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The entrance pylon to Edfu temple http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...319-living.jpg Our safe bike parking in the Oasis Hotel in Luxor. The hotel's staff living room. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...320-sphinx.jpg Sphinx at the Luxor temple http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p.../321-luxor.jpg The Luxor temple. In here you find heaps of statues, columns, obelisks, hyroglyphic texts - a true paradise for Egypt fans, archeologists and uneducated tourists like us. You can estimate the grandness of the temple if you compare the size of the statues to the size of the tourists walking inside the area. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...322-memnon.jpg Our bikes posing in front of the 'Memnon Colossi'. These two statues are all that remains of a once big temple. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...atschepsut.jpg The funerary temple of Pharao Hatschepsut near the Valley of the Kings |
Hey BikingMarco, just wanted to say that I've been following your story and I think you are a very talented writer. I really enjoy the way you put your experiences in writing, as well as your view of the world/people/sights/cultures you encounter.
I know it's not on your itinerary, but if you ever pass by Western Canada, let me know! I lived in Australia for 2 years and I'd do anything to go back there! Travel safe! Sam |
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"From then on we explored Luxor by foot. The Luxor temple, the Karnak temple, the promenade along the Nile river, the market. There is history everywhere. It's hard to feel excited by some old ruined temples. But then, if you are made aware that some of these have been there for up to 4000 years it makes the whole thing awesome. These walls and statues are twice as old as Christianity, 20 times as old as modern Australia. And are still standing tall. You can still look into the perfect faces of various Pharaos in their statues of granite or sand stone. The same stone faces as people had looked into while in Europe the Greeks developed their first democracy and let it go bust, while the Roman Empire rose and fell. Pretty much all events of modern and classic history have dawned and passed away while these statues of the Pharaos, these walls of stones filled with hyroglyphic texts and pictures, these grand obelisks, have been standing in the desert unchanged. In fact have been standing there way before all classic history events. Considering the age of these structures I must say visiting them became an awesome event. Much more so than photos will ever be able to show." Keep up the good work. :thumbup1: |
Thanks guys, much appreciated!
You never know where destiny takes you, maybe one day back to Western Canada... Been on holidays in BC and Alberta 9 years ago and loved it! |
A question of money
Marco,
I'm on my way up to Egypt. Currently in Katima Mulilo on the Namibian / Zambian border. Just curious - what did you pay for your ferry ride to Aswan and also would you have the co ords for that cheap hotel at Luxor you found. Kind regards Ben. |
Quote:
Don't have the coordinates for our hotel in Luxor. But it is in Station Street, 2 min walk from the Luxor Railway Station. If you ask near the station, people will show you the way. It's the Oasis Hotel, one night incl breakfast and free Wifi with common bathroom 20 Egyptian Pound per person (US$ 3.50). Don't get mixed up with the 'Nubian Oasis Hotel' which is a very dirty place in the same area. |
Thanks Marco - thoroughly enjoying your write ups. Keep the good stuff coming.
Cheers Ben. |
Egypt
Once more things developed differently than expected. Both, Martin and me, we were looking forward to take the Western Desert route from Luxor to Cairo. A route leading away from the busy roads along the Nile river and into the lonely deserts of the Egyptian Sahara. It would link some exotic oasis along the way featuring awesome hot springs and historic sights. All in all a very pleasant route to choose.
However, things started to develop differently when we tried to buy petrol in Luxor. Because there wasn't any. Luxor is one of Egypts major cities and a top tourist destination. But all petrol was sold out on all petrol stations. And there wasn't any black market either. We simply did not have sufficient fuel to embark onto a lonely desert adventure yet. So let's find petrol first. We travelled North along the Nile river on our quest for fuel. But the same picture everywhere. Petrol stations which had run out of petrol days ago or just yesterday. No fuel anywhere. Much further North, in Quena, we were able to secure a few litres on the black market. But all petrol stations here were out of petrol too. Under these circumstances we considered it foolish to embark into the desert. If cities like Luxor had run out of petrol, how likely would it be to find any in some remote oasis? After all the desert route stretches for over 1300km. So we started re-routing. With the fuel we got from the black market guys in Quena we could reach Hurghada on the Red Sea coast. There should be fuel for sure. And if not, at least we were stuck somewhere cool with a beach. So off we went towards the Red Sea. It is a long stretch through the Eastern Desert to get there from Quena. But is is a fantastic tarmac road. The landscape is rather uninspiring. Lots of gravelly flat brown desert. But the main theme of this journey to the Red Sea was wind. Really strong northerly wind. The closer to the Red Sea we came the stronger the wind got. We camped one windy night in the Eastern Desert. Martin even pitching his tent inside a deep cable trench to shelter from the wind, me camping in the shadow of a big stockpile of gravel for the same effect. When we finally reached the port city of Safaga the next morning the wind became the overwhelming theme of the day. It was one thing that this city had no beach. But in this wind a beach would not have been a great place to be anyway. However, in our first glimpses the Red Sea indeed looked awesome. It presented us with the perfect pattern of turquoise and deep blue patches of water on an ocean without waves. But the coastline around Sufaga is mostly built up. With the big port. Some concrete ocean promenade. And rubbish tipps. We only stopped for a minute. And happily filled up our tanks at the service station which had petrol to sell. And then continued North along the coast line in search of a better beach. After all, for me it was the first time to be back at salty waters since leaving Dar Es Salaam in November last year. If you are like us and you did not know it yet - Egypt's Red Sea coast is a prime destination for European holiday makers. A cheap location for diving and snorkelling and spending some time on the pool of some average resorts. And that is exactly how we found it. If there was a beach it was owned by a resort. The resort's security would not let us anywhere near their beach. If you don't arrive there by bus they are not interested in you. Not even bothering to appear friendly they immediately let you know that you're not welcome there and you should go away now. Don't even park in front of the gate. We did at one place. Outside, next to the gate. In line with other cars and buses. It triggered some nasty language from the security guys rushing towards us. Us, by then frustrated and ignorant of them, stood our ground. Just a minute later a guy from the hotel management came along to ask what we thought we were doing there as well. However, we were outside their high walls so we stayed. And walked along their high walls all the way to the water. To sit down and relax for a while. Enjoying the turquoise waters of the Red Sea. Watching the dive boats of the resort pass by. Curious what it was all about, on our way back we walked along the water into the resort's reserved beach. No problem to get past the security guy there with our white skin and foreign accents. And what can I say. What we saw quite shocked us after travelling all those months through Africa. In there the signs were written straight in German. Announcing the day's entertainment options. Lots of tourists were sleeping on their beach beds in the sun. Getting tanned. Being massaged. And entertained. The whole place was run by a German travel agency. And resembled perfectly a little island of Germany in the Egyptian desert. And desert was all that was around that resort. There was no escape for the 'inmates'. That's how we would feel, spending our holiday in there. And that is again when we appreciated our freedom. To just walk out the front gate, mounting our bikes and go. Awesome feeling. The day continued this way. We would ride through the desert with a view of the turquoise Red Sea waters to our right. We would be overtaken by lots of tour buses. We would fight against the strong headwind. And every now and then a bunch of huge concrete buildings would appear at the coast, boasting some exotic sounding resort name and being surrounded by high security walls. At the end of that day we arrived in Hurghada, the capital of all Egyptian Red Sea holiday resorts. 15km before we even reached Hurghada we rode through a city of resorts and hotels. One right next to the other, each one with an even fancier architecture and fancier name. Never in my life have I seen so many of them. And how can a town exist of just that? Where do normal people live? Are there any locals? We rode past exclusive shopping malls, MacDonalds, Pizza Hut, Burger King. And no where was there any public beach access. We could see the beautiful water in the background. But big walls and security fences left no gap to go there. Being shocked by this I remembered how lucky we are in Australia where beaches can not be privately owned. Hurghada city though was a surprisingly pleasent place. There were actually (slightly) more locals than tourists. And some shops. And cheap local restaurants. We stayed one night in Hurghada in the Sea Wave Hotel, a small but lovely hotel a few blocks away from the beach and the main road. And therefore affordable. The owners of the hotel were mega friendly and we had the best time in Hurghada just chatting to them. Which compensated a lot for the frustration of the day. When we left the next morning the strong northerly wind blowing in our face became the prominent feature of the day again. The ongoing push against your body makes riding a very tiring activity. And the wind makes it so cold. For the first time since the cool mountain elevations of the Ethiopian highlands I had to wear my jacket with the warm winter lining and a woolen neck warmer to feel somewhat comfortable. Just that we rode along the ocean coast at around zero elevation. Through the Egyptian desert. I would never have though it can get so cold during the day here. Once, in between two resort towns we just left the road today, rode perpendicularly from it straight through the stoney desert towards the ocean. There was no road, no path, just flat hard ground. For maybe two to three km. Arriving at a point at the coast where there was no resort, no security, no walls. Not another person in sight. There and then, seeing our tyre tracks in a straight line from the road in the distance, seeing our bike parked against turquoise sea waters, we remembered why we are travelling again. Because we're free. |
Egypt pics
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Camping in the windy Eastern Desert. Martin's pitched his tent inside the deep trench on the right hand side. A perfect wind shelter. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...325-resort.jpg The entrance to one of the Red Sea tourist resorts. We would have an argument with the resort's security for parking our bikes in the parking lot outside their gate. We won. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p.../326-cairo.jpg 425km to Cairo. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...327-desert.jpg Going a few km off road straight through no man's land once got us to this spot right at the Red Sea. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...28-shelter.jpg Sheltering from the wind in the Eastern Desert. We set up our tents inside these abandoned buildings. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p.../329-ocean.jpg For many hundret km we rode along the perfectly turquoise waters of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Suez. Unfortunately you cannot feel the cold northerly wind on this picture. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...b/330-suez.jpg Cargo ships in the desert. From this angle you can't see it. But it's there. Underneath the ship. The Suez Canal. |
Great Thread, posting and pics! Thanks for those inspiring chapters of your journey!
Greetings from Amman Achim |
Cairo
Four days we spent in Cairo. First and foremost to inquire about the visa situation for Libya and Syria and to decide which way to go from here. And of course also to do some sightseeing and to experience the city of Cairo. A place which 25 million people call their home. More people than the population of the entire continent of Australia. If so many people choose to live in Cairo it must be an awesome place indeed.
As for the two first and foremost points: neither the Libyan nor the Syrian embassy would give us a visa for their country. In Libya the situation becomes more uncertain with time, foreigners got kidnapped. And no further visa will be issued until the situation has calmed down to a secure level. Also the border between Egypt and Libya is closed, even a visa would not help us at the moment. The Syrian embassy in Cairo told us they issue visa only for residents of Egypt. Which we are not. We could get the visa in our home countries. Or, if we are lucky, at the border. Judging by past experiences we decided to trust our luck and try the Syria way. Otherwise, with Libya and Syria closed, we would be stuck. According to latest news the situation in Syria seems to be getting more and more under control. Hopefully they get their issues sorted within the next 4-6 weeks for our arrival. However, our success was much greater in the sightseeing business. I must say Cairo is awesome. In my imagination Cairo was a dirty noisy busy place, chaotic and full of touts hassling poor tourists. And although all these points are true I really loved Cairo. I loved it because it is full of life. Just imagine 25 million people! So all the dirt, the noise, the chaos is caused by people making their life there. The streets are full of cars and Chinese motorbikes, constantly honking. Driving within centimeters of each other in total disregard of lane markings or traffic arrows on the pavement. But still respecting each other. Whenever a small space opens there is a car to fill it quickly. For pedestrians, crossing a road is an adventure by itself. There is no traffic lights. Almost none. You can imagine what it means to cross five lanes of constantly moving traffic with only a few centimeter wide gaps in between moving cars. Well it means, you will hear a lot of honking. But slowly walking into the traffic it magically starts flowing around you. An unbelievable experience. We stayed at the Ismailia Hotel right next to Tahrir Square. It's this square which became the focal point in the Egyptian Revolution in 2011. I remember TV pictures of the square being filled with shouting crowds, holding up posters and flags. I remember pictures of the square being shut off from the rest of the city by army tanks. Back then no one could predict what the army would do. There were pictures of people being beaten by police, taken away by secret service agents. Pictures of dead people lying on the pavement. Just one year ago. During that one year the situation has calmed down. The army decided not to shoot it's people but to form an interim government instead. Egypt was back to normal. But is now heating up again. Cairo people are very proud of their revolution. But they do realise now that the 'interim' situation seems to become longer lasting than expected. So again people start to protest on Tahrir square. We could hear them in the early mornings from our hotel. Many people talk to us about the recent events and their concerns for the future of their proud country. There is still a lot of graffiti. There is a life size doll hanging from it's neck from a light pole. There are still makeshift tents on the Tahrir Square roundabout. And protest posters. One of the tents features a photo exhibition about the 2011 revolution, showing the crowds filling the square. And showing the casualties, terribly disfigured dead bodies. Every evening videos of these past events are shown from a screen. A constant memorial to the people's revolution. Although today Tahrir Square is filled again with traffic, there are still tanks in Cairo. One here, one there but certainly a constant presence throughout the city. Due to their role during the revolution Police has completely vanished from the streets of today's Cairo. For their own safety. Which leaves the city sort of lawless. And many people warned us of the spike in the crime rate. But we had more the feeling that people celebrate the absence of police with fun activities. Like kids riding motorbikes against traffic on the roundabout. Doing wheelies stopping only centimeters from honking cars. The law is now in the hands of the people who take care of each other. The mood more that of celebration than of fear. And it is this what makes me love Cairo. A city full of life and energy. People shout out of cars 'Welcome to Egypt' towards us. Random people cross the street for us to shake our hands and welcome us in their city. Again, we get invited for tea. There is a lot of positive energy in this town, beaming from it's people. And there are so many of them. Filling the streets till late at night. Shops are open late, the footpaths are full of people, moving, talking, shouting, laughing, having tea together. If it wasn't for the dirt you could think Cairo is a place in any Western country. There is an underground metro system, heaps of shiny high rise buildings. There's designer shops, latest electronic stores, there are expensive cars, upmarket restaurants. All the popular fast food and pizza chains. The world's famous luxury hotel brands. It's all there. And there is the other Cairo too. At prayer time you can hear a three dimensional choir of mosque minarets and their loudspeakers. There is the old citadel, inside it the biggest and oldest mosques I have ever seen. From up the old walls of the citadel you can spot the pyramids in the hazy distance behind the skyscrapers. From up there the sounds of people, cars, horns and minarets appear like coming from many old scratched records playing all around you. And there are the markets selling all these exotic spices, garments and souvenirs. Apart from the general flair of being in Cairo there were two distinct highlights for me. One was the Egyptian Museum. The mother of all museums. Whatever was found in the tombs of the Valley of the Kings, in the temples and excavations in the desert, it's all displayed there. Most importantly the contents of the undisturbed tomb of Tut Ankh Amun, a whole wing of the museum filled with treasures of this rather unimportant child pharao. But the by far most impressive exhibition was the royal mummy room. When you travel through Egypt you will come across temples, pyramids, statues, obelisks - all linked with one pharao or the other. Ramses, Tutmosis, Amenophis, Seti, Cheops, Hatschepsut and so many others. Ramses II sticks out for his extraordinary monuments. Extraordinary in size and numbers. The temple of Abu Simbel features four twenty metre high statues of him. The temples of Luxor and Karnak many more. And here, in the Egyptian Museum, you can meet the real guy. After seeing so many of his monumental statues, in the museum you can look into his face, the real face of the man himself. The one guy behind all these huge temples. The original face behind all these colossal statues. Lying here peacefully, eyes closed, the hair grey as for every other old man. Bare feet and wrapped in cotton. His monuments crumbling to dust all over Egypt during the course of the past millenia. And still, today, 3500 years after he died, you can look into his face. His skin black and dry but still smooth enough to show his features, his lips, his wrinkles on the forehead, his pierced ears. It's the face of an old man. You wouldn't think he's been dead for long. Altogether the museum shows the mummies of 11 pharaos. Seeing them after learning their stories sure gives you goosebumps. The number two highlight for me in Cairo was, as expected, the Great Pyramids of Gizah. You can see them in the distance from high points in the city. But once there they are truly massive and very very impressive. The oldest one more than 4500 years old and still 140m high, as high as a 45 storey building. Although the plateau they are standing on is still part of the desert, the city encroaches very closely. Just behind the perimeter fence you see the roads, the high buildings, even a golf course. And the noise of the city is everywhere. Another fact I like. These old monuments of the dead are still surrounded by life. In all cases we were lucky, kind of, that the latest unrest succeeded in scaring tourists away. So both, the Pyramids and the Egyptian Museum were far less crowded than we would have expected. In fact most other visitors beside us were locals. So four days after our arrival in Cairo we left today. We chose Friday because it's holiday in Islam, reserved for prayer. Therefore there is almost no traffic on the road. Getting through Cairo on our bikes with no issues at all. The wind blowing away the layers of dust which accumulated on the bikes while parking for four days. We are now on our way to the Sinai peninsula. And then Jordan. |
Cairo pics
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Tahrir square - it still shows evidence of recent protests http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...32-traffic.jpg Cairo's traffic can be described as chaotic http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...33-balcony.jpg Most of Cairo features brown dusty apparment buildings http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p.../334-river.jpg High rise buildings along the Nile River |
more Cairo pics
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This is what 25 million people looks like http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...b/336-army.jpg After supporting Egypt's people during the revolution the army made many friends amongst the population. http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...337-mosque.jpg mosque within the citadel |
Pyramid pics
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Martin and me and the pyramid of Cheops http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...b/339-hand.jpg Touching history - these stones were laid 3500 years ago for the Chefren pyramid http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...340-sphinx.jpg Sphinx and the pyramids of Mikerynos and Chefren http://www.mhes.com.au/foreverfree/p...41-saqqara.jpg At the step pyramid of Djoser in Saqqara |
Wonderful write-up and pictures. Thank you. :thumbup1:
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