Egypt and Mediterranean Cruise - Sea Day and Kios, Greece

Oct. 26 – Day at Sea

Another day with no voice.  It was announced that the Egg drop contest would be held today.  So Jay and I had to hurry up and make our devise. We thought we had a few more days, but they changed the day.   We used an empty water bottle, straws, stir sticks, balloons, toilet paper, dental floss, safety pins and a large plastic garbage bag.  We put the stir sticks on the bottom of our water bottle so when landing it had some stability.  We put a balloon with a little air in the bottom of the bottle and then our egg and then surrounded our egg with toilet paper and then another balloon on top.  So we felt pretty sure our egg would survive.  After Jay dropped our device from the 7^th floor to the 5^th floor I had to unwrap the egg to see if it broke.  Our egg did crack a little and we didn’t win the competition.  One of the rules was that if your device had a parachute the parachute had to be folded.  We folded our parachute and put a paperclip on it for transport.  Unfortunately Jay forgot to take the paper clip off so our chute didn’t open.  If our chute opened we would have had a very soft landing.  After the competition, Jay went back to the 7^th floor to try our device again, without the paperclip, and the chute opened and fell softly to the ground.  There were several oohs and aahs from the crowds that were still in the area.   Not bad for only having a few hours to make our devise. 

It was windy and sunny today.  We spent some time at the pool.  Seas were a little rougher today, but not too bad.

Jay and I attended a training session in the casino on playing craps.  Jay stayed and played a little and did pretty good.  Makes you wonder if this is just beginners luck or they are just trying to hook you on the game.

Oct. 27 – Khios, Greece

One more day with still no voice.  I’m sure Jay loves it!!!   Today we were supposed to stop in Khios, Greece.  Khios was a tender port, meaning the boat anchors off shore and you are put in the life boats and brought to shore.  Unfortunately the waves were too high for them to tender us to shore. There were gale force 8 winds, which is about 39 to 46 mph with 18 to 25 foot seas.  So another day at sea and the bad part is we got up very early for no reason.  Now we are sailing to Istanbul, Turkey. 

Very windy day and cool with a temperature around 60.  We played a trivia game in the morning and won with 17 right answers out of 20.  Jay and Dad did the longest drive at the electronic golf; neither was close to the winning 250 yard drive.   The ship passed through the Dardanelles Strait.  The Dardanelles Strait is only 0.75 miles wide at its narrowest point and is 38 miles long.  The strait separates Europe from Asia.  We passed a Turkish submarine going the other way through the strait. 

Gallipol War Memorial

Turkish Sub

Egypt and Mediterranean Cruise - 1st Port - Egypt day 2

Oct. 25 – Day two in Cairo

I think I’m catching my dad’s cold and I have seemed to have lost my voice.  We had a nice breakfast at the hotel.  Our first stop was the Alabaster Mosque or Mohammad Ali Mosque (not named after the boxer).  One of the women in our group tripped over a step and fell because of a crazy vendor that was in her face.  Later we found out that she broke her ankle.

We went to the Egyptian Antique Museum and spent about two hours in the museum seeing various Egyptian artifacts and the highlight was the King Tut exhibit with the golden head piece.  Unfortunately we couldn’t take any pictures in the museum.   We learned later on that the head of the museum was arrested and he was being tried while we were in Egypt.  He was arrested after the March uprising for allegedly turning off the security cameras in the museum during the uprising allowing thieves to take several artifacts.  Fortunately most of the stolen items have been found and returned to the museum.

The museum building was right next to the government building that was burned during the uprising in March.  They are not going to demolish that building, but are going to keep it as reminder of that day.  The government building and museum were right on the edge of the Tahrir square where the Egyptian’s were demonstrating against Mubarak.

On our way to lunch today, we were driving across a bridge and we were stuck in some traffic when all of a sudden another bus driver decided to drive on the sidewalk with his vehicle, a full size city bus.  As he passed us, a section of the bridge collapsed under him, but he kept on going.  We were hoping that nobody was under the bridge area and that we would get off the bridge before any more of it collapsed.   We could see the river below through the hole which was about 4 ft x 6 ft.    I wonder how long it took for someone to rope off the area and then to fix the huge hole.

Lunch was at a Nile River restaurant.  It was a buffet and it wasn’t too bad.  Since traffic was so bad, our tour guide arranged for us to have a boat ride on the Nile where we would later catch up to the bus.  The boat was a small motorize boat called a felucca.  This boat just fit the 20 of us.  Our guide said that sometimes families live on these boats.  It was hard to imagine that.  As we first took off, the boat driver had to siphon gas from a 5 gallon can into his tank.  Immediately after he siphoned the gas, he lit a cigarette near the open gas container.  Jay, being the fire protection guy, was looking how to escape the boat if it caught on fire.  I’m not sure if my parents noticed, but if they did, I could only imagine what they were thinking.   As we were at the shore and getting off the boat, another boat hit us.  The lady with the hurt ankle was knocked on to our tour guide.  Jay was helping people of the boat and caught my mom as she was getting ready to step off the boat.  Everyone made it safely ashore.  As our boat drive pulled away from the shore, he made sure that he bumped into the other boat. There were some words exchanged between the boat owners, which I am sure had some to do with the other driver’s heritage and camels.

As we started our drive back to Alexandria our driver took a short cut and ended up on a one way street going the wrong way.   There were 7 lanes of traffic coming right at us.  You could hear my mom in the front of the bus saying “Oh my God”, “Oh my God”.  We finally made it to the highway without any further excitement.  As we were getting close to the main area in Alexandria, there were people everywhere.  It must have been shopping night since everyone was out.   Traffic again was not moving and it was getting late.  At one time our security guard was ready to get off the bus to clear the traffic in order to keep us moving.  We finally made it safely back to our ship.  We were the last group back to the ship and we were about 20 minutes late.  After the last person in our group made it on board, they pulled the ramp in preparation of the boat leaving the dock. 

Our tour guide mentioned several times to us that this would be a trip that we would never forget and he was right.  It was quite an adventure and one that we will never forget.  Especially since I have no plans in the future to ever go back to Egypt. 

Egypt and Mediterranean Cruise - 1st Port - Egypt

Oct. 24 - Day 1 in Egypt

We met our tour group early in the morning.  As we left passport control and walked out of the building where we were immediately greeted (mobbed) by vendors, like right in your face vendors.  Our guide, Kareem, was there waiting for us along with our armed security guard.  The guard was carrying a fully automatic pistol under his suit jacket.  I am sure my parents were wondering what in the world they were doing taking this trip with us.  Our group became now known as “Dennis Group”, which was what Kareem always called out to us when he needed our attention.  One of the guys in our group bought an Egyptian head scarf for $5.00, Jay bought the same thing later in our trip for a $1.00.  We all loaded up in our small bus for our 3 hour drive to Cairo.  On the road to Cairo we saw many large beehive shaped structures near the homes.  The structures were pigeon houses, where people raised the pigeons for food. 

As we came close to Cairo, we could see the pyramids towering above the city.  Unbelievable!!!!  We did notice how dirty the city was.  Trash was everywhere.  Our first stop was Memphis at an open air museum which is where we saw a huge statue of Ramses II and the Sphinx of Memphis.  The statue was over 3200 years old.   There was a vendor that came up to my dad, and dad will listen to anyone, but this vendor would not leave him alone.  Dad had his own personal escort back to the bus.  The whole way back to the bus the man was trying to sell my dad something.  He wouldn’t take no for an answer. 

We then stopped for lunch at a place that our tour guide had arranged.  As we got off the bus we could see the locals making bread and there was an open pit grilling area.  The dining area was outside under a thatched canopy.  We had traditional Egyptian food from the area.  God only knows exactly what we ate, but it was good.  Of course Jay had to try an Egyptian beer, Sakara Gold.  The food was pretty good, but mom didn’t eat too much, she was afraid to try the food.  A couple musicians played while we were eating lunch.

Our next stop was Sakkara, which is part of Memphis’s massive necropolis, and the burial site of the most ancient Pharaohs where we saw the first pyramids built, the Step Pyramids.   The Step Pyramids are the world’s oldest stone monuments.  The group did a quick tour in a few of the chambers. 

The next stop was to the Great Pyramids and for our camel ride.  Just amazing.  I only wished we had more time to just admire the pyramids.  We were rushed to the camels, where we were further harassed by the camel’s owners.  We heard that once you are on the camels and if they don’t think you have tipped them enough they will not lower the camel for you to get off until you give them more money.  Getting on and off wasn’t easy either.   You feel like you’re going to fall over the front of the camel when it is getting up or down.  We rode the camels for about 15 minutes with the pyramids behind us.  After our camel rides we were off to the Sphinx.  Just amazing.  Again, vendors all over.   It’s a shame that the vendors are in your face so much that it is really hard to soak up everything around you. 

We got to experience the worst traffic ever on the way to the shopping area.  There are no traffic lights or stop signs, not that that would do any good.  There are 5 lanes marked on the road and they make 7 lanes.  And we thought rush hour in Houston was bad – no comparison.  It makes Houston traffic look like nothing.

We checked into the hotel, Obeori Mena House, this was a very luxurious hotel.  We had enough time to get ready for our evening, which was a dinner cruise on the Nile with belly dancers.   Some of the other people in our group went to dinner on their own and others went to a Laser light show at the pyramids.  We had the security guard with us the whole time.   The dinner cruise was OK and the food was OK, but the entertainment was pretty good.  Of course the guys enjoyed the belly dancer, but there was also a male dancer that was unbelievable.  The man was an Egyptian whirling dervish, or Sufi dancer.  He constantly spun around for at least 10 minutes.  It was amazing how he spun and twirled the skirts that he wore.

When I laid in the bed that night I thought I died and went to heaven.  The bed was so comfortable, so different from our German bed from IKEA, which is absolutely terrible.  I wish I could have taken the bed back to Germany with me.