Eighteen of the 27-member group had a 12:30 a.m. flight, so we needed to check in to the hotel, shower/shave, repack and gather back in the hotel lobby at 9:00 p.m. for an airport transfer! Obviously, this was a real challenge to do after such a tiring day of travel and a long, 3-three week trip! It was a mad dash, and I didn't think we were going to be able to do it, (I think it took all the energy Lea could muster to be able to do all of this at such a frantic pace) but we all made it back in time to leave for the airport. Traffic again was very heavy and chaotic--typical Cairo traffic! Earlier in the trip, we had noticed that they steer their grocery carts the same way they drive. At the airport we learned that they do the same with the luggage carts. To us, it's complete madness, but to them it's organized chaos.
Well, the airport was stressful, but we made it through the gauntlet and our flight seemed to leave on time which leads us to where we are now, in Richmond. It looks like our flight to Cincy is getting ready to board, so I'll close for now.
Thanks and Love,
Stuart
Going back to the trip, we left the Black Desert and arrived at our hotel in the Bahariya Oasis shortly before dark. Lea, Frank and I were disappointed that the new section they were building in January was still under construction. This was the most disappointing oasis hotel experience we had had on our Inspection Trip in January and, unfortunately, the hotel hadn't changed any since. One trip participant commented to Lea the following morning that the hotel was the example of what happens when men build, design, run and maintain a hotel without any input from women! He's probably correct. The hotel grounds and common areas are nice enough considering you're in very rural Egypt in the poorest oasis in the desert. But the rooms sorely lack any comforts--for instance, no shower curtains. Like our visit in January, we had low water pressure and could only get a trickle of water from our hand-held shower head. Lea was exhausted and after spending the night in the desert we both desperately wanted a nice hot shower, but none was to be found at this hotel. After several visits from maintenance, and a shower head replacement, we figured we had it as good as it was going to get and took our showers.
We went down to dinner hungry but for what turned out to be the poorest offerings we'd had all trip. There was little available to us other than salads. We sat around our table eating quietly looking every bit the travel-weary group we were. Many of us had been traveling together for three weeks which included a major Dragon energy working (and all that entails) with Samuel--we had good reason to be whipped. As Lea would say, we looked like we'd been "rode hard and put up wet." which is a phrase I think she picked up from Gwen back in her horseback riding days. Lea retired early, but I was concerned about going back to the room at 8:00 p.m. I knew that I should avoid going to bed that early if I wanted a full night's sleep.
So I joined another table and we chatted for a while. We left the dining room and as I was walking back to our room, I stumbled across a small group of ours sitting out in the garden chatting. The temperature was delightful, so I asked if I could join them. It was a delightful exchange of White Desert trip stories. Jeanean was sharing stories as only Jeanean can with Catherine S. egging her on every bit of the way! It was a hoot and I'm glad that our guide, Mena, was a part of this experience. He commented on how early we retired every night, especially when we had an early morning the next day. On this night he was able to see that not everyone was in bed by 10:00 p.m.
The following morning was a check out and a 9:00 a.m. departure. The tombs and museum of the Golden Mummies didn't open until 9:00. So, we made our brief visits and then stopped at a coffee shop under the guise of a bathroom stop for our group, but I think the real reason was that our drivers wanted to have a "shisha"--tobacco water pipe. After spending about 30-minutes there, they took us to a little oasis very near the hotel where we had spent the previous night. We walked back through some date palms and ended up having a delightful picnic in the shade of the trees consisting of: eggplant; tomatoes, olives and cucumbers; falafel; bananas, pears and dates collected from the trees we were sitting under for desert, and more.
There are many varieties of dates all of which can, and are, eaten at different times of the year. The picnic dates (as you can see) were yellow and tasted a little like caramel! Yum! At the restaurant in the Khan al Khalili market, we ate fresh red dates. These were sweet, had the texture of a crisp apple with a similar water contecnt, but were a little starchy. Apparently, these dates can be eaten once dried, as well, which must occur around Christmas time, as our guide referred to these as Christmas dates.
When we arrived at the picnic site, we walked past a donkey. Once we were settled in at our picnic area, Lea remembered we had an apple in our backpack and wanted to feed it to the donkey. When she was in college, she used to train donkeys for the Shriner Circus! She loves donkeys, and animals in general, so we went back so she could feed the apple to it.
We then loaded up in the Land Cruisers and headed towards Cairo. Shortly after we were on the main road one of the cruisers had a flat tire. We watched as they changed the tire and had us on the road again in less than 5-minutes. In watching at how efficiently this took place I assume this was a common occurrence in the desert. I was right. It happened again with another one of our vehicles later that afternoon. They must go through a lot of tires!
We made another unexpected stop enroute. Like the Black Desert stop, this wasn't something we had experienced in January and it was delightful. We went off road and up a steep sand dune for a photo op. The view was stunning!
Also stunning, was the fact that what we were standing on (had driven up) was a dune of compacted and crushed seabed shells.
What ended up happening was that every jeep had a photo taken with their driver. It all started rather spontaneously with jeep #1. Each vehicle "stole" their idea and wanted a photo with our fellow travelers and driver. After we did this, we agreed that we wanted a photo taken with everyone. To make a tri-pod, we attached Don's camera to a portable and flexible tri-pod I had brought with me. We then attached it to a hand-hold on one of the vehicles. Don set his camera to timer mode so he could join the frame. Thanks, Don, for catching this Kodak moment for us all and for emailing the photo to me so quickly so I could post it.
We had climbed up the dune in the Land Cruisers following a switch-back style path. However, we went straight down the steep side of the dune on our departure!
We hit the outskirts of Cairo around 5:30 p.m. Friday is the Islamic holy day of the week, so Thursday afternoon traffic is like our Friday afternoon rush hour traffic (but since it's Cairo you can multiply it by 100!). Traffic was bumper to bumper and moved at a snails pace! We didn't arrive at our hotel until 7:10 p.m. Eighteen of the 27-member group had a 12:30 a.m. flight, so we needed to check in to the hotel, shower/shave, repack and gather back in the hotel lobby at 9:00 p.m. for an airport transfer! Obviously, this was a real challenge to do after such a tiring day of travel and a long, 3-three week trip! It was a mad dash, and I didn't think we were going to be able to do it, (I think it took all the energy Lea could muster to be able to do all of this at such a frantic pace) but we all made it back in time to leave for the airport. Traffic again was very heavy and chaotic--typical Cairo traffic! Earlier in the trip, we had noticed that they steer their grocery carts the same way they drive. At the airport we learned that they do the same with the luggage carts. To us, it's complete madness, but to them it's organized chaos.
Well, the airport was stressful, but we made it through the gauntlet and our flight seemed to leave on time which leads us to where we are now, in Richmond. It looks like our flight to Cincy is getting ready to board, so I'll close for now.
Thanks and Love,
Stuart
Greetings from New York's JFK Airport!
We just arrived a few minutes ago and it's great to be back in the USA--the land of high-speed internet (among, of course, many other awesome things and people!)! :-)
First of all, Lea asked that I tell her folks hello for her! "Hi!" Clyde, Neva, Bob and E! :-)
Our flight from Cairo was fast, fun and easy. I may have written earlier that Lea and I are flying business class cashing in some (most) of our American Express points. The flight home was even better than the flight over. We both got a lot of sleep. Lea's was Ambien induced, mine was sheer exhaustion.
Our last day in the desert was good but really made for a long travel day. But before I get into that, I think I should fill you in more on the day before. I mentioned the white desert and how impressive it was. After visiting it, we went back to the camp for lunch and then packed our bags and headed to the final oasis on our safari--the Baharya Oasis--via the black desert.
Before reaching the Black Desert, we had a scheduled stop at the Crystal Mountain. Didn't I already mention this? I'm not sure. Sorry if this is a repeat. It's not so much of a mountain as it is a hill and the crystals aren't quartz crystals that we often think of when we think crystals, so at first, based entirely on the name, the site can be a disappointment. However, upon closer inspection, people began to realize how amazing it is to find all these crystals growing out in the middle of the desert. They're everywhere you look.
When we were packing up from lunch at the encampment in the desert, you could see water vapor, like steam, rising in the air. It was sooo hot!. After a while we noticed the formation of clouds--the first we'd seen on our entire trip! By the time we reached Crystal Mountain there were very distinct clouds over head, so providing us with much welcomed shade. Here's a photo of one. I thought it looked like a peace dove.
After Crystal Mountain, we were back in our LandCruisers and heading to the Black Desert. We made one brief roadside stop for a photo op, and hardly anyone left their vehicles. Mena told me he thought our group was tired of the desert, and maybe they were.
On our Inspection Trip, we didn't make an excursion into the black desert, we only saw it from the road. With the group, we actually went off road and got to see the black desert up close and personal. It was nothing like I imagined it to be. It was more awesome than I thought it would be. Here's a view from up top the mountain. The wind up there was a amazing the temperature must have been 20 degrees cooler than the white desert was during at noon. It felt so refreshing! At this stop everyone came back to life again. Everyone left the vehicles and enjoyed the desert. One of the drivers made tea using a tea pot on a propane fueled burner. Everyone was laughing and having a good time! Maybe we weren't tired of the desert as much as tired of the 120 degree temperatures! This site was shaded and much cooler. Yay!
I need to cut short as they're going to boarding our flight soon. We fly next to Richmond, then Cincinnati and then drive home! We're so looking forward to being home again soon and seeing our pups! We've really missed them! I'll add more from Richmond, if there's time. If not, I'll come back once we're settled in a bit at home and share with you the last day of our trip.
This really was a trip of a lifetime and our group, the Egyptian people, the land, our guides and, of course, Manal and Basem, all made it so magical and memorable for us. This is a journey that we'll always remember.
I'll add more soon. Until then, much Love,
Stuart
First of all, Lea asked that I tell her folks hello for her! "Hi!" Clyde, Neva, Bob and E! :-)
Our flight from Cairo was fast, fun and easy. I may have written earlier that Lea and I are flying business class cashing in some (most) of our American Express points. The flight home was even better than the flight over. We both got a lot of sleep. Lea's was Ambien induced, mine was sheer exhaustion.
Our last day in the desert was good but really made for a long travel day. But before I get into that, I think I should fill you in more on the day before. I mentioned the white desert and how impressive it was. After visiting it, we went back to the camp for lunch and then packed our bags and headed to the final oasis on our safari--the Baharya Oasis--via the black desert.
Before reaching the Black Desert, we had a scheduled stop at the Crystal Mountain. Didn't I already mention this? I'm not sure. Sorry if this is a repeat. It's not so much of a mountain as it is a hill and the crystals aren't quartz crystals that we often think of when we think crystals, so at first, based entirely on the name, the site can be a disappointment. However, upon closer inspection, people began to realize how amazing it is to find all these crystals growing out in the middle of the desert. They're everywhere you look.
When we were packing up from lunch at the encampment in the desert, you could see water vapor, like steam, rising in the air. It was sooo hot!. After a while we noticed the formation of clouds--the first we'd seen on our entire trip! By the time we reached Crystal Mountain there were very distinct clouds over head, so providing us with much welcomed shade. Here's a photo of one. I thought it looked like a peace dove.
After Crystal Mountain, we were back in our LandCruisers and heading to the Black Desert. We made one brief roadside stop for a photo op, and hardly anyone left their vehicles. Mena told me he thought our group was tired of the desert, and maybe they were.
On our Inspection Trip, we didn't make an excursion into the black desert, we only saw it from the road. With the group, we actually went off road and got to see the black desert up close and personal. It was nothing like I imagined it to be. It was more awesome than I thought it would be. Here's a view from up top the mountain. The wind up there was a amazing the temperature must have been 20 degrees cooler than the white desert was during at noon. It felt so refreshing! At this stop everyone came back to life again. Everyone left the vehicles and enjoyed the desert. One of the drivers made tea using a tea pot on a propane fueled burner. Everyone was laughing and having a good time! Maybe we weren't tired of the desert as much as tired of the 120 degree temperatures! This site was shaded and much cooler. Yay!
I need to cut short as they're going to boarding our flight soon. We fly next to Richmond, then Cincinnati and then drive home! We're so looking forward to being home again soon and seeing our pups! We've really missed them! I'll add more from Richmond, if there's time. If not, I'll come back once we're settled in a bit at home and share with you the last day of our trip.
This really was a trip of a lifetime and our group, the Egyptian people, the land, our guides and, of course, Manal and Basem, all made it so magical and memorable for us. This is a journey that we'll always remember.
I'll add more soon. Until then, much Love,
Stuart
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