Alexanders in the Mediterranean: January 2011

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Enough 3 stars – we’re staying at the JW Marriott Resort!

Checking into the JW Marriott Resort in Cairo

Relaxing

While we were all sick in Alexandria at the Egypt Hotel in a tiny grotty room with a bathroom that has no shower or bathtub, just a hole in the floor, and of course the Middle-eastern/European tradition of throwing your used TP in the garbage instead of down the toilet, we were feeling the need for something more upscale.

Ross at the Buffet

Marina searched for hotels near the airport and we selected the J.W. Marriott. What a great hotel – definitely 5 star. We were comparing it to other hotels we’ve stayed at – Atlantis in Paradise Island is probably the most posh, the Grand Wailea in Hawaii is awesome as is the Wynn Encore in Vegas … but this one ranks right up there with all of them. A couple of pools, beautiful rooms, separate showers and baths (I took 3 showers in one day !!), a fabulous buffet, as much alcohol as you could possibly drink, cable TV with channels in English; and beds with about a dozen super soft luxurious pillows with equally soft bedsheets. OMG – we went from near squalor to the lap of luxury. The kids being the kids fit in right away, snuggled right into bed watching TV and barely left the room.

Girls at the Hot Tub

Marina and I had a couple of meals, walked around a bit and decompressed from the ‘assault on your senses’ called Egypt. Unfortunately we have an early flight to TelAviv and tomorrow starts at 05:30, but one night of rest is worth the price.

Saturday, January 22, 2011

Alexandria -- At Both Ends

Leaving Siwa we caught a public transport bus for Alexandria – kind of like a Greyhound only dirtier and with smokers.
An idea of the beautiful scenery can be seen in this video Marina took: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaYmrTCaPdw
Nine (9) hours later we arrived somewhat worse for wear. We were hoping to get some beer but alas, none of the restaurants we went to served it. We did see a place called “Drinkies” that sold Heineken, but we didn’t get there in time and they were closed.

We took an hour tour of the Biblioteca – the newly built library that is truly fantastic. Then we retired back to the Hotel Egypt. It’s an OK enough hotel on the waterfront but there is a very busy freeway right in front and the washroom didn't have a shower or a tub, just a shower head and a drain hole in the floor -- :-( not exactly a perfect experience.

Out front of the Alexandria Library

Looking up the wall/roof

Ross Overlooking the student rooms

Jessie pretending to be a noble

More in the Gallery

One of our favorite lines in the movie “The Bucket List” that has become very appropriate in Egypt is “never trust a fart” and that pretty much sums up our experience in Alexandria. Anyway … it struck Matt first – a queasy stomach – and then Ross got it, then Marina, and finally Jessie. Three of us went out for dinner, leaving Ross behind. When we got back Ross was in our bed sleeping after having had several intimate experiences with the throne.

Ross' favorite room

Ross probably remembers the ceiling of the room more
than anything else in Alexandria

The next morning Marina and Jessie were afflicted with stomach issues too, so we had four people in our hotel room in various states of discomfort. Marina and I went out and got some food and drinks (plus some Immodium) and came back for a quick nap. After we got back I was the only one fit enough to eat. In the afternoon we decided to go for a walk and strolled along the waterfront to explore Alexandria. Marina wasn’t feeling very well and we walked like a couple of 80 year olds with emphysema – stopping every hundred feet or so for a rest. By the time we got back to our hotel room we walked in on our friend Samantha in the hotel room rendering comfort to Ross – who had apparently spent a good length of time on the bathroom floor in pain. Jessie didn’t know what to do so she got Samantha – a mother of 3 teenage boys, to come take a look and make sure Ross wasn’t dying. Good thinking Jess!

Well, we then got some ‘industrial strength’ stomach medicine from John, a Californian travelling with his son Matt from Boston. John and Matt are really interesting guys … both PhD’s, Matt’s owns a growing string of Frozen Yoghourt stores in Boston, John has done many things from serving in the US Airforce in Cambodia, to being an academic, to working for the State Government in California, to being a Water Commissioner in his town, to being a Scout Leader. It was always John we went to when we needed something like ‘industrial strength’ stomach medicine because he is always prepared.

Pigeon Anyone??

We went out for dinner with everyone for our final night out. Ross took a pass which was probably a good thing to do. Ebrahim took us to a nice local restaurant – the girls ordered pasta, I had stuffed Pigeon. The Pigeon tasted like a cross between chicken and duck – and it would have been better if I’d had wine or beer to get my courage up a little more. Apparently you’re supposed to eat the bones … but the thought of choking in an Egyptian restaurant (then getting taken to an Egyptian Hospital in an Egyptian Ambulance) made me pick at the bird gingerly. I reckon that I got about ½ a bite of meat out of the whole thing. Mind you, when you see what crossing the street is like in Alexandria, maybe the Pigeon was a low-risk option. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D58bhQhdTc8

We all went to bed early because of a 6:30 wakeup call … plus the fact that you can’t find a drink easily in Egypt and the TV cable was broken.

Samantha in the Catecombs

Bas Relief on the front of the Sarcophagus

More Empty Tombs -- where did all the bones go?

The next morning we got up – Ross still hadn’t eaten anything and continued to have stomach problems but we managed to make it to the bus and visit the Catacombs of Alexandria. These were discovered by one of the greatest archeologist families in Egypt: the Donkey family. This is about the 5th or 6th monument or tomb site we've visited that was discovered by a donkey … I guess their sure-footedness lets them get off track enough to find these things. Alexandria has a lot of Greek influence as you ‘d expect and the Catacombs are an interesting mix of Egyptian and Greek. The Sun Gods are there but they wear Greek dress. There was also a new god that was the son of Zeus and Isis .. a melding of the two cultures. This is apparently a trick from Alexander the Great to continue to respect the conquered culture and then slowly combine it with the Greek.

You go down a shaft that has very shallow steps into an ante-room that would hold the mourners and into the burial chambers. The coffins didn’t have lids, they were carved completely out of rock to look like they did, and then had each had a back door which is how you put the bodies in. This approach cuts down on grave robbing I guess.

The third floor is under water and the tombs have been flooded twice in the last 100 years. Interestingly enough they’ve found no human bones there, only the bones of horses. Our guide said it was the salt water that dissolved the bones – possible, but when asked why the bones of the horses survived he said they had a different chemical makeup (doubtful if you ask me ... probably better to ask a scientist rather than an historian questions on dissolving bones). So a little more research is required to figure out why the human bones are gone when some animal bones remained.

Finally we piled back into the bus and headed for Cairo. We originally planned on staying at the Pharoahs hotel downtown Cairo – another 1.5 star hotel, but while in Alexandria we decided to book into the J.W. Marriott by the Cairo Airport.

Street Scenes from Alexandria

Siwa Oasis – 4x4'ing and Sandboarding Fun!

The last oasis we visited was Siwa, a little bit bigger and more upscale than the other two oases we visited. We stayed in the Mubarek hotel – probably named after Hosni Mubarek, the President of Egypt since Sadat was murdered in 1981. According to our guide, the Egyptian Constitution limits the President to two six year terms, but Mubarek has been in power for nearly 30 years.
So … if you have the power and you're willing to do what it takes to keep it, you can pretty much do whatever you want. (this blog-post was written on the 20th of January ..... after the outbreak of civil unrest it appears that the Egyptian people have had enough. We were aware of the upcoming Jan 25th Facebook Protest ... though I would bet that nobody expected this level of outpouring of support)

Anyway the hotel was originally an athlete’s village but was clean and comfortable enough. The rooms were clean, the shower worked, there was a pool table – but no Internet … criminy … what does a guy have to do to get Internet service in a hotel in Egypt?!?
Marina and the rest of the gang found a restaurant in town: Abdu’s, that was good, cheap and had WiFi. Woo Hoo what a find! We ended up doing lunch and dinner there as well as doing a bunch of marketing for food in Siwa. Unfortunately they didn’t sell beer we ended up never finding the ‘trifecta’ of a place with good food, liquor sales and WiFi.

Sunset over Siwa

Dinner at Abdu's

Maybe in 10 or 20 years they’ll have it. Ross and I stayed behind – me working on a proposal and Ross playing computer games. Around 8:30pm we gave up and started walking to town – a little intimidating when you’ve never been there, it’s dark and not particularly inviting. We met up with Marina, Jessie, Samantha, Sarah and Jeremy – and Jeremy and the Alexanders found an internet place to send off some emails …. Ross and I devoured the pizza and cheese pie Marina brought us – then washed it down with Coke – no rum unfortunately. We walked back to the Hotel in a pack and collapsed into bed.

Day 2 started at a reasonable time (10am) with a bicycle ride around Siwa to Cleopatra’s pool, then a dip, then riding around looking (or in our case not-looking) at various ruins around Siwa.

Every year a wonderful teacher (now Vice Principal) in West Vancouver School District named Scott Slater, collects bicycles and sends a 40 foot container of them to Namibia for a program called ‘Bicycles for Humanity’. It’s an awesome program that helps enable some very poor Namibians to work their way out of poverty.

Anyway the bikes we rented would have likely been rejected by Scott as being too worn out for the program. Ross’ pedal broke off leaving him with a metal stud to ride on, my seat post dropped all the way downto the point where my calf was hitting my thigh so that my foot kept getting knocked off the pedal. Anyway by the time we made it back to the hotel our butts were sore and our thighs were burning.

After our bike trip, we took a pair of LandCruisers into the desert to do some 4-wheeling and sandboarding. These LandCruisers were newer and in better shape than the ones we came across the desert with – and good thing that was too.

Man could these things drive. The videos don’t really do it justice, the first dune we went tooling down at about a 45 degree angle was amazing, then we kept doing it and finding more outrageous things to drive over, around – and one time through.

Our guides were careful not to do jumps – but we did get high-centred once over the top of a dune and had to pile out. The driver backed up and then went over and jumped the top of the dune, stomping the brakes to make the nose dive over the dune so he didn’t high-centre again. We made an iMovie about it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WShyYa5Zug.

We stopped at the top of a dune to do some sandboarding. There were a couple of old snowboards – some with bindings and some without, we had a gas trying to go down the hills. I made 3 or 4 runs as a snowboard – the climb back up is a bit of a grunt. The kids used them like toboggans. Ross must have made 20 or more runs, his legs are like steel and cable – unbelievably strong and he seems to have endless reserves of energy.

The last run of the day we got picked up by the 4x4’s and then got a lift back to the hotel. It was pretty much the same as going skiing at $60 each but at the end of the day it was huge amounts of fun and well worth it.

That evening when we returned to the hotel, Ebrahim had negotiated to keep the bikes avilable for us and we rode into town at night and back to Abdu’s for dinner.

It was quite the adventure riding on the dirt roads during the day and at night it was even more so. We were all bouncing around in potholes and dodging the bikes, motorcycles, motortrikes, donkey carts, cars and 4x4’s (none of whom use headlights btw) but made it back to the hotel safely for a game of pool and a good night's sleep.

Friday, January 21, 2011

Fun in the Bahariya Oasis

In the Bahariya Oasis we toured around by 4x4 as the town itself didn't have much close by to look at. So here is a photo essay of the activities we had in and around this Oasis!

A hot spring...somewhere in the desert at the side of the road.

Heading down to a tomb...in a random place in the middle of a village.

The tomb inside...

Now this is traditional desert imagery!

This is what an oasis looks like.

Lunch provided by our drivers at a road side stop.

A very big "hill" in the black desert - we climbed it!

Ross hit the top first...no kidding...

View from the top of the "hill" out to the black desert.

Jessie with a camel at a camel farm we visited.

Lots of camels at the camel farm.

Our guide and driver trying to get the guard out of bed as he was supposed to accompany our entourage...we waited over an hour and finally got clearance to go without him. He won that one I guess.