Wake up call was at six this morning. I actually slept all the way through. After breakfast we headed out to the west bank of Luxor. In ancient times the east bank was for the living because that where the sun rose. The west bank was for the dead so that where the Valley of the Dead is. The ancient pharaohs stopped using pyramids because they were so big they attracted thieves so they starting hiding the tombs. We saw three different tombs, some of which hadn't b...

We left the hotel at five this morning to catch our flight to Luxor. Fortunately we were still a little jet lagged so we were up early anyway. Mahamaud arranged for breakfast to be waiting for us at reception but it was mostly bread so Bec wasn't able to eat much. It was pretty cold waiting at the airport, they had the air-conditioning up really high, I had to pull out my shrug and wrap up. The flight to Luxor was really quick, at least compared to the last few f...

We've seen so much today. We got picked up from the hotel and met Abby, our tour guide for the day. It just going to be me and Bec on the tour which is a little disappointing but it's better than a large group. We got a good picture of the pyramids as we drove past but as they are the youngest of the sites we are seeing today we are doing them last. First we drove out to Memphis. Amazingly it was really empty. Very few tourists. I asked Abby and she said that b...

So this is Cairo. We arrived round lunch time here and whoa! What a difference. We could see getting off the plane for one thing. For another we were bused from the plane to the terminal which was great after almost 24 hours straight of constantly filtered air. Dubai was not nice in that regard. We were met at the gate by Mahamaud who is our tour group leader for Egypt. We'll be meeting our guide and the rest of the group tomorrow. We drove from the east of the...

It was still just before dawn as we flew in over Cairo so we didn't get to see much. Hopefully there'll be more to see on the way out. Speaking of out I will be so unbelievably happy to be out of this plane. The air in here is crap! I can't even identify exactly what it is that's the problem but it's awful. The first leg to Sydney wasn't too bad but it got progressively worse. Probably just me but I still really need fresh air! In the airport we saw a surpris...