Egypt

Last stop on the year long trip, Egypt scared me and intrtigued me at the same time. I’d spent the last three months in relative luxury in European countries where I spoke the language and knew the locals. Now I went to the Middle East, the birthplace of religon, but still the third world. Starting in Cairo, then to the easy tourist destination of Sharm El Sheik, I slowly went deeper into the outback, and further from creature comforts for one last gasp of backpacking style.

Stories

Favorite Photographs

Cairo

Tiresome. Maybe I had been on the road too long. Maybe I had become used to prices clearly marked in stores. Maybe I had become at home with the ability to blend in with the crowd in London. So when I arrived in Cairo, and everyone wanted to be my friend, buy me some tea, show me their shop, or take me around town, I was no longer ready for the energy needed to deal with it all. “Hello my friend, where you come from, are you married, how old are you, do you need some spices? A girl? Where you go now? Please, I just have some questions.” Cairo is a jumbled city filled with dust, traffic and smog. Despite this I did have some very interesting days about, but mostly I hid in the confines of my hostel.

Visits

Birqash Camel Market

When in Egypt, do as the Egyptians. My faithful friend Robert and I hired a driver and went off the the Camel Market in Birqash. It’s just like any used car stop in the United states, lots to choose from, questionable quality, and arguing salesmen.

Our driver was not pleased when we suggested buying a baby camel and strapping it to the roof of the car. You can, however, fit up to four camels into the back of a pickup truck for transport to your place of buisness. they don’t go in easily, but folded up they take up less space than you imagine.

Camel Bound – Bound so it won’t run away, a three-legged stance
Camel Eat – Dinnertime at the market
Camel Leg – Strange shapes, these camels
Camel row – Just like a used car lot
Camel Sales –
Camel Sellers – looking like regular guys about town
Men – business men without the suits

Cairo, the Pyramids

When you first see the top of the pyramids peeking over the roadside trees you are forced by sheer human nature to press your face against the glass and gasp at the size of the things. Then you meet the hoardes of hawkers, camel guides, and perfume dealers. Tough to concentrate on the actual experience of being there when you’re slapping away mercenary pests as thick as mosquitoes in an Alaskan springtime. The three main pyramids are Cheops, the oldest built around 2600 B.C., Chephren and Mycerinus.

Port Safaga, the amusement park

This is an industrial town on the Red Sea coast, mostly concerned with exporting Potash by ship to the rest of Egypt and the Middle East. In the middle of the one-road downtown there soared a rickety old ferris wheel, sitting empty in the mid-day sun. Myself and my friend Robert were stuck waiting for a convoy to get us to Luxor, so I went over to photographs the strange juxtaposition of an amusement park in a desert. About ten minutes after I started exploring, two small beat-up busses arrived at the gate and out piled sixty or so schoolkids. They were as happy and excited to be at this little rat-trap amusement park as most school trips running through the gates of Disneyland in California. It was one of the most serene sensations of enjoyment watching these kids shrieking and smiling and staring at the tall white photographer tracking them down.

Desert, between Hurghada and Luxor, and Sinai

Though it shouldn’t surprise me, Egypt is dry and hot. I expected sand dunes and camels, but on my trip through I was amazed by the mountains and vast, empty flat areas. The desolation was wonderful, and made it especially interesting that the government doesn’t allow foreigners to pass through without a convoy. We had four sub-machinegun toting guards with our single taxi the entire 6 hour trip.

 

Luxor

This is the place where the tomb-seekers flock. Luxor sits on the Nile and is home to the worthy Valley of the Kings, Luxor Temple, and Karnak, some of the best-restored examples of ancient Egyptian architecture and culture. Geared for tourism, but only just hiding a thriving local city, Luxor allows access to the wonders of ancient kings, if you can just get through all the local entrepreneurs trying to bring you special places and selling you special things.

Aswan

A bustling city far south on the Nile Aswan was a stopover for merchants from the south of Africa. Now it’s main business is tourism, and sections of the city crawl with vendors eager, very eager, to sell you spices, perfume bottles, drums, just about anything. And they are the most persistent salespeople I encountered in the country. Aswan is also home to the Temple of Philae, rescued from the rising waters of the dammed Nile between 1972 and 1980 by moving it block by block to a higher island, and reassembled for the tourists and historians.

Felluca trip, the Nile

The felluca boat is the local method of navigating the Nile. For centuries this simple wood-hulled, single sail boat has been used to transport people, livestock, and goods throughought Egypt. Shile still functioning as local transport, the felluca tourist trip is a staple of the riverside communities. My trip piled 25 backpackers into two boats for a three day trip down the Nile from Aswan to Luxor. My time was short though, so I had the boat pull over after two days and drop me off in Kom Obo and continuing on my own.

Sharm El Sheik, Sinai, and Hurghada

One of the premiere dive destinations on the planet, Sharm is coated edge to edge with western-style beachside resorts and restaurants. The diving was wonderful, but the encroaching construction threatens to kill the very reason people come to visit. The coral reefs that line the coast are under constant seige from construction refuse and uncaring divers. Despite these difficulties, Sharm and the dive boats offer up a wonderful selection of shapes and colors to photographs.

Naama Bay, Sinai

Neighboring village to Sharm El-Sheik, Naama Bay is where the luxury resorts first popped up under Isreali rule before the Egyptians got it back. Perched on the sea just inside the mountains of southern Sinai, it’s a wonderful place, but doesn’t feel much like the rest of Egypt, just a fun beach town for Italian tourists and divers.