– Heard on Cairo FM, a reference to all fasters making their daily slog to iftar

I have squeezed a great deal of motion into this rather unforecasted trip, and accordingly I haven’t covered the half of my experiences within this blog. It’s simply not possible to adequately communicate the clash of beauty, awe and bafflement that you experience when you are out on the road (although Kerouac did do a handy job).  Moreover- each eye is different, and I guarantee that my travel companions would offer different testimonials of the scenes that we have collectively witnessed. 

 I haven’t even told you about the food…

All that said, I really want to bookmark this past week and return to it later on for further exploration- there’s simply too much to see in this part of the world. Although I’m not inviting you to come on my hypothetical return trip (really, I’m not the best travel companion), I think you all should go and do this trip yourselves.  If you’re too broke, or too stuck in our American stereotypes of the Arab world, then you need not continue down the page and read about my travel guide-style synopsis.

NB: Special thanks to Pulliam Travel Services for putting together a superlative itinerary that made my first foray into the Middle East ridiculously easy.  All of the stops on this trip were not devised by me; I was just following in the steps of a well-trodden path (which I still managed to mess up at certain points).

This will be cut and dry:

I landed in Cairo. Americans can get a visa on arrival ($15USD)- you get them at the bank counters to the right just before immigration. Once in town, it pays to know someone living there, who also knows good drivers and the cool places to check out. Although my short stay only allowed me to see a sliver of the sites, Islamic Cairo was really cool to explore.

Take a bus to Sinai Peninsula. It leaves for Saint Katherin’s at 11am from Turgoman Station. It takes 8 hours and I think costs 45LE.

You get spit out at the last stop, and are looking for a place to stay. Drivers waiting for the bus will ask you where you are staying. The correct answer is the Bedouin Camp (also called Sheikh Mousa) and one of the drivers will bring you there. You arrive in very cool settings and will sit, enjoy some tea, and then talk about rooms and what you want to do (i.e., when do you want to climb Mount Sinai). We were short on time, and said we wanted to see sunrise the following day. 

The last rest stop before you get to the top of Mount Sinai (which you can see above the Bedouin 7-Eleven)

You have to have a tour guide (the cost is 85LE) to climb up. Our camp set us up with a nice guide and we set out after a three hour “nap” at one in the morning in the moonlight (still you should bring a flashlight, sunscreen, water and sturdy shoes).  Less than three hours later, we were near the top and waiting for the sun to do its thing. I recommend “renting” a camel-fragranced blanket to wrap around yourself as you sit on the mountain top and wait for your numinous experience.

Back on the ranch, eat a tasty breakfast and have an invigorating shower. By this time you will have negotiated a driver to take you to Dahab (for a van of five people we paid 10DL each I think). It takes about an hour to get to Dahab.

Once in town, you can install yourself on one of the many waterfront properties- but bear in mind that most of them have salt water coming from the taps and showers. This kind of takes the utility out of bathing- but hey, you get what you pay for. The food, swimming, diving and snorkeling can’t be beat. All in all, it’s a very chilled-out locale.

Next destination is Petra, which I haven’t posted about yet. To get there, you first need to arrange a driver that goes from Dahab to Nuweiba. The hotels do this, and it costed three of us 50LE (I think).

The ferry to Aqaba (in Jordan) is what you are aiming to take. The fast ferry leaves at about 1430-1500 every day (maybe except Saturday). You need to pay in U.S. dollars, and it costs $80. The ferry is great, and takes about two hours. On the ferry your passports are collected (this is a very orderly process) and you retrieve them once you have disembarked the ferry and are deposited in the Aqaba terminal.

You’ll need a driver to take you from Aqaba to Petra. This usually costs around 60DJ I think. It takes about 90 minutes, and there are taxi drivers waiting at the ferry gate to take you where you need to go.

You won’t get to Petra town till about 8pm, so you should make reservations beforehand. I would not recommend The Petra Inn, but I would recommend Movenpick if you are rich. Lots of other choices to stay, but the Petra archaeological city is the main show in town as far as attractions go. I recommend you buy a multi-day pass (bring your passport), bring water and food, and go early (park opens at 6am). This way you can check out the sun painting the sandstone as it rises. Soon it gets unbelievably hot, and you will be wanting to make the long trek back out of the city. Bring a hat. And more sunscreen.

From there we took a taxi to Jordan. That was earlier today, and it took three hours, and costed 70DJ and a bit of our sanity.

Alternatively you can also go to Israel, the Dead Sea… even Syria and Saudi Arabia if you really, really wanted to do so, and can get the visa. There are many other places within Jordan that I’d like to check out, but alas, I’m only here for two days more, and I need to start grad school at some point in time.