OnTheRoad

The trip from Jordan to Cairo, Egypt, is not a simple as one might suppose. In theory, it's a short ferry trip, followed by a long bus trip. The reality, in our case, is that it's a really, really long ferry trip, followed by several days of lazing around beside the Gulf of Aqaba, followed by a long bus trip.

The ferry ride is crazy expensive for a one hour trip, at US$70 one way making the three hour trip over the Cook Straight on the Interislander ferries look like damn good value. That price is for the fast ferry, however, and that's the one we booked... but not the one we got. Turns out that bad weather (a little wind) was preventing the fast one from going, so the slow ferry it was for us. After some confusion and haggling, in which we established that no refund could be given (as we'd booked in town, not at the port), we were bumped to first class (which doesn't mean much, trust me), and also, given that we're "married", given a cabin, which is much more useful.

Anyway, two and half to three hours was the expected time for the slow ferry. Eight hours later we're waiting outside the port of Nuweiba, Egypt, waiting to come in. Rough seas were preventing us from coming in. At four in the morning we were awakened by knocks on the door and accompanying cries of "Yella, yella!" (more or less, go, go!). Ah, time to disembark.

The next challenge, after locating our luggage (lying more or less unattended in a crowd of porters) was to locate my passport. June had a visa already, as she couldn't get one on arrival. I could get one, of course, but they'd taken my passport on the boat and told me to deposit money at a bank in the port, then go to the visa office. I couldn't deposit money of course, because it was four in the goddamn morning. After making it all the way through customs and bumped out the other side, without actually getting my passport checked, we turned around and walked back through the other way. Eventually we found the visa office, where the very helpful man that had taken my passport on the boat was still awake. A quick radio call dragged a bank teller from somewhere to open the bank (I wish I could do that whenever I wanted), and wham, bam I had my visa.

One taxi ride later, swiftly negotiated from 60 EGP down to 20 EGP, and were were deposited at Soft Beach Camp, a little north of Nuweiba. Here we stayed for a few days, unable to drag ourselves away (although I only went swimming once, and June not at all).

Finally we did escape, onto a bus across the Sinai, under the Suez Canal and into Cairo itself. The trip is beautiful, but stops infrequent and the bus windows dirty, so I'm unable to supply you with photos. We'll have to do the trip in reverse later on, as we head back to Jordan from here, so perhaps I'll be more lucky this time around.

Cairo itself is much better than I had faired. To those that think Cairo is bad for touts, you've clearly never visited India. Egyptian touts seem to leave me alone after a quick "no thanks"/"la shukran", as opposed to their Indian counterparts, that sometimes need to be literally shaken off.

So, we're settled in now, after a little hassle finding a place. By the way, the Australia Hostel is great, very friendly staff and pleasant looking. We're not staying there, as they were full, but they helped us out and showed us around, and we'll be heading there when they've got space. Today, we're off down to check out Islamic Cairo and Khan al-Khalili, once I finish updating this, to wander around and drink excessive quantities of Turkish coffee, aka Khawa. Mmmm.

No new photos for now, but given that I have free wireless and I'm in a new city... look for new photos within the next 24 hours anyway.