Needless to say Heather and I haven't stopped moving since she arrived. We took a plane to Cairo, Egypt 2 days after she arrived and I don't think we were prepared for that city. I have never seen a city with so many people, cars, dust and shopping in one place. The city never sleeps!... Literally, the shops stay open until 1am EVERY NIGHT and open up again at 8 am!! Don't worry the children are up and roaming the streets then also! We stayed at the Novohotel right off of the Nile, we had a great view of the Cairo tower, the Nile, and all the city lights. We were only there 3 days but we packed in the fun.
Day 1: we visited the Cairo Museum and tried to make sense of all the thousands of artifacts...I was most fascinated with King Tut's head dress and the ancient kings mummies exhibition. We then met a kind man who walked us to a quiet cafe and then showed us to a Perfume/oil essence shop. We spent far too much time and money there but ended up getting some nice scented oils. We topped the day off with a night dinner cruise on the Nile with entertainment including a guy that spun around in circles for over 5 minutes nonstop, and bellydancing. All was very entertaining but we were very excited to get back to our hotel and relax!!
Day 2: Began with a tour to Memphis (the old capitol of Egypt), Sakkara (the worlds oldest stone structure built around 2630 BC), and of course the Sphinx and Pyramids. It was amazing to see up close the huge blocks of stone, and still can't believe they built it so long ago! We also visited a rug making school and looked at the beautiful handmade/pricy rugs. Along with that stop we were dropped off on a few other "tourist traps" this I am sure what they were because we always knew we were in the right place when we pulled up and a dozen huge tourist busses were parked outside. A papyrus factory, and "cotton factory" were among a few of these. (and the "cotton factory" looked like a small department store with Polo, Lacoste, and other American brands all of which had Egyptian Cotton on the tags... we were a bit confused.)
Memphis
Sakkara
Rug making school
They showed us the process to make Papyrus, you first strip the bark of the plant, cut it into pieces, soak it in water for hours, press and flatten the pieces, weave them together and press them for hours. The natural sugar in the plant acts like a glue holding the pieces together.
Day 3: We went with our same tour guide and he showed us some of the old churches of Cairo including the Hanging church and Citadel which was built in 1183 AD. The Citadel was very interesting and the view over Cairo was amazing. We then went to the Khan El Khalili Bazaar, I have been to my share of Bazaar's but this one was the most aggressive and busy bazaars I have ever been in. You literally had to look at the ground if you wanted to walk, the shopkeepers would literally pull you to look at their shops, luckily we both survived, with our purchases of course :)
Sitting in the Citadel (we had to cover our knees so we wore these)
View of Cairo
Citadel
We came home for a day and then took an early flight to Eilat. We were delayed at the Tel Aviv airport for 4 hours... so we reverted to childhood game M.A.S.H. to pass the time. That game is great and our futures look bright and exciting! haha
We finally got on our 40 minute flight and made it to Eilat. Eilat is a coastal town in Israel on the coast of the Red Sea. We stayed in a little hotel across from the airport. The next morning we took a "guided tour" from our hotel, across the Jordan boarder and on to Petra. I use the term guided loosly because our "tour" of Aquba consisted of us driving through the town's main road and not a word from the driver. The drive was a little over 2 hours. We were in a van with other tourist, we drove by Wadi Rum (a large desert where people camp, hike, and live). We made frequent stops ... who knows why, we think it was for the driver to take a smoke, and we realized then that 10 minutes means about 30. But yes we did make it to Petra. It was again filled with tour buses but we were able to find our group and follow our guide on the tour. Petra is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen with the sandstone canyon, the natural swirls of colors was amazing. We were able to see the Treasury, and then walk down to the rest of the city below. Filled with houses, temples, shops, large homes of the wealthy, theater and irrigation system.
The sandstone walls
There used to be camels carved and a man on the wall and you can still see the feet of the camels and the lower half of the person.
They had irrigation systems and pipes for the water to enter the city
The Treasury
After Petra we drove and ate a much anticipated lunch overlooking the city. Then we drove back to Eilat walked around and got ready for an early day to Taba!
We woke up early to meet our scuba instructor at "the Egypt boarder" we failed to clarify which side of the boarder. So we went through customs and the huge lines and made a lot of people mad by making our way to the front quicker than we should have :) but we couldn't miss meeting our guide! We made it after a bit of waiting. We were able to spend all day on a boat, we went to 3 diving sights and had lunch. The weather was amazing and scuba was so fun! It was crazy to think we were on a boat in the Red Sea scuba diving... what an adventure!
