Coconut Pyramids

Hi!

I'll be cutting my cake soon so you can all see the very interesting creation that was. I've actually eaten a fair bit of it. It's a bit crumbly - and interesting as all the raisins sunk to the bottom - so there's a layer of mostly just cake, then the nuts are below that, then the raisins at the bottom. Anyway you'll be able to see when I cut it and take photos. It is very delicious anyway despite being crumbly.

But yes I managed to do one more lot of baking today. You wouldn't have thought it was possible but it was not enough for me to use up 85% of my baking cupboard when I still had 125g of coconut and sugar in there. (I don't have a hope of using up all the baking powder and baking soda). So I found a recipe that has coconut, sugar and egg whites in it. Perfect! It's from a book I bought the other day "The Great Big Cookie Book" by Hilaire Walden. The recipe is for coconut pyramids which was eaten during passover - they don't have any yeast in them, and the pyramid shapes are a reminder of when the Jews were slaves in Egypt.

Anyway unfortunately I burned these while writing the first two paragraphs of this blog! But regardless they are delicious and simple and I will make them again and again. Infact even burnt I still ate about 6 as soon as I took them out of the oven. The mixture tastes like like Bounty Bars (which if you think about it makes sense sugar + coconut). Infact I have plans to make these and dip them in chocolate - Darren has requested them with caramel in the middle but we shall see.

Coconut Pyramids (I halved these quantities to match how much coconut I had)

225g coconut
115g caster sugar
2 egg whites

Mix the coconut and sugar. Lightly whisk the egg whites. Mix enough egg whites into the coconut sugar to make a firm mixtures (you might not need all the egg whites). Shape teaspoons into balls then press onto oiled baking sheet and shape into pyramids. Bake for 12-15 minutes at 190 celcius until tops are brown (in my case this happened after 9 minutes!)

Here's a quiz thing I grabbed from a blog I like Baking with Dynamite I actually wrote the answers for this in yesterday they are a day old.

You have to answer with one word answer - damned near impossible - how do you say where someone is in one word!

1. Where is your cell phone? Near
2. Where is your significant other? Computer
3. Your hair color? Brown
4. Your mother? Enthusiastic
5. Your father? Kind
6. Your favorite thing? Hugs
7. Your dream last night? Unpleasant
8. Your dream/goal? Family
9. The room you’re in? Lounge
11. Your fear? Worms
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? Happy
13. Where were you last night? Here
14. What you’re not? Ugly (haha I got Darren to answer this one for me I couldn't think of anything - isn't he sweet)
15. One of your wish-list items? Cake-mixer
16. Where you grew up? Christchurch
17. The last thing you did? Pub
18. What are you wearing? Dressy
19. Your TV? Ghostbusters
20. Your pet? Soon
21. Your computer? Reliable
22. Your mood? Lethargic
23. Missing someone? Yup
24. Your car? Sold!
25. Something you’re not wearing? Shoes
26. Favorite store? ASDA (haha)
27. Your summer? Soon
28. Love someone? Lots
29. Your favorite color? Red
30. When is the last time you laughed? Today
31. Last time you cried? Yesterday

:)
Mindy

Snowmen

I made some snowmen last night. They look ok - they really needed to be made over a series of days so that they could harden properly in between but I was in a rush. I'm always in a rush. Well just because I get excited about things and want them to be finished. This time I had an excuse as I needed to give them to Marie today for her kids. Anyway the photo isn't great (damn) oh well you get the idea.


:)
Mindy

I'm going home!

At 3.45pm on Saturday the 20th of December... that's very soon. We arrive at 10.20am on NZ509 on the 22nd of December. For those not familar with the UK to NZ trip - that does make it seem like almost 48 hours or travelling and while it feels like this it's not quite that bad, part of the difference is because of the time difference between the UK and New Zealand. It's a long enough trip though. But I'm really looking forward to it! I can't wait to see what movies we're going to get and what food we're going to get. Hehe most of all I'm looking forward to arriving home. It's funny though as to get excited about something I have to picture it and I can't quite picture arriving home because I can't yet decide what I'm going to wear. But once I've decided what I'm going to wear I'll be able to picture and will be able to sleep again.

I haven't been sleeping very well. I think I'm excited. I might sleep tonight though as I'm really tired. Surprisingly though I'm not stressed just excited, I think almost everything is under control moving and packing wise.

So since getting back from Egypt I haven't been up to much exciting but got a couple of work parties coming up which will be fun! Also I have been doing some creative baking using up baking ingredients. First I made a delicious cake I can't remember what it was called and I didn't take any pictures so I'll make it again and document it better. My proudest achievement is making a Christmas cake without any flour. Oooh! That reminds me I need to go and "feed" it.

Ok back so basically my goal was to use up a bag of raisins I had, I also managed to use up my ground almonds, two bags of chopped mixed nuts, all my butter, mixed spice, rum essence, an my cherry brandy and a good portion of my cornflour. I'll also take some photos of it when I cut it and put the recipe. I don't think I'll ever make it again as it really was just an exercise in using up ingredients.

Tomorrow you can see my icing snowmen which is using up the rest of my ready to roll white icing.

:)
Mindy

Day 8 - Egypt

We arrived back in Cairo not too far off schedule and went straight to a yummy breakfast at the hotel - omeletes made to order, crepes and chocolate. Yum! Hehe then it was "nap" time. We grabbed a quick sleep before the group headed to the Egyptian museum. Here again I noticed sometime that was common throughout out trip - even though half the people who were friendly to us were trying to get money out of us the other half were just genuinely really friendly - waving to us through the window of the tour bus, yelling out and smiling even when they weren't in a situation where we could have given them money. Darren was sitting on a bench in Cairo next to an elderly man and his three daughters and two sons and he started dealing out mandarins to his children and because Darren was sitting there he offered Darren one too! Their genuine unreserved friendliness was so incredibly touching and eye openin gand it really has inspired me to be as friendly and as kind to people as I possibly can be from now on.

Me sitting by the pond outside the museum with some lotus flowers in it.

Anyway back to the Egyptian museum - it was gorgeous, so old school and charming. It was stuffed full of artifacts - more than you could imagine. Everything was displayed in old fashioned wooden cabinets with glass fronts - old fashioned not because they were styled like that but simply because they were actually old. The labels were scarce and when they did have them they done on a typewriter and often in only one language, not always English. The most memorable things there were Tutankhamen's burial mask (it looked exactly as it did in all the pictures), his solid gold coffin, a huge mummified alligator (or was it a crocodile - a crocodile I think), and a great mummified Nile Perch.

Darren outside the museum.

The next stop was surprisingly one of my favourites. We went to a flower essence shop where the elderly Egyptian owner was an incredibly gracious host providing drinks and country bread for us while we ate our koshari and listened to the process of making flower essence (the same process they used thousands of years ago). The shop was absolutely beautiful filled with thousands of perfume bottles and big carafes of flower essence. Then it was time for the smelling to begin. This shop provides the essence for the big perfume companies and the pure essence (without the alcohol added diluting it) smelt exactly like the perfume from the shops - I know this because my perfume j'adore was the second woman's fragrance we smelt. The flower essense wasn't cheap around $100NZ a bottle but the size of the bottle would make tons of bottles of perfume if you did dilute it (which you don't need to). You only needed two drops and it would apparently last all day - however as I write this it's now day two after our visit and Darren still smells beautiful. It was absolutely amazking the whole experience of being in this shop so enchanting - we ended up buying two bottles, lotus flower for me (which was the essence the pharoahs used to offer to the gods), and the scent for Darren called Ramses II.

Perfume bottles at the flower essence shop.

The last stop was the markets. Everyone who knows me know I love markets and during this trip I've also come to enjoy haggling. I got some great deals which I won't go into as some of them may become Christmas presents! The markets were gorgeous and lively and things I wanted to write that I've noticed about Egypt and now would be a good time to say is how great it smells! That might be surprising but it does smell really nice - lots of different smells, my favourite being the smell of people smoking the apple tobacco in sheeshah pipes - I had two puffs myself but enjoed the smell of it more than actually smoking it.

A main street outside the markets.

Sob sob, and that is all, it was back to the hotel and sad goodbyes to Sam and Sam and Surasha and Teagan. I really hope we manage to keep in touch with some of great friends we've made during this holiday.

As a little girl I was fascinated with Ancient Egypt, I can remember pouring over books about it from the Burnside Primary School library. Reading about Pharoahs and temples and perfume cones and eye makeup. My interest in Egypt has continued to adulthood and so it was extremely special for me to actually get to go there. This is so corny but this really was the best experience of my whole life - it was such an amazing place with great people a fascinating history and I don't want to forget a moment of it. The only negative part of the trip was Darren getting sick but despite that I know it was a special trip for him too.

Now it's back to reality - it will be sad not to be woken by the call to prayer tomorrow morning.

:)
Mindy

Day 7 - Egypt

I would just like to start today's record by saying that it is so incredibly hard to describe how amazing this whole experience has been - this record must read like our itinery somewhere "today was temple blah followed by temple blah" however each place was very special in its own way and there was not a single thing we did that I was not incredibly grateful for having seen it. Not the least of which was the sunrise hot air balloon ride over Thebe's Necropolis on the West Bank, across the Nile from Luxor. We woke at 4.15 to assemble in the hotel's reception and be given our breakfast boxes. I am such a kid and get overly excited discovering what is in each one. This was a goodun and had an apple, guava (which I was excited to try but unfortunately didn't like), a tiny cucumber, a tomato, 2 bread rools, 2 sweet pastries, honey, jam, butter, a boiled egg, and a yoghurt. A lot! I reserved half for lunch.

We were met by the air ballooing company and taken down to a beautiful little ferry all set out with tea cups and some delicious orange cake (which we'd also had on the felucca). We crossed the Nile on the ferry and a short minibus ride took us to where we were boarding the ballos. It was quite a sight seeing the hunreds (well tens) of balloons in the area all being inflated, glowing red in the darkness. The noise was quite qurprising too, those fire things made a big racket.

On the ferry crossing the Nile, before sunrise.

Balloons being inflated.

Our balloon carried 25 people and it was a long rectangular shape with little pods - 3 people per pod. Our friend Ingrid and Damien where next to us which was good as we could all take photos for each other. Being a tour was great - Darren and I were able to get so many more pictures of the two of us together than normal. Anyway back to the balloons, it was quite an exciting feeling, the balloon rising off the ground, and also seeing the other balloons ascending. We could see all the sites and the excavations still going on - just as interesting for me though was looking at the landscape - the neatly laid out irrigated fields, then the abrupt change to desert and sand. What a differece the little channels of water make. Being nosey I loved looking down into the courtyards of houses where people lived right next to their donkeys and chickens. It was also interesting to see men working their fields - digging a new channel, a task that would take a matter of minutes with a tracter, and these guys were out doing it by hand before 6am in the morning! One thing I've noticed here is hard some of the people work - even the hasslers touting their goods at the tourist sites are up so early in the morning and working so hard - seemingly non-stop!

Up on the balloon.

The sunrise of course was amazing, a sight I will remember for the rest of my life.

How quickly the green land becomes desert!

The balloon captain skillfully landed the balloon where the ground crew and our vans were waiting. We were instantly swarmed by young kids - around 4-10 years old, demanding "baksheesh" or a tip for doing absolutely nothing! One cheeky young boy offered to help Surasha disembark, she declined then he claimed he'd hurt her hand and deminaded a pound! Darren gave one boy the fruit for his breakfast box out the window of the mini van and almost caused a riot.

We then got dropped off to board our tour bus and travel to the nearby valley of the Kings where the New Kingdom kings all built their tombs at the end of tunnels snaking into the mountin. This complex construction was to try and thwart tomb robbers. Only 2 of the King (including Tutankhamen) were actually successful (although the tombs are empty now at the hand of Western explorers) byt the tombs themselves were beautiful to look at, highly decorated in many colours. Darren and I just went into two of the tombs as the queues for the others were too long and not all were open as they they rotate which ones are currently open anyway. By the way the environment here was harsh! Already very hot before 9am and so dry - the air hurt my nose because it was so dry but wrapping my linen scarf around my face made a huge difference - I may have looked stupid byt was so much more comfortable.

Next stop was the mostly reconstructed monument Hatshepsut dedicated to the most successful female pharoah Queen Hatshepsut. It was pretty impressive and not being a temple was in a completely different layout and style, however, we were all pretty hot and tired by then and the best view was from the outside anyway. We did look around inside but only briefly.

Me outside the Hatshepsut Monument.

Darren doing the Mummy thing inside the Monument.

The last stop of the morning was the Valley of the Queens. We saw the beautiful King-style toom of Nefertari - wife for the great temple builder Ramses II (I think) and we also saw the tomb of a Prince, Amunherkhepshep son of Ramses III. His tomb was interesting and Sam told us that when he had died his mother had been so upset that she miscarried the baby she was carrying and so to ease her pain the priests mummified the foetus and placed in the tomb as well. It is very important that there only be one person in Egyptian tomb, however the Egyptians (in ancient times) did not believe the foetus was a person yet so this was why this exception was made - and the practise of putting miscarried foetuses in otmbs actually continued.

After a very long hot morning it was time to go back to the hotel for a long hot shower and a bit of a TV break - watching Broken Arrow of all things! Darren also was feeling (and looking) quite a bit better now which I was so relieved about.

The afternoon was a trip to Karnak temple - the biggest and most important temple which had been added to by many pharoahs. It was really cool here as Sam taught us to read some hieroglyphics which I can still remember now. The temple was huge - hard to think of it as one thing as it was really a temple complex. It contained a big lake filled by underground pipes leading to the Nile which the priests used as Holy water and to bathe etc. The best part of it was the amazing Great Hypostyle Hall with 134 huge pillars and beautiful colours on the parts of the ceiling that remained.

Great Hypostyle Hall pillars.

Some sort of ram-looking sphinx there was an avenue of them.

It was back to the hotel for a yummy pasta dinner with Surasha and Sam and then onto the sleeper train which was 100 times better for me this time as I used my scarf to cover my eyes and used earplugs. It was a lot worse for Darren though as he was right next to a broken door that kept swinging and slaming open and shut all night long.

Sunset view of the Nile from our hotel.

:)
Mindy

Day 6 - Egypt

Well this photo isn't very weather appropriate for Egypt. Nevermind. So today was another early morning for me. I woke several times in the night to sounds of partying from the other feluccas, but it wasn't too bad. I woke permanently befor 6 to the beautiful sounds from both sides of the river of the call to prayer. It was such a peaceful beautiful time with the haunting chants and the sun just rising over the perfectly still Nile. We also started moving the - the feluccas were gently guided to our disembarkation spot (this was all done while everyone was still asleep). After piling on the buswe headed first to Kom Ombo temple (Darren sat this one out though thankfully did find sitting in the bus pretty comfortable) this was a pretty cool temple with a Nileometer in it. It was quite disembled though, people had been taking blocks from the temple for years! It was also very hot already - it's amazing how hot it is during the day but how cold it gets at night here. You really do need several layers on.

Me at Kom Ombo temple.

Pretty columns at Kom Ombo - by the way the sky was that intensely blue everyday except our last when it was slightly overcast.

Colour still visible on ceiling at Kom Ombo.

It was time for a more driving, on the bus past donkeys, through villages with the amazing half built looking houses. We were also overtaken today by a ute carrying a load of camels! We were heading Edfu temple which in stark contrast to Kom Ombo is the best preserved most complete ancient temple in Egypt. It was really cool seeing all the chambers and priests secret passage ways in tact - and the condition of the wall reliefs was amazing. We also learnt how one month a year Horus' statue from the Holiest of Holys is taken on a boat and floated down the river to his wife Hathor's temple and put in with Hathor's statue and all there for a month to do whatever they pleased. Another month a of the year Hathor's statue was taken to Edfu to be with Horus there. This is the origin of the word Honeymoon - which came from Holy Month I think. Darren made it into this temple which was good though he doesn't look very smiley in the photos.

Statue of Horus outside his temple at Edfu.

Poor Darren too sick to smile at Edfu.

Once we got to Luxor in the bus I had an amazing show in the hotel - it was so nice to feel really clean again. Darren was very glad to get there as he'd had a terrible night the night before so he was able to just lie down and be comfortable for awhile. Gentleman that he is he didn't mind that I went off to see Luxor temple and have dinner with the group. S o after it does dark I headed off with Sam and Su for a goregous horse and carraige ride through the nighttime streets of Luxor to Luxor templ.e

The temple looked amazing all lit up. The reliefs, carvings, and statues really had a whole different element to them up lit with shadows deepening their patterns. I was really so glad to see a temple this time of the day, the whole atmosphere was also somewhat more magical (even though in general all the temples did have a magical quality about them). Also at Luxor temple was the avenue of sphinxes - these looked so magnificant and dominating even despite most of them missing a bit of face or legs. The last at Luxor temple which was really cool to see what the obelisk which is the other half of the pair to the one in the Place de la Concorde in Paris. It was a bit depressing to see the stump where it should have been, though would have looked great as a pair, however, at least it is very prominently and proudly displayed in Paris given the honour it deserves. my guide book says that in return for Mehemet Ali (the leader of Egypt) offering this to France as a gift France gave Egypt a clock which broke en route and has not yet been repaired (this was over 100 years ago) bugger.

Luxor temple statues.

A very delicious buffet dinner with Su and Sam then back to the hotel room to check on my darling Darren, and try and get some sleep before the 4.15am wake up call the next day!

As today was the last day on the felucca I just want to say how much I enjoyed the trip with my felucca mates - Ingrid, Damien, Mark, Janneke, Sam, Surasha, Sam (the pretty one), Claire and Jen - thanks for being such good company and making the trip such a pleasant one!

:)
Mindy

Day 5 - Egypt

Well today we woke up on the Felucca. I woke up quite early and couldn't get back to sleep, mostly because I only had one thing on my mind - I'll give you a clue it starts with p and rhymes with the prounounciation of the letter. So to distract myself I looked over the side of the felucca and it was quite beautiful. Tiny little fishes swimming around, it was remarkably clear - I was surprised I couldn't see the torch I'd accidentally dropped over the side the night before.

Morning on the felucca.

Breakfast was delicious, all the food on the felucca was delicious - I think that may have also been because of where we were. Breakfast was similar to lunch, wholemeal pita, salty soft cheese, fig jam (yum!) boiled eggs. Lunch today was the same bread, cheese, cucumber, and yummy little sausages I think they were called kofta. Dinner again vegetable stew, rice, bread, and this time fried chicken which tastes so much like KFC but yummier.

Darren putting on a brave face.

The day today was spent cruising down the Nile, avoiding the sun, and sleeping a little bit too. In the evening we docked with a lot of other feluccas (just our group itself was 4 feluccas) and they thankfully erected a makeshift long drop. Then it was time to get the bonfire started and sing and dance around it accompanied by Nubian drumming.

Sunset on the Nile.

On a more serious note Darren began to get very sick, we're very worried it's his liver again and trying to decide whether to cut the trip short. We'll hopefully be able to make it to the end if he doesn't get any worse. My poor sick baby.

:)
Mindy

Day 4 - Egypt

3.30am. Yes this is the time we got our wake up call today. 3.30am to catch a 5.00am flight to Abu Simbel. So we turn up at the airport and board a very civilised plane (not that Egypt is uncivilised but I was expecting the plane to be more like the sleeper train) and as soon as bum hit seat most of us tried to get some more sleep. We arrived at Abu Simbel airport and got the shortest bus ride ever to the terminal and onto another bus. When we arrived I wasn't quite sure at first what we'd arrived at. Then we went round a corner and wow! It was such an amazing temple - the four massive Ramses II - from young to old carved into the mountain. The third innermost chamber or "Holiest of Holies" had four statues in it - one of Ramses II who considered himself a living god, and on two days a year the sun would hit the statues but it would only ever reach the third statue and not go any further as the fourth was the god of the underworld I think, or the god of evil or something - anyway what amazing Maths must have been done to work that out!

The temple, just after sunrise.

Me and D outside the temple.

Also amazing was the temple was so well preserved - I think from being underneath sand, there was even still colourings in the interior statues and walls. So beautiful and so, well strange, to be seeing this sort of thing in person! There was also a beautiful much smaller Queen's temple - quite touching that Ramses II loved his queen enough to build her a temple. Both temples were cut straight into the mountain too, one can only imagine how well a project like that would have needed to be managed given the tools and equipment available. It was such a beautiful time to be there as well - just after sunrise, so peaceful not many other tourists, the temple overlooking beautiful still Lake Nasser. My last statement of awe about the temple is that in the twentieth century the whole thing - including the mountain - was actually moved to avoid the lake. Incredible!

Some pics of the great Ramses II.

The temple from a distance so you can see how it was carved into the mountain.

So then it was back for a very good breakfast at our hotel and a shower and a bit of free time around the pool before meeting up to go over the felucca briefing. It was around this time that Darren revealed his tummy wasn't feeling the best. Uh oh.

Around 2pm we boarded the felucca and had a nice simple lunch of whole wheat pita, some kind of soft feta like cheese stuff, cucumber, falaffel, (Darren and I are both in love with the food here), before we set sail tacking down the Nile. A very relaxed lazy afternoon ensued marred only very slightly by the tinge of needing to pee (which can only be done in the bushes after the captain has pulled over to the bank).

Our four feluccas.

Darren relaxing on board the felucca.

When we did pull over for the night everyone was nearly asleep and Darren was in considerably more pain. We had a beef stew and vegetable stew for dinner with rice and my favourite wholemeal pitas. Intriguing was the plate the captain put down calling it "salad" - it looked like a plate of little red potatoes. I picked one up and doing do revealed that it they were potatoes they weren't cooked. I tentatively took a bite and found that I was biting into something sweet, with a subtle flavour and the texture of an unripe pear. Our felucca-mate Claire figured out when she saw the stone that it was a fresh date! Anyway I was so excited to have tried it and seen where the dried dates I love so much started their life.

After dinner it was up to a small Nubian village to check out a family house (with a proper toilet) to see how they lived. They were very gracious and welcoming and we had sheesha pipes with them and tea and spent the evening hanging out there and talking to a lovely Australian couple off our felucca, Ingrid and Damien. Then back to the feluccas where sleep was quick coming.

:)
Mindy

Day 3 - Egypt

Well the overnight train, what an ordeal. But before I get into that I forgot to say yesterday one of the most bizarre sights in Cairo was the herd of goats and other animals right in the middle of town. What they were doing there I don't really know but it was a funny sight all the same. Anyway so I woke up so many times in the night and then sort of woke up more permanently about 6am and the sun was just coming up so I got out the camera and took some photos.

This is Darren showing how it's done - sleeping on the sleeper train.

And here's a dawn pic I took.

So broken sleep - well that's not really a big deal, however, when the tour leader Sam came with our breakfast at 9 and informed us that the train was 4 hours late and we might miss out on seeing the sights, well I wasn't too excited about that.It was a long time to be on the train and when we finally arrived at 1pm or something we were all a bit worse for wear. And I'm not even going to say anything about the toilets on the train - will just say that our first stop after the train in Aswan was to the hotel for toilets! After the toilets we did head straight for the sites. We first went to the High Dam. It was interesting but I have seen a lot of big dams in my life and so it was really no more impressive than any of them. Plus I was really tired - but it was good to see - and the Aswan dam too. I guess most interesting was the amount of security around the dams. You were only allowed yto take normal photos, no big zoom lenses and no videos - armed soldiers enforced this. Also around Aswan and the dam there is 10% of Egypt's military - amazing.

Then it was back on the bus (we have been getting on and off buses a lot) and we drove to a see bay in Lake Nasser with tons of wee boats moored. We got onto one to go to the Island where the Temple of Philae was relocatedto. Now would be a good time to talk about the Nubians as this was when Sam told us about them. So we're now really in Nubian country and the Nubians all run the boat ferries and feluccas around Aswan, the women don't work but to contribute make beaded necklaces. On the boat the men were selling these necklaces and they were gorgeous. I bought one with big red discs that was 30 Egyptian pounds - nice! It was so exciting to see some Nubians as the book I'm reading that is set in Sudan has described them in great detail.

So the temple of Philas was beautiful, all the more because of the beautiful island setting. Very lush and green and very interesting rock formations too. So Philas Temple was built by one of the Ptolemys (Greek rulers in Egypt) so not nearly as old as some of the things but still very beautiful, and still very old. It was on this beautiful peaceful island we got to watch the sun set. Bliss.

Temple of Philae.

Sunset view from Philae.

Me on the way home on the boat looking back at the Island.

It was back to the hotel (very decent) for a shower then headed out for abrief trip to the markets during which we went to the most strange duty free shop ever. The tour was very well planned, for those who didn't want to go to the market (boys) they could all sit and have a coffee and sheeshah pipe (tobacco typically flavoured with apple and smoked through water). It found some girls to head into the market with and found a gorgeous pashmina. Aswan is famous for cotton so it was a must buy and I'm proud to say with the help of my new friends we got the price down from 400 to 70 Egyptian pounds which I was thrilled with. And it's so beautiful.

Then back onto a boat to go to dinner at a Nubian restaurant on an island. It was a really nice dinner apparently cooked in a special copper or stone pot. I had vegetarian and it was with rice and some grat spiced fried vegetables. Yummy! And there was this awesome Nubian dance show with really really loud drums. It was great fun, a couple of dances had big puppets and one a guy with tribal dress on. There was tons of audience participation - I even got up for a big group dance at the end. Then back to the hotel around 10.30om for sleep before a 3.30am wake for Abu Simbel!

Nubian dancing at the restaurant (I'm second on the left).

:)
Mindy

Day 2 - Egypt

What an amazing day! We had a nice breakfast at the hotel and met a couple of people on the tour. Then we all got on the bus to meet our very jovial tour leader Sam - he's great always smiling and always joking. Then it was off to brave the traffic and make our way to the nearby pyramids. We got ferried between the pyrmaid sites on the tour bus and the first time we got out we got hassled out of 40 Egyptian pounts - not too bad really and now I've got a bee in my bonnet about it so I'm not letting that happen again - it's ggood though really, all part of the experience. As an example of how cheeky these guys are our tour leader has a code for when he gets asked to recommend things and he seriously thinks a good deal, as opposed to when he recommends them just to get rid of the guy. A guy came and asked if we wanted to buy a headscarf for 5 Egyptian pounds, later that day we got offered exactly the same headscarf for 100 Egyptian pounds!

Me at the pyramids!

So they pyramids - well what to say - it was amazing actually being there, actually seeing the sphinx - a very early memory of mine is watching Asterix and Cleopatra and seeing the sphinx in that.

Wow the sphinx in person.

Before seeing the sphinx went inside the second pyramid. That was amazing - you have to walk bent in half (literally) down steps, then you get to stand and walk upright for a bit, then hunch over again and walk up to get to the inner chamber, the king's chamber. The heat inside was amazing, really really dense heat and a real lack of air - we were totally puffing by the end and just from lack of oxygen, not from lack of fitness!

Cheesy pic (idea stolen from Andrew and Grace) of Darren holding the pyramid we went inside.

So going into the pyramid was a really cool experience. Next coolest was camel riding - we made a last minute decision to get a camel ride from one pyramid to another, and it was great but a little scary - our camel kept trying to bite one of the other camels and our camel guide almost got into a fist fight with one of the other guides!

On our camel.

Anyway next stop was the Papyrus museum where we splashed out (even though Darren did an amazing job haggling) on a beautiful papyrus with a wedding scene on it. It is beautiful. It was 620 Egyptian pounds and we got it down to 500 plus a 210 papyrus thrown in free! We compared the deal we got around the group and I think we managed to get the best deal. Also of note was they provided us with hybiscus juice and it may just be because I was really thirsty but I loved it!

Next we stopped in at supermarket on the way to Sakkara - this was the second necropolis of the day (Giza and the great pyramids being the first). Here is the step pyramid and a myriad of tombs. From here we could also see the best bent pyramid and the red pyramid (the first proper pyramid). There was also a beautiful columned building and coronation hall. The amazing this here was the peacefulness - it was possible to be all by yourself without seeing another tourist - and it was so serene and beautiful. Of course just round the corner there were tons of people!

Darren in front of the step pyramid.

Now's a good time to say we've met tons of really nice people - everyone on the tour seems lovely some we'll hopefully stay in contact with after the tour. A nice South African couple, and lots of Australians, two other kiwi couples. It's great!

Then after Sakkara we went to a resort to relax - the was a pool and a shower and I just changed my clothes and spent the rest of the time with Darren socialising. We had a fairly authentic tea, amazing bread (but I generally love bread anyway) salads, stews, rice, yum! Now we're at the train station waiting for our overnight train that may be up to two hours late. Fingers crossed it's not!

:)
Mindy