Land of the Pharaohs - Day 1

Diddington - Heathrow - Cairo


03:30 - The alarm goes off. We're so excited, we've all hardly slept.

04:07 - Leave the farm. Light dusting of snow overnight. -5C. Arrive on time. Park. Check in. All good.

Breakfast at the Giraffe in Terminal 1. Huevos Rancheros with tabasco sauce. A bloody marvelous way to start the day.

We are on our way for our next adventure:  2 Weeks in Egypt with my 67 year old mother.  Who has mobility issues, and has been finding the stairs in our house a problem.  But she has a prescription for mega painkillers, and the knees are better than they have been for weeks. We want her to fulfil her life long dream of seeing the Pyramids and temples of Egypt first hand.

We've asked Explore Egypt to arrange a guided trip through Pharaonic Egypt as well a Sahara Desert safari.

BMI flight 771 from Heathrow to Cairo was supposed to take off at 09:15, but de-icing took a lot longer than anticipated and we finally take off at 10:10 from a snow covered Heathrow.

Cloud cover all the way over Europe, except where the Austrian Alps poke through. There are few things as beautifull as snow-covered mountain peaks in sunshine. It's been almost 2 years since I last ski'd. Have to something about that. When I am solvent again.

Over the eastern Mediterranean sea the cloud starts breaking up and I see the blue sea with a few scattered Greek islands.

We reach Africa over the Nile delta. Lego-block settlements surrounded by patchworks of lush green fields and blue canals.

Descending over Cairo, I see myriads of four of five storey flats, yellow-orange-brown, many with their roofs covered in satellite dishes.

Cairo airport is shiny. Polished marble and palm trees. And that lift-muzik they play in an attempt to to calm you down so you don't assault the farting snoring bastard passenger that sat next to you.

A wheelchair is the best thing you can have in an airport. You get fast-tracked everywhere. Immigration is a blur.

Our luggage arrives undamaged and we exit the baggage hall to meet our guide, Gouda. We are all taken to our mini-bus, where we meet our driver, Talat. (And our mobility problems start.  My mother finds the step up into the mini-bus quite difficult, but at last she manages to ascend relatively gracefully.)

The drive from the airport to the hotel is about an hour's drive, most of it on 3 or 4 lane highways. Being born and bred in Africa myself, I find civil disobedience quite refreshing. I try it at least once per day. Egyptians, however, have an unhealthy contempt for what I consider the rules of the road. Basic stuff, like the use of indicators, generally accepted practices such as actually being inside of the bus while you are travelling on the highway, staying between the lines. The four lanes painted on the road only indicate the minimum number side by side vehicles on the road. Six is common, seven is possible.  The proper, and frequent, use of the hooter seems to be very important.

I am somewhat unsure about Talat, not to mention my life expectancy, but I was somewhat reassured by the way he switched on his hazard lights, swerved out for a truck that decided to park diagonally across the highway, give a hoot, avoid all other 'vehicles' attempting the same manoeuvre, all the while using one hand to gesticulate wildly and not even pause his sentence. Discussing football is very important in Egypt.

Goda says: 'Smile, you're in Cairo'. Right. I'll try and relax my sphincter too.

I decide that the best remedy is not to watch the road. It's past sunset and I watch the orange, purple and blue out over the desert, before we get in amongst kilometre upon kilometre of high-density housing blocks in various stages of completion.

We arrive at our hotel. Check-in is quick and we follow the porter to our rooms. The hotel, aptly named 'Oasis' is a large open plan complex with single storey blocks of accommodation separated by plazas, lawns, fountains and palm trees. Beautiful. The rooms are spacious and everything is clean, opens, closes, switches on and off and run hot and cold. Excellent.

I find my way to the outdoor restaurant next to the pool and decide to celebrate my good fortune with a local Sakkara beer for me and a G&T for Eli. It's midwinter in Egypt. Cool, but not cold. Around us are other guests doing much the same thing, chilling out, drinking beers and smoking apple-flavoured shisha pipes. Two days ago the coptic christians of Egypt celebrated christmas, so it's stil christmas music playing all evening.

 

Happy to be alive

 

Writing the diary

 I fetch my mother and we order dinner: Baba Ganoush and Grilled Pigeon for me, Kebab and Kofta combo for Mom and Shish Taouk for Eli. Unpretentious and delicious.

After dinner I try an apple-shisha myself, washed down with beer while I watch the evening get darker and wonder what tomorrow will bring.