It took approximately 2-3hrs for the customs officials to check every conceivable orifice on the truck in a sheltered area of the port. Their english vocab was limited to a few grunts and three words, "where's ze whiskey?". Story has it that the previous Kumuka driver got caught illegally importing 40 bottles of Jack Daniels from Syria.For some reason, they believe that stupidity can strike twice.

After finally registering the truck with a damaged arabic license plate that appeared to have a bullet hole through it, we began the short drive to Dahab. A small seaside backpacker town that moves at a pace slower to time. It was the perfect resting spot with our hotel adjacent to the main esplanade. A 200m long walkway curved around the scenic bay, scattered with restaurants, souvenirs and a plague of Egyptian entrepreneurs.

The next day we hired some snorkel gear to investigate the coral reef next to the lighthouse.The lighthouse was recommended by the locals, however it took most of the heated morning to find, searching for a lighthouse with a beacon. In fact the "lighthouse" was a pub.

Highly recommend Dahab for it's laid-back tone, cheap food and the backpacker bohemian atmosphere. Shame the location was bombed three weeks later at the restaurant we spent most time gorging our stomachs, Al Capone's.

Mount Sinai in the heart of the Sinai peninsular was the next tourist checkpoint. The climb began at midnight with the aid of a local Bedouin, who was equipped with nothing apart from his dusty clobber i.e. no torch or water. The climb took a few hours along a rocky camel track until we finally reached the small peak to sleep under the stars. When we initially arrived on the peak there were only a handful of other revelers, one of which kept us awake with the splattering of vomit every hour from the rockface below. Then eyes open at 5am and around 300 people were standing around our sleeping bags staring at us! These people appeared out of nowhere. It's tradition to catch the spectacular sunrise before paying homage to the small church perched on top of the hill. Apparently, Moses climbed up here to get his commandments donkey years ago.

It was a long drive the next day to Cairo, accompanied by an armed policeman who spoke no English. The Sinai peninsular has been hostile territory for many centuries and today was no different. The guard proved quite useful at checkpoints and at a small oasis oil town when the spring off the clutch peddle snapped. Apart from that he just sat in silence cuddling his poorly maintained machine gun.

A bunch of new fresh faces joined the group in Cairo, before visiting the famous pyramids in Giza. The pyramids are just as impressive as the pictures in old primary school books, though it was disappointing to see the encroaching city that will eventually surround the last world wonder.

We were fortunate enough to make the small quota of tourists to enter the Great Pyramid. A small, steep descending path went deep in to the belly of the pyramid. The path was only 1m wide by 1.5 metres high and was meant for two-way traffic. Dark, humid and walking in a crouched fetal position it was easy to get infected with claustrophobia. The lights leading in to the chamber were engineered with cracked Bakelite and crusted duct-tape. It wasn't surprising that the lights went on out on our last 5 metres before the exit. All you could hear were screams from the people behinds us in the kings chamber - madly scouring for mobile phones for light.

The next few days involved some hefty long drives through the Western Sahara Desert. Four days through the white desert, black desert (next to each other - weird) and some wildly remote oasis towns; we were subject to some killer mosquito bites, raging kids, a 120 looking year old man beer leech, more police escorts and a blinding sandstorm in the middle of the morning.

On reaching the southern region of Egypt, it became more apparent the security of risk of religious-charged extremists and the neighboring hostile country of Sudan. Travel between cities was allowed only in an armed convoy.

Convoys would depart each city at selected times of the day from nominated checkpoints - transport outside of these hours was strictly forbidden. Convoys actually proved quite convenient and efficient, as the police would block intersections ahead to keep the forward momentum. Once departed, the truck would stop only once at a fuel depot (one that is armed, protected and littered with dodgy souvenir merchants).

Luxor would arguably be the hub of condensed wholesome egyptian history. Valley of the Kings/Queens, two large temples and a thick lashing of markets drew most of our time.

Luxor was also the transport hub.We spent a few days east on the Red Sea at Hurghada before returning to Luxor for the train journey south to Aswan. In itself, Aswan does not have much cultural significance. But it's a clean city and serves as a port for both the 4:30am large convoy south to Abu Simbel and the start of the feluccas trip down the nile (north on a map).

The Feluccas were amazing. A small wide boat with a 10m high sail decked out with one rather large mattress. Our skipper, Shaggy, guided the boat downstream dodging large passenger liners and bags of floating garbage. Most of the day he was stoned, singing buffalo soldier and laughing at times of silence. In total we spent 3 days on the Nile, soaking in the peace of the surrounding desert and listening to a fellow traveller's acoustic guitar skills.

Back at Luxor, we took the overnight train back to Cairo for the ceremonial finale visit to a Kareoke bar. The next day we went to the airport hoping to be 3hrs early. In actual fact, as soon as we arrived, the check-in board said "boarding" with two big flashing red lights. Lufthansa forgot to notify the reschedule of the flight and without going in to too much detail, it was like pushing elephants.When you're in a rush, everything typically slows down.