Western Desert Egypt, land of camels, oases and the occasional donkey...

Sunset, Western Desert, Egypt

Woke up to the alarm buzzing for the first morning for quite a while, I had slept straight through the call to prayer, although with the campground surrounded my mosques I am still unsure how I managed this!. We headed out of camp on foot bound for Karnak Temple for the 6.30am opening time. As we walked we saw the moon getting ready to set on the opposite bank of the Nile, it was the biggest and yellowiest moon I have seen. Karnak Temple is larger than the other temples we have seen, but does not contain the impressive detail as most of the others. We spent a couple of hours wandering around and taking photos of the 134 huge towering columns and stone sheep carvings then headed back to camp for a breakfast of French toast, nutella and banana and our last shower before Giza, six days away.

Karnak Temple, Luxor

After a quick food shop we headed out into the Western Desert. We were stopped at a lot of police checkpoints on the way out of Luxor, after a few nights of less than desired sleep, I curled up in a ball on the side seat and was out cold under my Maasai blanket quickly, I only woke as I started to get cold...errr, yes I meant to type that, cold. With the canvas sides up and the truck moving at 80km/h things can get pretty chilly in the back sometimes. Shortly after we stopped for lunch on the side of the road, I climbed tot he top of the nearby hill and was surprised at the strange collection of rocks, it was like someone had tipped their rock collection out on the ground. We continued down on of the most scenic roads I have ever experienced, towering limestone (or sandstone) escarpments, cliffs and canyons for about 50km. At the end of the canyon the road flattened out amazingly quickly.

Road weaves through the desert terrain

 Little did anyone in the back know at the time, but we were heading in the wrong direction, north, instead of south west, we were actually on one of the main roads to Cairo and wondering why it was so busy! At one of the intersections we had taken the wrong turn, quite understandable as there are very few signs and most of the signs are in Arabic. After a few more police checkpoints we pulled up on the side of the road for a bush camp, not surprisingly we quickly had a visit from a local, “no English?”, “no Arabic?”, “no English?” we assumed that he wanted either money or didn’t want us to camp there and money... ha ha, no grass, no toilets, no showers, no trees, no water, no money! As Mark had reversed the truck back to pull off the road the mud guard got caught on the tyre and ripped off, the sand was soft so we camped quite close to the road, the traffic went all night! A full moon rose (the real moon variety) and very soon the cameras were out getting photographs, myself cursing the bastard who stole my tripod, yet again! The temperature in the desert dropped away incredibly quickly and very soon we were viewing our travelling companions wearing clothes not yet sighted, I was very excited to pull my striped beanie out of my locker to keep my ears warm. Spencer and I were the only ones to not put the rain cover on the tent; we woke up with damp sleeping bags from dew. With the smell of Spencers ass I wanted as much ventilation as possible!

Sunrise, Western Desert

A 6am start the following morning, it turns out that there are places in Egypt where you can avoid the call to prayer, you just need to get out into the desert! We left camp at 7am heading in the right direction. Ronald had been tracking our direction the day before and had announced that our campsite was the same distance away from the oasis we were heading to as out campsite in Luxor had been!, all part of the adventure and another story for blog readers I say. After driving a few hours we somehow accumulated a police escort, there were four guys with machine guns following behind us in a police vehicle, occasionally using their siren to remind us that they were there. We stopped on the outskirts of a town called El Kharga. Not quite sure what the problem was, Mark went into the tourist information office to sort it out, our police escort then followed us into the centre of town, we did a 540 degree turn through a roundabout, I assume to piss the escort off. Upon parking the truck we realised that our police friends are guarding it for us, a man standing right at the back of the truck with an AK-47. I am getting much more used to seeing guns the further that I travel through Africa, but seeing a machine gun so close to me still has an effect on me. After witnessing the power of an AK-47 in Cambodia when Spencer fired 50 rounds in about 10 seconds it is scary to think that so many young police officers, security guards hold them so complacently on the streets. Spencer and I went for a stroll to find a toilet, he claimed that he was desperate, but kept turning down every available toileting spot, to finally walk a huge lap and end up in the same street. After he returned from his hiding spot in the trees, I ducked around the corner for a wee, it’s all good until I realise that there is a camera aimed at me, then realise it’s my own camera with Spencer holding it! I manage to zip my pants up just as a car drove past, the man behind the wheel looked left, looked right, then swung his head so quick as to give himself a neck injury!, now that’s the meaning of rubbernecking! I have never seen someone move their block so quickly! From there we got two bags of chips and two cornetto ice creams for 5 pound (less than one Aussie dollar), we found a place to sit in the shade to devour our ice cream and were annoyed when we realised that the man who had tried to sell us something (we think) earlier was loitering around us. After looking up to see him staring at me on three separate occasions I flung my arms up in the air in a “what the f&*k” type of expression, not a good idea, then he was over trying to talk to us with a big smile on his face. He didn’t speak any English so had no idea what I was talking about when I told him to stop staring at me and to go away (not in those exact words), we walk back down the street only for him to follow. Spencer had the next go at him, again lost in translation. We were confused as he had nothing apparent to sell and hadn’t asked for money, we had no idea of his purpose. I decided he was a bit loco, but Spencer claimed that he was too well dressed, I decided he was a loco with a very caring mother (he was about 30). On our way back to the truck we stopped at a sweet stall where Mark and Kyle were buying something, we got a huge candy/toffee like Frisbee thing, walking away from the stall we see the man who had been following us again! Spencer waved him on his way and we continue on our merry way back tot he truck which is now guarded by about 10 men with guns. We figure a game of scrabble is in order and set up the board on the footpath, much to the amusement of passing traffic. After pomegranate, chocolate and cheese for lunch Jen, Jules and I were leading thanks to some great words like ferment and quin the local police arrive in even greater numbers and we are ushered to the police station, with about 20 tiles left to play we were sitting out the front of the police station whilst Mark was inside registering our details, the scrabble board had been carefully picked up and the game continued on the top of the esky in the back of the truck. The police escort followed us out of town, still sounding the occasional siren. We stopped on the outskirts of town so some people could have a swim in an irrigation channel with suspect floaters which looked remarkably like poo on the top. I declined a swim, immersing myself in poo water surrounded by armed Arab men and men armed with mobile phones with cameras didn’t really seem inviting! Spencer went in and smelt suspiciously like poo afterwards! Whilst sitting in the truck I realise that the man who was following us was sitting just outside the truck, with the police. Turns out he is an undercover tourist police, following us around to make sure we were safe and sound, and he was armed. Now I can say that I have sworn at an armed Arabic man in Africa and lived to blog the tale. My suggestion to the tourist police is to get ID cards made up to show the tourists that they are protecting exactly who they are. The only time I have felt uncomfortable in Egypt was because of the people who are there to protect me! We drove for a couple of hours still being followed by five armed police officers behind us, we made a bush camp behind a mobile phone tower and our police friends parked up behind us. They then left to head back into town for food and gear to sleep the night. After a ‘what would you do if you heard gunshots coming towards the truck and you were in the desert?’ type conversation over dinner (most people put down to run for the hills, despite the raging full moon that was leaving shadows across the land). I took some night shots of the truck and phone tower.

Camp by the mobile phone tower, you can see our police escort vehicle behind the truck

                                     
We woke up in the middle of the night to hear a car slow down on the highway and then pull off the road, I looked out of the tent to see lights pulling up two meters behind the truck. The occupants of the car got out and were standing around the truck holding a very loud conversation in Arabic. By this stage I am starting to plan what I am going to take for my evacuation into the desert if the situation declines. Eventually the second car leaves and the following day we discover that the original police escort abandoned us sometime during the night, ‘what the?...’ The next morning we stopped at a town called Mut, which had an old abandoned section of town.

Old Town, Mut

We went for a stroll through the ramshackle assortment of mud brick and straw houses that had been abandoned. We climbed to the top of one of the houses with a local man in tow who insisted that we come to his house for tea, with no time for tea before the truck left we declined the offer, he instead walked us back through the maze of alleyways to the truck. I used the toilet near the truck, only to be surprised by a local boy bathing in a green wheelie bin in the female toilets! Hilarious! Burbs was on cook group by himself that night, to speed the sightseeing process up so he had time for shopping, we had seen him sprinting through the old town with his camera out in front taking photos as he sped through. We continued on our way, stopping at Mut Well 3 for a swim in a hot spring at a hotel. The water was very brown and all our togs were filthy afterwards, but the water was warm and the closest thing any of us will get to a shower for six days. A man from the hotel was trying to sell us beers for 25 pound, they are usually about 8! You can buy 25 falafel burgers for 25 pound! After drying off we clambered back into the truck and continued down the road, passing some magnificent but barren mountains with not a scrap of foliage on them. We also passed some irrigated areas which were oddly green in the dry desert. We stopped at El Mozawaka tombs which is a small hill with tombs dug into it. You could look in and see bodies in the tombs, some had several in each and others were so close to the entrance that you could reach in and touch them if so inclined.

Spencer tries to pose as a photographer....he didn't fool anybody!

Untamed Outback...appropriate!

The following morning we stopped in a town called Farafar to buy lunch and for food group shopping. We continued onto some calcium carbonate formations in the desert, some photos and a game of Frisbee, we followed the backtrack for a while longer, seeing more stone formations and lots of alabaster laying on the side of the road.

Calcium carbonate formations, Western Desert

Burbs with his best Arab pose on!

Spencer and myself, Western Desert

Lunch time

The sand on the road was pretty soft in spots and eventually we came across a permanent tented camp with a swimming pool (there was not a drop of water or tree anywhere for miles). The man at the camp told us we would not be able to continue on the road in the truck, so we turned and made our way back tot he highway. We stopped in an area which was a petrified forest, we found many strange rocks and some petrified wood, some of which looks like petrified mangrove roots. With the calcium carbonate in the soil it was almost impossible to take your sunglasses off; to do so would be inviting snow blindness. That night we made camp in the White Desert Natural Preserve, which is full of white domes, which remind me of a smaller, white version of the bungle bungles in Western Australia, as we had driven past a police patrol and were not sure if camping was allowed we waited until after dark to put our tents up or fully unload the truck. A few of us went for a walk whilst waiting for the sun to set, we headed east and were surprised to find lots of other people camping nearby, complete with camels!   

Corrogated road, White Desert Natural Preserve

Fisheye view of the White Desert



Myself, White Desert Natural Preserve



Other campers, White Desert

White Desert Natural Preserve

The Saffa brothers, White Desert

While packing up the following morning I almost fell over in the dish water that had been discarded, it had turned the ground more slippery than Teflon! Again I blamed my crocs and relived my ‘almost toilet disaster’ where my right foot slipped out from beneath me and the only thing that saved me from remaining, to this day, in splits position on the toilet floor was the fact that my pants were around my knees and therefore saved my legs from adopting the full splits position! We made a stop for lunch and cook group, chocolate pudding with last nights leftovers, awesome! I had been looking forward to Son’s chocolate pudding since Ethiopia! We stopped at a cultural museum which turned out to be a very weird place, no entry price signs, no person there a head of clay statues that people wanted to buy but the man kept saying they were not for sale, there were lots of rooms set up in a traditional manner and all made from clay. We were not sure if the man was trying to charge us money as we left, he seemed unable to produce a price for our five minute wander through the gallery. When we were climbing onto the truck he was hurriedly shouting Arabic into his phone, we assume trying to get the owner o the place there to sort things out, we were long gone....We continued down the road, upsetting more locals; after stopping and walking over to some old roman ruins, three opportunists followed us over trying to extract money from us by saying that the ruins were on property owned by them...yeah right! And besides, you would have more luck in squeezing blood out of a stone than money out of a group of people who have not worked for at least six months!  They were persistent, following us right over to the truck and still asking for money as we were driving off! Sitting in the truck with people asking for money is common practice over here anyway! (I will point out that there was no ticket booth, fences, signs or anything at this site, the information that we had also said it was free).

Old Roman Ruins

That night we set up camp near another mobile phone tower, again, right on cue, a local man arrived to check out proceedings, but strangely, he didn’t want money and was happy for us to camp there! After dinner, before the long awaited chocolate pudding Kyle, Kenji, Gab and I wandered over to the train line. Ronald had used his blackberry earlier to look up the train timetable, but found that there were only freight trains on no set timetable that day (Ronald has become the truck librarian, finding out cricket scores, locations, train timetables and scrabble dictionary contents!) Armed with Canon cameras and me with a camp stool as a tripod (again cursing the bastard who has my tripod, hope they have poked out an eye with it) We take a couple of shots down the lines, talk some camera talk, all interesting stuff like f-stops, aperture, ISO’s etc etc, then we see a light up the track and think that ‘just maybe’ its a train, I look and announce it’s just a truck on the road, nope the ‘chuf, chuf, chuf, chuf’ sound does it, it’s a train, “cripes, I have a fish eye lens on and I’m in the desert, at night with a train coming!”, after contemplating allowing huge amounts of sand onto my sensor by changing lenses, I decide that without a proper tripod my photos are probably going to be pretty ordinary anyhow, so I leave the fisheye on. (a fisheye lens is a very wide angle view, meaning that it can capture a photo of almost 180 degree view, making everything look much smaller than it is in real life, still don’t understand...imaging the complete opposite of a telephoto zoom lens) A quick 30 second discussion about settings and who is going to do what and we are set up, staggered along the tracks about 2m from the expected train. I have always believed that trains create a sucking effect as they pass and tell everyone to secure their lens caps, as the train approaches we hear a man on the train yelling something to us, then we get blasted with sand...remember we are in the Western Desert of Egypt. I still wonder what the crew on the train must have thought when they saw us there, possibly assumed we were bandits! We had a variety of shots, all at different settings, but none compared to seeing the train barrelling through the desert in the middle of the night unexpectedly! After all 80 odd carriages pass it’s then time to compare our shots and then head back to the truck to clean off our beloved Canon cameras...gee I keep good company, only thing that would have made it better would have been Dranspaddock there with her Canon camera (and if I had a proper tripod!).

Kenji takes a long exposure photo of a passing freight train, Western Desert

What better place to lay on train tracks for a photo (this was after the train had passed!)

Downloading photos with the electricity from the phone tower, Western Desert....true Untamed Outback Images style!

After  the sand has been eliminated from our pride and joys it’s time for chocolate pudding, complete with fresh strawberries and cream, awesome! Pudding was even better than last time and completed a great day in style! After dinner it was announced that when we arrive in Giza we will be having a full truck clean, everything, absolutely everything, out of the truck and clean. Following that announcement was another, that the following day would also be ‘no swear day’ to raise money for movember, Jen’s response “what? On truck cleaning day?” ‘No swear day?’ hmmm, now that’s a problem for me at the moment, it’s been far too long since I spent a day in a work place or with my mother (Hi Mum, love you!) that my swearing is out of control. I get out of the tent and my first word is a swear word!, at five pounds a word and no income, I announce a vow of silence for the day! (Yeah, those of you who know me, know that I have even less chance of achieving that as I do of not swearing or summiting Mt Everest without oxygen wearing a bikini). Mark paid a 200 pound “all you can swear pass” and was throwing words about, the rest of us couldn’t afford 200 pounds for the luxury of unlimited profanities so had to keep them in check. I did notice a wider use of the English language that day! We drove through fog into Giza, the fog cleared to show smog! We stopped at a service station to get the chassis of the truck pressure sprayed then headed into our campsite, seeing a decapitated horse floating in the drain. 20 million people (only two million less than the whole of Australia) live in Cairo and traffic is crazy!, every road appears to be a one way street so we ended up doing a few laps to get to the campsite. On the way we got our first glance at the pyramids, ‘crickey, they are big!’ After aspiring to see the pyramids since I was about 12, I was prepared to be disappointed, but I was able to announce that I was impressed already! We had a bit of time for lunch before truck cleaning started...errr, or should I say the bitch and whinge fest! From where I was scrubbing and cleaning everyone looked to be getting right in and doing a good job, but there are some people who will find fault at anything that some people do...emphasis on the ‘some’. I put my head down and scrubbed and seemed to avoid any shrapnel. It was a bloody big job, when it was said that ‘everything’ came out oft he truck, it was no kidding. Even the seats were removed and scrubbed, all the food items were washed, sugar, tea and spice containers emptied and washed then refilled, cutlery, plates etc, pots were scrubbed back to silver. It is good to use clean gear again, I am glad that there are no dusty roads between Cairo and Istanbul! Afterwards most people indulged in a beer, ‘no swear day’ appeared to be over so we all indulged in a tad of swearing and I had a soft drink! Yay! After the drinks it was time for a shower, the first in six days, heaven!

Truck cleaning day

The following morning we headed to the pyramids, upon arrival the truck was thoroughly searched and we had to walk in through security and meet the truck on the inside. The saffa brothers decided to get on their Arab get-up and before we could say ‘Arabs’ the whole truck were reinvented as Arabs, I have to say that it just completed my pyramid experience to see all of us dressed up! We wandered around the great pyramid (Cheops) which is the largest at 146m, followed by the pyramid of Khafre (Chephren) which is the one you see with part of the limestone veneer still intact. It is smaller than Chephren, but is sits on higher ground so looks taller.  The inside of a pyramid is hot and stuffy and incredibly narrow. After entering the passage way drops away sharply and is enough to invite claustrophobia. There were no paintings like inside the tombs and all the artefacts have since been moved to the Cairo museum or to other museums around the world. It’s impressiveness is in the mass of small tunnels designed to trick any tomb robbers and the awareness of millions of tonnes of bricks over your head! We got back on the truck and drove up to the viewing point, now I thought that the truck attracted a lot of attention before... but  that’s nothing compared to the attention an overland truck full of Arab impersonators at the Great Pyramids of Giza attracts! At the viewing point we were aware of some people taking photos of us instead of the pyramids! We then made our way down to the sphinx; only half of it is open for viewing so it was a push and shove fest to bustle your way into a position to get a photo. Tour guides really need to sort their s&*t out and not decide to talk to a group of 50 people in a doorway, blocking the other 100 people a minute wanting to get through that doorway!. The Sphinx was not as impressive as I had imagined it to be, maybe I should have viewed it before the pyramids, at 20 odd meters high, it’s a short ass compared to a 146m pyramid! The sphinx really needs his nose back, Napoleons army shot it off and now its in the British museum...send it back! Selleys should sponsor the glue to stick the honker back on!

AK (Adam Kennedy) and Spencer at Giza

Myself and Spencer, Arab style

Spencer and myself infront of the second pyramid

Getting back on the truck

Hendrick, Spencer, Myself, AK, Burbs, Son, Kenji and Ronald at the pyramids lookout

Ronald, Burbs and Spencer, Giza

 Spencer was on cook group that night; he whipped up veggie burgers that most of the carnivores preferred over the beef variety. The following morning we had an early start for the short drive into Cairo, mainly to avoid the traffic and also to ensure there was a parking spot (or three consecutive ones) in the car park where the truck will be parked up for the four days we will be in Cairo. Even early in the morning the traffic was ridiculous, the truck did some pruning of the trees down a couple of side streets. Our hotel is good, on the ninth floor above KFC, opposite the train station and over the road from the museum. Spencer and I headed off to get some supplies, after checking the museum opening times and turning down many, many taxis we cross the Nile on foot, about the 30^th time we have crossed the Nile in the past three months. We took the train down to the main train station to book tickets to Alexandria in a few days time, what an experience!, the station is undergoing renovations and the ticket counted has been moved, we had to find the tourist police to ask where it was as most of the signs were in Arabic, we find the ticket office (we had previously walked into it but not realised we were in the right place) We line up at one counter and wait, then are surprised and pleased to find that the man behind the glass speaks English, he directs us to the next counter, we wait at the next counter until he man who pushed in front of us is served and then are redirected back tot he original counted, again we wait till the rude bastard who has pushed in (honestly there is nothing bar physical violence, that you can do against a huge Egyptian man wearing a suit who pushes in front of you) So we are then redirected back to the other counter, ‘what the?’ No, we are directed two counters up! With the interpretive help of a local man we buy our tickets, all written in Arabic! It shall be interesting trying to find the right platform! We get the train back to our stop but decide to ride the trains for a bit, what the hell, our ticket cost all of 20 Aussie cents, lets get full value out of it! Depending where the train was on the line would depend on the amount of people on it. Riding Egyptian trains when they are empty is great, when they are full is not so great, 90% of the inhabitants are males and 100% of them are sleazy, even the kids! Damage done; one old man knocked for six by both myself and then Spencer, hey I was going out the exit door, he was attempting to barge in before I had left the train, he deserved everything he got! 3 boys got ‘the bird’ from both Spencer and I and five young boys were ignored for their stupidity and massacring of the English language. One helpful man shunned as we had had enough by that stage! We then go searching for a card reader, after over 50 shops (Spencer sitting beside me claims it was 200!) I find one, and a tripod! Spencer had not been at all in favour of me buying another tripod that was anything less than perfect or anything cheaper than super-expensive as he claims that he is sick of hearing me bitch and whinge about substandard tripods....well I was going to wait till I got home for a great one, but I feel like I have a brand new BMW in my tripod (compared to resting a ridiculously expensive camera on a camp stool) and will make sure never to whinge about it’s short comings (at least in Spencers earshot!) we then attempt to find the truck, not as easy as we thought, round and round in circles, my feet aching from carrying my camera bag and tripod miles and miles, we arrive back at the hotel after way too may km’s and way too many people trying to extract coin out of us and after one man telling us to ‘walk like an Egyptian’, I mean what the? No one in Egypt walks like that!  

Today we spent the morning at the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, when lonely planet described it as having too many artefacts, I didn’t take too much notice, but there simply are too many artefacts! Over 100,000! It put me more in mind of a storage shed than a museum. We paid the extra to go into the royal mummies room, looking upon a 3000+ year old mummy is a weird experience. From there we checked out Tutankhamen’s treasures, another weird time, I vaguely remember seeing the Tutankhamen exhibition at the Melbourne museum when I was a kid, I don’t think I understood much about him at the time, but remember being amazed at the funary mask. Seeing it again on the other side of the world so many years on seemed surreal.  Spencer feels that they possibly would have used a copy for the exhibition in Melbourne, shall have to research that one!  Seeing so many artefacts has me in a mixed mind about the Cairo museum, way too much Egyptian history in one place, just imagine if the museum was destroyed? The reason it is all there was originally to protect if from tomb robbers, however so many of the statues and stone work could be returned to the temples, especially Karnak, which I said earlier appeared to me missing the finer details, well it is, they are all in the museum in Cairo!

Toilet break, Western Desert

Truck waits for us as Crystal Mountain, Western Desert

Sudan, Pyramids, Sand, Sand and more Donkeys!

We were up reasonably early as it was far too hot to stay long in a tent, after chocolate and banana buns for breakfast we headed off for a walking tour of Khartoum’s streets. Took a couple of sneaky photos off bridges, but there were always security guards in close proximity. After drinks in a local falafel house we headed back to the sailing club. I wandered down the street to buy a head covering of some description and noticed a very different reaction from people to a single, white woman, with no wedding band and no head covering. Whilst in the back of the only shawl shop that I could find, which had no lighting and was incredibly dark, the shop assistant (male) asked me ‘where is your friend” dodgy!

Cut up some watermelon for everyone for lunch then attempted to have a shower before leaving Khartoum at 3pm. I was very keen for a good shower as we have six nights of bush camping, so seven days without a shower. The shower was usually a dribble of six drops, but this day it was like two drops, then, just after I had lathered up, the water stopped completely! I waited and turned tap off, then on, then off, then on, to no avail. I eventually got a small amount of water out of the basin tap to get a little of the soap off, but just had to towel off. An hour later the water was back on, but by that stage I had become one with the soap and couldn’t be bothered to hassle with attempting another shower.

We were glad to be in the moving truck, as the breeze was slightly cooling, the day was well over 40 degrees and I was fully understanding why African Trails still make their trucks with the canvas sides, we would have died behind glass windows! We were stopped at many military checkpoints, our photos permit documentation is also out registration to travel north documentation was collected back from us at one checkpoint, from there onwards copies of these were kept with out passports in the cab, making the process quicker. I still find it funny that all this documentation is checked closely, but the numbers of people on the truck is not actually counted! Some checkpoints are very quick and some are very slow, the one constant thing is that there will be ladies selling nuts of chick peas at the checkpoints!

We watched the sun set from the truck with the hot wind still blowing in our faces; the sun looked like a huge orange fireball hanging over the horizon. We passed a military convoy heading south, with many tanks of varying size and shape, not long afterward we were overtaken by two trucks with machine guns mounted on the tray, they were the largest machine guns that I have ever sighted, the first sight of these vehicles beside us put my heart into my mouth as you read quite a bit about bandits in these parts. And in many countries the military and police are worse than the bandits!

We pulled off the road in darkness, but could just make out the outline of the pyramids in the skyline. We camped in the car park and sat around the charcoal burners still discussing the heat, there was a slightly warm breeze, but is was still bloody hot and many people from cooler climates were suffering a lot more than us. After we had set up tents and eaten dinner the police arrived, due to the language barrier we were unable to fully understand the problem, at one stage we though we were going to have to pack up and leave, however we settled the problem by turning the side light off.

Slept OK, but the sand was so hot that I kept waking up with every part of me that was in contact with the ground lathered in sweat. We were up at 6am to catch sunrise on the pyramids, after waiting until 6.30 for someone to show up and take our money we just entered. The pyramids were really good, no one else there bar us, and I don’t think this will happen at Giza! We arrived back at the truck to find lots of curio stalls set up right around out tents and in our dining room.

On the way into town we were stopped at a checkpoint near the river and saffa (south African) Robert, not to be confused with the other Robert, took a photo of a MTN sign (mobile phone company) as it had a world cup picture on it, one of the officials saw him and shouted some word up at him, then a sting of instructions that no one knew what the words were, but we all understood his massage! Then he took his camera and walked off, still holding his conversation to the person on the other end of his mobile phone. At this stage I thought that the camera was gone for good, but Robert managed to jump out of the truck and convince the man that he was no threat to security and got his camera back, complete with big greasy thumbprint on the lens. I think there is still a hangover effect from the civil war in Sudan, and possibly in preparation for the upcoming referendum in January 2011, there is a lot of secrecy surrounding bridges, fuel depots and military and police people and equipment. Our photo permits very clearly state not to photograph any of these things or anything defamatory of slums....the only problem, is a cow dung hut considered as a slum? Or does it have to have some corrugated iron on it?

We stopped for four hours in a town called Atbara, long enough for falafel, drinks and a chocolate, so I thought. At 11am when I wasn’t hungry there were falafel sellers on every corner, at 12, when I was hungry, not a falafel in sight! the call for prayer is at 1pm on a Friday so all the men pack up early in preparation. Sonya, Adam, saffa Robert and I went on a mission for spiced tea. I know that your thinking ‘who wants hot spicy tea in 40 degree heat?’, but it’s seriously refreshing!, We sat on a street corner with about 15 bemused local men drinking our tea out of glasses (you see very few females on the street and even less females actually eating or drinking). It was amusing to sit on a plastic stool with a donkey right behind me having a Pidgin English conversation about eating donkeys and weather the meat was chewy. He defiantly said that they eat donkey, not so sure if it was chewy...not willing to try it myself!

After lunch we had to drop back to the checkpoint to give them copies of our documentation, out photo permits/ registration to travel north, not sure why they thought that it was essential to have this information on us, when they could get it all from the Aliens registration centre, it’s not like they have a great number of tourist through every day! After a few hours of driving through harsh, unforgiving country, scattered with square mud huts and blown truck tyres (yep, I counted 7 in 100m today!) we pulled up a bush camp just off the highway. I went on a photo mission after putting up ‘territory’s own’ (our tent), Falafel for tea, glad that I had missed out on it for lunch! Some of the west coasters pulled the sheesha (possibly spelt wrong, like a bong) out and smoked some fruit tobacco.

My feet are getting hammered, three stubbed toes, all from the same campsite, different rocks! I think I have another jigger happening, but have been unable to wash my feet properly to confirm it, and my little toenail is starting to fall off again, looking forward to getting back to civilisation and away from acacia thorns that constantly jab through my thongs and into my feet!

The following day we were up to take some photos of the sun rising across the desert, stopped at the Merewa pyramids. Some enterprising locals tried to get 25 pounds each out of us to visit the pyramids, one man pointed out “he is my manager, see he has a briefcase!” needless to say, and they didn’t receive their 25 pound from anyone! We walked the 500odd meters over to the 7 pyramids than climbed up the hill to overlook the Nile, pyramids and ruins. It is amazing to see the Nile snaking across the desert, lined with green trees and grass and then see how the land turns to desert about 1km from the river. From there we walked down and around the other ruins and cemetery before loading ourselves back onto the truck. From there we drove into town for lunch, the Sudanese people just get more and more friendly the further north we come. Kerry and I went to find a toilet, initially we were not understood, but were soon taken to a man who spoke very good English who took us to his house to use his toilet, just a hole in the floor in a shed out the back, he told us he was a dentist from Khartoum and even gave us instructions of how to ‘flush’ the toilet with a jug of water and ‘lock’ the door with an old piece of fencing wire! After a couple of hours driving we made a bus camp in the middle of nowhere, literally, nowhere, the only things visible was a mobile phone tower and a radio tower! The conversation that night revolved around food, ice cream, icy poles, zooper dopers seem to be the most sought after items..hmm, may have something to do with the 40 degree temperatures! After rechecking the guide book, Kyle announces that there is ice cream available in Gondola the next day. When we went to bed it was still darn hot, however by about 3am I had to wake Spencer up to get his sleeping bag from underneath him to sleep in as my Maasai blanket just wasn’t keeping me warm, he was happy with the blanket, the following night I made sure that I didn’t leave my sleeping bag in the truck, it had been so long since I had used it!

The following day I sat in the cab with Mark and Burbs, the ant bites on my butt have been rubbed raw from sitting on my undies elastic (darn, cheap Mr Price undies!) Lying in the sleeper compartment in the cab reading the Da Vinci Code and sitting up occasionally to check if there were any trees, animals or oncoming traffic....nope, none, lay back down! We stopped at Gondola for four hours, Ish, Jen, Jules, Son and I went on our ‘ice cream’ mission whilst Spencer battled out a game of travel scrabble with Pat, Hendrick, Robert (saffa) and Kaye, discussion over rules almost descended to squabbling at times whilst debate rages over wether words like ‘fag’ and ‘ya’ should be allowed! Our ice cream mission took us to many shops and had us lifting the lids on all freezers, to find a random array of items, after a few shops we found a tub of vanilla ice cream for 10 pounds, we also found a bakery with cakes and pastries and at another shop a tube of nutella! (Well the local brand which was just as good!) We went back to the ice cream shop, made the purchase, and back to the bakery to combine all ingredients for the feast of a lifetime!  I was dealing with the mystery of my lost five pounds (2 bucks!), couldn’t find it anywhere, searched high and low and high and emptied all my pockets out and assumed someone had pick pocketed it, to find it later that night whilst washing my shorts!, I am losing everything at the moment!

Still on our sugar high we left Gondola, driving for another few hours before making camp on the banks of the Nile, we could see a few Nile crocodiles over the other side of the river so were not really compelled to collect water for washing (all kitchen water is on the truck, but if you want to wash clothes or yourself, you have to source your own water). Kim had me in stitches by saying that she wasn’t going to go to the waters edge to collect water, but that she would make one of the locals do it) I nearly wet myself, what she meant was that the locals knew the river and knew how to collect water without getting a crocodile wrapped around their ears! She ended up finding an irrigation channel that was too small and shallow for any croc, so I got some water from there to wash my clothes as I had run out of clean underwear, unable to find my one decent pair of bonds undies! And then walked back over to collect another ten litres to wash myself in as I was stinking! Turns out that the large washing tubs are a great bath. But I did almost fall out at one stage! For the first time since Nairobi I actually felt clean (and it only took a plastic tub behind a bush and 10 litres of water to do it! (Now that’s saying something about every shower that I have encountered between that bush and Nairobi!)

Have put in an order with Pat, an Aussie, for his girlfriend to please bring the biggest jar of vegemite possible to Cairo where she is joining the truck to Istanbul, Pat tells us that he has never had vegemite, but that he know he doesn’t like it! All I can think about is my Nan, who said the same thing! Eventually after telling Pat that he is no Aussie without it and that he should have his Aussie passport confiscated (he is actually travelling on a Swiss one!) he agrees to try the vegemite when it arrives.

Travel and the desert does strange things to people, one morning we were talking about having a ‘flap off’ a contest to see who can flap their plates dry the quickest, a glance around the group showed many styles of ‘flap’ whole body swinging, freestyle swimming, mechanical flapping (that was Spencer) full range of motion flapping (me) and someone twirling with plates in outstretched arms! What the locals must think!

This morning we had a sleep in then breakfast on the banks of the Nile at 7.30am; I wandered along and found my favourite donkey, which was still tied up in the same place as the previous evening. He is the best looking donkey I have even seen and I wanted to put him in my locker to bring him home! Instead I got a few photos. We did the 200km into Wadi Haifa in good time; the roads here are in fantastic condition (better that Australia!) Once here we learned that the barge taking the truck was loaded and would leave a day earlier than planned, we had to pack gear for 6 days and say goodbye to the truck, we will be following on the passenger ferry on Wednesday. We checked into our ‘hotel’ and there was not a single person who would not prefer to be bush camping, if I had my tent, I would put it up in the room! The roof has a hole in it, and not a small one, like 2ft by 3ft!, the walls were painted, once...about 50 years ago, the floor is bare concrete and the beds are made of rope wrapped around the frame, they are all in a line which looks like stables and have bars on the windows, like a jail! Toilets are another story! Spent a couple of hours in the afternoon and evening climbing a small hill at the back of town with Kyle and Kim to take some photos, got some good ones of the town, then the sunset and a few night pics before making the ascent in the dark.

From there we ran into everyone else for tea at a small eatery then I went for a sheesha session with Kenji, the saffas, Gab, Ronald and Kaye and the south African bloke that we keep bumping into who is riding a motorbike from Cape town to Cairo, who I have met but have never caught his name! Sheesha is a big contraption which you use to smoke fruit tobacco, apple and mint were on the card tonight, I wasn’t in it for the tobacco, just the whole social aspect of sitting around two very ornate burners and a coal scoop talking crap! Waiting for the onslaught of bedbugs tonight.....bring on bush camping!

(Added the following morning...so about 2am I wake us as my bed is shaking (we are on single beds, Spencer is on the other side of the room) I say to him “what has happened?” as I thought he was waking me up as something was wrong (like a fire due to the shit electrics!) he is across the other side of the room, still asleep saying “huh?” I put my head torch on and have a look around, just to make sure no one is stealing my camera bag which I hook the bed leg through the strap, no it’s still there. After a couple of hours of being certain that there was something in the room, turn the torch on again, yup, bloody ferral cat! My bed must have shook where it dive bombed me from the hole above the window!