Egypt

Of course all Indiana Jones had to worry about were those pesky Nazis. If he had to deal with the far more aggressive sales people, camel ride pushers, crooked "tourist police", and giant tour bus groups he never would have gotten his hands on that ark!

We had a very good time exploring the amazing pyramids today and the Egyptian Museum was outstanding. Baylie was most excited about the mummy room and Shawn was jazzed about the King Tut collection. Fortunately, the museum is still there to see - it stands right next to a burned out government building that was destroyed in the revolution riots several months ago. We drove through Tahrir Square on our way back to the hotel and we crossed the Nile a couple of times today. So a little bit of modern history along with our dose of ancient times. Pretty spectacular really.

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We had an easy travel day from Sharm el Sheikh to Cairo today. But Cairo is one crazy city! We thought we had seen wild traffic before, but nothing compares to this so far. On the freeway we were passed by a small pickup truck with a cow in the back, but even that wasn't enough to get much attention! The freeway has four lanes of traffic if you go by the lines painted on the road, but several times I noticed six cars across in front of us. Apparently if you can fit between the cars ahead of you, just stradle the line and squeeze on in!

We went to the pyramids this evening to watch a "sound and light show". It was pretty corny, but Baylie and I thought it was cool to hear the Great Sphinx telling the stories of the pharaohs. Tomorrow we will see them in the morning and then go to the Egyptian museum. I'm enjoying this history lesson!

We went on a snorkeling excursion today to Tiran Island. The trip out there was a little long and I kept thinking of those of you with a tendency to get sea sick - it was a pretty rough ride at times! But we got very lucky and ran into a huge pod of dolphins with lots of moms with their babies. Baylie was thrilled! We stopped at three different magnificent snorkeling locations, had lunch on the boat, and had a very good day. We did meet a rather odd character on the boat, a nice young woman from Sweden who was traveling all alone. She is 6 months pregnant and had come here specifically to try and swim with dolphins in the wild because she had read that "they are very sensitive to pregnant women and will come to them and be protective". Hmmm. Not sure I felt up to such a strange adventure when I was 6 months pregnant. She was pretty unhappy when the guide stopped her from leaping overboard in the middle of the ocean when the dolphins were spotted.

Baylie discovered that in addition to her great strength in swimming she has quite a talent for "free diving". There was a guy in our group who is a professional free diving instructor from Italy. It's all about the ability to hold your breath and dive really deep for a long time with no scuba gear. She followed him everywhere. At one point they swam under a small outcrop of coral and I about fainted, but she came up smiling without even breathing hard. They were going so deep they kept passing scuba divers. The guide took her through a little canyon that no one else could even swim down to. When she followed him and they touched the tail of the moray eel I couldn't believe it. Can a mom be terrified and proud at the same time? I promise, I really am looking out for her!

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We have arrived in Sharm el Sheikh and I would love to tell you all about Egypt, but I suspect this place has very little resemblance to actual Egypt! Like every review said, this is 100% a tourist resort. We had a hard time finding a restaurant that claimed to serve Egyptian food, but after passing the Hard Rock Cafe, a sushi place, and an Irish pub, we did find a menu with "middle eastern cuisine". I'm definitely not complaining though! It's beautiful here, feels very safe, and we are in a luxuriously comfortable hotel that we got at a great bargain price. I can't help comparing the people we have encountered so far with the people in Turkey, however. I know it's an unfair first impression considering the atmosphere here, but in Turkey everyone who was nice to us seemed completely genuine and interested. So far everyone here who has been nice seems to have a different agenda. It's a very "hard sell" from the moment they start a conversation.

Today we spent the day mostly on the beach and the snorkeling was outstanding just footsteps from shore. We saw a spectacular lion fish and a pretty menacing looking eel along with all the tropical fish you see in every aquarium. I can't wait to go out on a boat and see what more of the reef areas have to offer! It was a little exhausting trying to keep up with my mermaid though. Once Baylie puts on a pair of fins she's pretty much gone. I attached a whistle to her swim suit strap (you know, in case she needed to notify people right away of...well....a "larger than normal fish")and followed her around for a couple of hours. We finally called it quits when the tourist traffic clouded up the water.

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