2009 Egypt Trip Highlights

12/1/2009-12/8/2009

2009-Egypt I
12/1/2009(SFO-Paris)
Once again, Yolly gave us a ride to SFO. The flights we booked through Delta but operated by Air France(we could not check-in because of this) so we had to go to aisle 7 to check-in, it was a snap. We chowed down most of the food we brought before entering the security check point. Security check is more strict than the last time we traveled. We were t Gate A5 when we board UA for the Baltic Cruise trip, today we are at Gate A7 - same location but difference wall postings. As expected, all announcements were made in French - English - Spanish. It appears that all European carriers serves better meal, this was no exception - all kinds of drinks before meal including wine, soft drink, liquor, and juice, a separate round of drink was severed with the meal,
we each had a small bottle of 2008 Red wine (LA BAUME), fairly good and goes well with the beef I ordered. Watched Ice Age 3 - interesting and entertaining. Our seats were on the last row of the section which were also right next to the toilet, popular area but also convenient for us. We landed at Charles Degroot airport at 11:25, this airport is one of the old airports that do not have enough land to expand and have run out of space - virtually all passengers must take shuttle to get to the terminal, and take another shuttle to get to different terminal for connecting flight. It took us 35 minutes to get to gate 44 F for Cairo connection flight.
It was cloudy and rained slightly in Paris. We waited a while at the boarding gate due to unknown delay. There was a long stair ramp which took us to the shuttle waiting. The carrier was a relative new Airbus 330 about 70% full. Air France provides meal menu on both flights (SFO-PARIS, PARIS-CAIRO) and serves free drinks of many varieties, the food was also splendid, quantity served was generous, we were able to save some for snacks.
12/2/2009
Cairo Airport is relatively small compared to its neighboring countries, visa fee is $15 paid at special counter, getting through custom wasn't difficult, just need time :-) Gate1 representative picked up all 6 from the same flight, two other couples are John/Cathrin from New port Beach and Eric/Sandra from ??? It took one hour to get to The Oasis Hotel, our guide Mamal kept pressing their excursions but we decided to take taxi on our own.
The hotel wasn't what we were used to, our room 3013 wasn't on the third floor, it's way back at the end of the hotel complex, amenities were not bad, possibly 3 star when it was built.
12/3/2009 - Cairo
All other Gate1 members took excursion, so we are all alone today.
Woke up at 4:00 am,fooled around a bit until it's breakfast time. The free buffet was edible, the only thing deserved praise was their hash-brown. Left hotel in "limo" heading toward The Pyramid of Giza at 7:45. I was very disappointed seeing the Pyramids in person may be because seeing too many nice pictures taken professionally, it could be because that Egypt is a not too rich country, their people do not appear proud of the treasure have. Most countries with this type of world class treasure would spend a lot and make their people proud.
[Observations]
- The place looks like a dump
- There was no signs/descriptions of the place (expecting people to find out for themselves)
- No instruction on where to buy different kinds of tickets.
- Ticket purchasing is done manually, one people outside taking money and write down what was purchased in a notebook(the old paper based), people inside the ticket booth hands out your ticket.
- Although the pyramid ground area was relative clean, there are many locals with camel waiting to get tips from tourists - take your photo, take their photo, buy something from you
- You get nothing but the tickets, no description of the pyramids, their history, preservation efforts, etc. as you could from all established facilities of the sort.
- There are police everywhere you go, for security reason of course, but most of them simply sit/talk/wandering around.

2009-Egypt II
12/3/2009(continued)
Note1: Almost everyone you might or might not need help from expect some "reward", ask someone for direction, go to the restroom, or being offered to take your picture, etc.
Note 2: There is no speed limit in Egypt (at least in Cairo and Giza), people drive as fast as one can imagine, so there are road bumps in the streets everywhere except freeway, but since freeways cross over many streets, the overpasses themselves serve similar purpose.

12/4/2009
3:45-wake up call (we ended up checking the time every 30 minutes beginning at 11:00)
4:00-luggage out at door
4:30-check luggage
4:45-leave hotel
7:00-flight to Aswan

There hot coffee and lunch boxes waiting at the lobby cafe, the cucumber inside was fresh and delicious, the first vegetable we have in two days. The coffee was really good even without sugar.
We arrived at the airport at 5:45, went through 3 security check points-the airport building entrance, concourse pathway entrance, and boarding gate entrance.
Note: the group was actually 40 something in size and we were the only people not in the excursion yesterday. We decided to join the excursion the next 3 days to save some energy and hassle - had to pay $60 more than if paid in the US.
Since we don't have the same last name, Anita and I were assigned different seats, it turned out mine 08A was the first one in business class-too bad it's only an one hour flight. s, not sure if it's only available or business class seats but I actually got hot swipe+juice right after seating, plus s light breakfast after taking off-unusual for an one-hour flight. Took one small coffee spoon as souvenir (not sure if they were included for different food items or packaging error, but there were two coffee spoons in the bag). Note that they are real silverware instead of the usual plastic ones - again not sure if it was special for business class only. Found out I am being envied and hated because of my sitting in business class, oh well, tough luck.
We were taken to Aswan High Dam, built by the Soviet union in the 70th - not much to see (we would not come on our own but no choice since it is part of the package), stopped at "unfinished Obelisk", the site where granite blocks were erected and served as construction material here.
We finally boarded the "Escape" cruise,an old but remodeled river cruiser, probably holds about 100 passengers-don't even try to compare this with Princess cruise ships. The food on board is edible at best, no fruits were served so far.
The evening tour of temple "Tom ???" was interesting but it's very chilly and Anita got sick afterward. I had a quick dinner (same staff with the exceptions of chicken and a cooked vegetables) and managed to get some food delivered to our cabin for Anita.

2009-Egypt III
12/5/2009
There is a tea&coffee at 6:15 before our morning tour, so we visited the bar at 6:00 before the crowd-there were only some small slices of cake, I took 4 slices of them - enough to go through the short morning tour.
Edfu temple is only 5 minutes away from the port, it was excavated in ???? - need more detail of the temple. We stayed on board the whole day to sail for Luxor after the Edfu temple tour - caught up with some well deserved sleep. There was a costume party(formal name?) before and after dinner when guests get to put on local (Egyptian) dresses, we had our usual dresses and simply watched-interesting, we were(especially me) never the party/social type. Dinner was little better than yesterday but,,,.
12/6/2009
This is going to be a fully scheduled day. Got up really early - as usual - had a quick breakfast as we'll be rifing and seeing temples and tombs all day.
Valley of Kings tour is more like Disney Land which you have choice seeing 3 tombs(general admission) or selected tombs. Most of them are similar, but the tomb of the son of Ramesses III- Khaem Wast is considered the best as colors on most of the reliefs are still well preserved, thanks to year round hot and dry weather. The only Egyptian Queen that has her own private tomb was Hatshepsut, who...

Valley of Queens simply wasn't worth visiting (except perhaps the one that's closed for maintenance). as the only two tombs open didn't have much to see or admire.

Note: The Luxor city has a better impression as the streets and tour sites (temple, museums, tombs) are well designed to attract foreign tourists - a much better experience than when visited the Pyramids of Giza and the Egyptian Museum. Although tip-for-forced-service is still wide spread. The only places that we did not get harassed were for-tour guide-commission-stores and Luxor airport (verify).

A couple of short stops later, our guide took the group to another store to see(and BUY) stone based products. This store appears to be one of the popular ones as the tour buses come in and go every minute, this directly translate into their attitude, we did not buy any thing(but we did take advantage of their free of charge restroom), there were, however, quite a few customers from our group, so the wait for everyone else was long and we had to rush back to the boat to get lunch and harry on to the next tour - they put their profit before their clients' interest, not an acceptable behavior even for this "affordable" travel.
The "Luxor Temple" tour in the afternoon was most memorable, its pillar formation was spectacular and there were tons of them still intact.

2009-Egypt IV
12/6/2009 (continued)
Eight from Manal's group had to leave for Luxor Airport early morning, Anita, Patrick, Wendy Lum (Sacramento), Jef Lum (Stockton), Sandra Horn (Kentucky), Eric Horn (Kentucky), Catherine Ward (New York), and John Ward (New York).
4:30-Wake up call
4:30-5:30-Breakfast
5:30-Leave boat
7:10-Luxor Airport
It was a short one hour flight but drinks were still served - nothing alcoholic though. Checked-in Inberotel Hotel at 8:45. A likely 4-star hotel-no robes, room 1103 was clean and on the ground floor (we thought it was on the 11th floor until we saw the elevator only goes to 4th floor).
We rested for a while (it wasn't difficult o fall asleep as we were both exhausted), we did wake up and watched two movies, one was "Water Horse", an interesting but fictional film kind of linked the Lake Niss monster to it. Another was "August Rush" about a music prodigy. Had lunch at hotel Italian restaurant "Il Giardino", nice pasta and draft beer-~148 Egyptian pounds(~$30).
Rested most of the afternoon, got a sandwich and a pastry for dinner. Got to the airport at 9:45, went through a series of security check points (guess they treat US bound flights more seriously). Our return flight was, unfortunately, operated by Delta, the plane was not old but also ill maintained - no per seat screen, only the old over-the-top CRTs, air-conditioning leaked water at several occasions, one air outlet was completely gone so the flight attendant had to use something to cover it up. There were at least a dozen wheelchair passenger never seen before. There also were a number of small kids, two were behind us (ages 5 and 8),another across the isle, possibly 4 years old. The four-year old screamed non-stop from the moment he boarded the plane, this lasted several hours until he felled asleep. Comparing meals served on Delta, the ones we had on Air France was 2 scales better. After 12 hours and 30 minutes we finally landed at NYC-JFK airport, since this is an early morning flight plus we do not have to wait for baggage, we got through custom in 10 minutes - would have been 20,30 minutes during the day.
We had some leftover food from the flights plus Starbuck coffee for breakfast.
Flight from NYC-JFK to SFO was also operated by Delta, the gate change was discovered early otherwise we may have to run to the new gate at the last minutes. It turned out the flight (757-200) was very empty, possibly 60% of he seats were unoccupied, virtually everybody got one row(3 seats) and there were still quite a few empty rows, never had I experienced such luxry, even better than business class as far as seating goes. No meal except nuts/pretzel were served on board and only non-alcoholic drinks were free of charge-a sharp contrast to what we had on board Air France.