Phototrip through Turkey, Egypt, Jordan, and Israel
03-25-2019
, 03:32 AM
Hello travel forum, this year I did some traveling to the Middle East (for lack of a better word for this particular region) and took a lot photos of course, so I thought I'd share them with you guys. And I did remember to resize my photos this time, as my last TR in the Stans took ages to load. Here's a rough map of my trip route:
So to begin, I was in Budapest (great city btw) and found a nice cheap flight to Istanbul. I did almost no advanced planning. Getting into to Turkey is easy though, you apply for a visa online, which takes very little time to get approved and costs $20. After getting stamped in and buying a SIM card at the airport I walked outside and tried to find the metro line that would take me into the city, but after asking a few people, I kept getting told there was no metro. But I had looked it up the day before and I was positive there was one! Well I didn’t do my research very well, because Istanbul has two major airports and I was at a different one than I thought, oops. I was at the crappy one (SAW) that's wayyy outside of Istanbul to the East and has no good public transportation to the city. Eventually I found a public bus that would take in the right direction at least, but man was it slow (but entertaining!).
The highlight was when we were entering the highway on ramp we cut off another bus (or they cut us off, I can’t remember), but our driver and the other bus driver were crawling along going a few miles per hour just screaming at each other through the window. Next they both stopped their busses on the side of the highway so they could argue face to face! They were basically nose to nose yelling and wildly gesticulating at each other and eventually my driver reached over slapped the other driver in face and drove off. The other bus driver was angrily tailing us for a little bit, we soon lost him in the traffic. Good stuff! You just don’t see this kinda thing in the West! Some of the passengers were rolling their eyes or shaking their heads, indicating our driver most likely has a screw loose. After lots of stop and go traffic I eventually hopped off a metro station, but I couldn’t get the machine to switch to English, gave up and grabbed a taxi to the city center. Normally I pride my self on being able to navigate public transportation in new cities, but I'd have take the L on this one.
the Bosphorus (the straight that divides the city, and europe from asia)
Istanbul is freaking huge and sprawling! It’s like 3 different land masses coming together, but all still separated by water. You can really see it when you're driving over the massive bridges. It took me a while to realize how far outside of the city I still was. I made it to the guesthouse around dusk and found some food. There are restaurants, little cafes, and shisha places basically everywhere. I stopped in a random one and ordered a beef and eggplant shish kebab and a salad, which was completely unnecessary as the kebab came with all sorts of other stuff and the salad could feed like 4 people. Grand total was lol $5. Turkish food is delicious and incredibly cheap. I was liking this country already! Apparently as a tourist, I came at the right time as the Lira was tanking, so everything would be less expensive than I had thought. Two days later the Lira dropped like 30% overnight and it was kind of interesting because all the designer fashion stores like Louis Vitton and Gucci were getting swarmed because Istanbul was now the cheapest place in the world to pick up these high end goods! I sadly did not take advantage of this arbitrage opportunity however. I had sightseeing to do.
eggplant and beef kebab
kid catching a tram in the Taksim area
down by the waterfront, the blue mosque (sultan ahmed mosque) in the background
Sulimaniye Mosque
sneaky turkish ice cream guys
It definitely takes a few days to explore Istanbul because it’s pretty spread out. It’s also not great for walking because it’s hot and hilly, but the public transit is pretty good and cheap. I spent 4 days just wandering around the neighborhoods, stopping in the markets and mosques, eating good, and smoking a lot of shisha. I was sharing a dorm room with some guys from Oman, so I'd go out with them at night to eat and smoke. Man, the shisha places around here are top notch! I have a hookah at home and I can never get as much smoke as these places. Around town:
blue mosque
walking towards the Hagia Sophia
Inside the Hagia Sophia, which was a church, then a mosque, but is now a museum instead.
The eclectic Balat neighborhood
Sulimaniye mosque in the background
central bazaar
these are everywhere! doner kebabs only cost around $1
After Istanbul the next place was Ephesus, a very prominent Greek city, which was then taken over by the Romans in 129 BC. It was famous for it’s Temple of Artemis, which was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, although it was burned down by some ******* named Herostratus. But there’s still lots of very well preserved Roman ruins. I’m not a history buff or all that big on seeing ruins, but it was certainly a nice morning stroll before some of the big tour buses came rolling in.
The Library of Celsus
umbrellas mean the Chinese tour busses have arrived!
the sunday market
A couple hours away by train is a place called Pammukale, which has these white crystalized calcium deposits that look like snow. It's very touristy, but definitely otherworldly. If I had to do it again I would have like to do it either later in the evening or early in the morning rather than the middle of the day when it was jam packed.
Next: To the Beach!
Oludeniz, on the Southern Coast
blue lagoon. wayyyy too many people. Pebbles instead of sand. Meh.
Paragliding is really popular around this area. I guess it's one of the top paragliding destinations in the world. Every time you look up there are a bunch of parachutes floating through the air. I wasn't planning on doing any paragliding, but if it is world class here, then I guess I should give it ago!
I found a company that could squeeze me in on their last jump of the day. I figured the closer to sunset, the better. Of course I had to google paragliding accidents in Oludeniz first, but it sounded like the tandem jumps are pretty damn safe. It's usually solo, inexperienced jumpers that wind up crashed into something. It took 30 minutes to wind up the mountain road in a van, but once you're at the top the view is great, but they don't waste any time! I got strapped in with my guide in front of the downward facing concrete slab that would be our lift off point. The instructions were pretty simple: walk, run, jump! I think the most important thing is to not drag your feet along. And before I knew it, we were off! Everything was very smooth. Paragliding is very relaxing, you're just floating around through the air enjoying the scenery. Although at some point the guide did some fast downward spirals to liven things up. The only annoying thing was how many pictures and video he was taking for the video package. But other than that, it was a great experience and the scenery really is spectacular.
wooooo! Blue Lagoon in the backdrop. I did hate the shoes they gave me to wear though, ha.
more ruins
Next I signed up for a 4d 3n Mediterranean 'Blue Cruise'. I booked this last second, so it wasn't really the best company to go with, but it all worked out ok in the end. I was expecting more of a young traveler type crowd on the boat, but it was a Spanish family of 5, a South African family of 4, an Aussie couple, a quirky middle aged non-English speaking Chinese woman and me. But everyone got along pretty well and South African parents were really keen to booze it up, so we had some pretty fun nights on the boat. We did skip some things that were supposed to be on our schedule and the boat driver just seemed to do whatever he wanted to do as opposed to what we wanted to do, so there were some complaints. Oh well, this is what happens on the budget trip.
Our boat
sunset the first night
the crew
oops
most people sleep out front
not a bad life
Back on land, the eternal chimera flames near Olympos
The view of the mountains from Antalya
Antalya
Antalya is a very pleasant city. There's not a ton to do, but you've got great views over the ocean and lots of nice cafes and restaurants. I stayed two days here before heading to a place in central Turkey called Cappadocia. If you've ever seen photos with weird rock outcroppings and 100's of hot air balloons in the sky, that's the place!
Although I broke up that journey with a little stop to a town named Konya, famous for being the home of the Sufi mystic Rumi. They have a nice museum where you can learn all about the whirling dervishes! And there's almost no tourists in this town either.
the mosque at night.
the rock formations in Cappadocia
rock church
the scenery here is absolutely fascinating
And then when you wake up early you get this:
And that's all for this installment, I have a bunch more on Cappadocia and balloon photos coming up next. Then the very non-touristy Eastern Turkey region. Hope you enjoyed!
So to begin, I was in Budapest (great city btw) and found a nice cheap flight to Istanbul. I did almost no advanced planning. Getting into to Turkey is easy though, you apply for a visa online, which takes very little time to get approved and costs $20. After getting stamped in and buying a SIM card at the airport I walked outside and tried to find the metro line that would take me into the city, but after asking a few people, I kept getting told there was no metro. But I had looked it up the day before and I was positive there was one! Well I didn’t do my research very well, because Istanbul has two major airports and I was at a different one than I thought, oops. I was at the crappy one (SAW) that's wayyy outside of Istanbul to the East and has no good public transportation to the city. Eventually I found a public bus that would take in the right direction at least, but man was it slow (but entertaining!).
The highlight was when we were entering the highway on ramp we cut off another bus (or they cut us off, I can’t remember), but our driver and the other bus driver were crawling along going a few miles per hour just screaming at each other through the window. Next they both stopped their busses on the side of the highway so they could argue face to face! They were basically nose to nose yelling and wildly gesticulating at each other and eventually my driver reached over slapped the other driver in face and drove off. The other bus driver was angrily tailing us for a little bit, we soon lost him in the traffic. Good stuff! You just don’t see this kinda thing in the West! Some of the passengers were rolling their eyes or shaking their heads, indicating our driver most likely has a screw loose. After lots of stop and go traffic I eventually hopped off a metro station, but I couldn’t get the machine to switch to English, gave up and grabbed a taxi to the city center. Normally I pride my self on being able to navigate public transportation in new cities, but I'd have take the L on this one.
the Bosphorus (the straight that divides the city, and europe from asia)
Istanbul is freaking huge and sprawling! It’s like 3 different land masses coming together, but all still separated by water. You can really see it when you're driving over the massive bridges. It took me a while to realize how far outside of the city I still was. I made it to the guesthouse around dusk and found some food. There are restaurants, little cafes, and shisha places basically everywhere. I stopped in a random one and ordered a beef and eggplant shish kebab and a salad, which was completely unnecessary as the kebab came with all sorts of other stuff and the salad could feed like 4 people. Grand total was lol $5. Turkish food is delicious and incredibly cheap. I was liking this country already! Apparently as a tourist, I came at the right time as the Lira was tanking, so everything would be less expensive than I had thought. Two days later the Lira dropped like 30% overnight and it was kind of interesting because all the designer fashion stores like Louis Vitton and Gucci were getting swarmed because Istanbul was now the cheapest place in the world to pick up these high end goods! I sadly did not take advantage of this arbitrage opportunity however. I had sightseeing to do.
eggplant and beef kebab
kid catching a tram in the Taksim area
down by the waterfront, the blue mosque (sultan ahmed mosque) in the background
Sulimaniye Mosque
sneaky turkish ice cream guys
It definitely takes a few days to explore Istanbul because it’s pretty spread out. It’s also not great for walking because it’s hot and hilly, but the public transit is pretty good and cheap. I spent 4 days just wandering around the neighborhoods, stopping in the markets and mosques, eating good, and smoking a lot of shisha. I was sharing a dorm room with some guys from Oman, so I'd go out with them at night to eat and smoke. Man, the shisha places around here are top notch! I have a hookah at home and I can never get as much smoke as these places. Around town:
blue mosque
walking towards the Hagia Sophia
Inside the Hagia Sophia, which was a church, then a mosque, but is now a museum instead.
The eclectic Balat neighborhood
Sulimaniye mosque in the background
central bazaar
these are everywhere! doner kebabs only cost around $1
After Istanbul the next place was Ephesus, a very prominent Greek city, which was then taken over by the Romans in 129 BC. It was famous for it’s Temple of Artemis, which was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, although it was burned down by some ******* named Herostratus. But there’s still lots of very well preserved Roman ruins. I’m not a history buff or all that big on seeing ruins, but it was certainly a nice morning stroll before some of the big tour buses came rolling in.
The Library of Celsus
umbrellas mean the Chinese tour busses have arrived!
the sunday market
A couple hours away by train is a place called Pammukale, which has these white crystalized calcium deposits that look like snow. It's very touristy, but definitely otherworldly. If I had to do it again I would have like to do it either later in the evening or early in the morning rather than the middle of the day when it was jam packed.
Next: To the Beach!
Oludeniz, on the Southern Coast
blue lagoon. wayyyy too many people. Pebbles instead of sand. Meh.
Paragliding is really popular around this area. I guess it's one of the top paragliding destinations in the world. Every time you look up there are a bunch of parachutes floating through the air. I wasn't planning on doing any paragliding, but if it is world class here, then I guess I should give it ago!
I found a company that could squeeze me in on their last jump of the day. I figured the closer to sunset, the better. Of course I had to google paragliding accidents in Oludeniz first, but it sounded like the tandem jumps are pretty damn safe. It's usually solo, inexperienced jumpers that wind up crashed into something. It took 30 minutes to wind up the mountain road in a van, but once you're at the top the view is great, but they don't waste any time! I got strapped in with my guide in front of the downward facing concrete slab that would be our lift off point. The instructions were pretty simple: walk, run, jump! I think the most important thing is to not drag your feet along. And before I knew it, we were off! Everything was very smooth. Paragliding is very relaxing, you're just floating around through the air enjoying the scenery. Although at some point the guide did some fast downward spirals to liven things up. The only annoying thing was how many pictures and video he was taking for the video package. But other than that, it was a great experience and the scenery really is spectacular.
wooooo! Blue Lagoon in the backdrop. I did hate the shoes they gave me to wear though, ha.
more ruins
Next I signed up for a 4d 3n Mediterranean 'Blue Cruise'. I booked this last second, so it wasn't really the best company to go with, but it all worked out ok in the end. I was expecting more of a young traveler type crowd on the boat, but it was a Spanish family of 5, a South African family of 4, an Aussie couple, a quirky middle aged non-English speaking Chinese woman and me. But everyone got along pretty well and South African parents were really keen to booze it up, so we had some pretty fun nights on the boat. We did skip some things that were supposed to be on our schedule and the boat driver just seemed to do whatever he wanted to do as opposed to what we wanted to do, so there were some complaints. Oh well, this is what happens on the budget trip.
Our boat
sunset the first night
the crew
oops
most people sleep out front
not a bad life
Back on land, the eternal chimera flames near Olympos
The view of the mountains from Antalya
Antalya
Antalya is a very pleasant city. There's not a ton to do, but you've got great views over the ocean and lots of nice cafes and restaurants. I stayed two days here before heading to a place in central Turkey called Cappadocia. If you've ever seen photos with weird rock outcroppings and 100's of hot air balloons in the sky, that's the place!
Although I broke up that journey with a little stop to a town named Konya, famous for being the home of the Sufi mystic Rumi. They have a nice museum where you can learn all about the whirling dervishes! And there's almost no tourists in this town either.
the mosque at night.
the rock formations in Cappadocia
rock church
the scenery here is absolutely fascinating
And then when you wake up early you get this:
And that's all for this installment, I have a bunch more on Cappadocia and balloon photos coming up next. Then the very non-touristy Eastern Turkey region. Hope you enjoyed!
03-29-2019
, 09:14 AM
Cappadocia is definitely one the highlights of visiting Turkey, the scenery really is fascinating. In the main town so many of the hotels and restaurants are carved into the ubiquitous rock formations. I stayed in a hostel that had the dorms basically inside a cave. Also met some cool people there. I was telling one person from Korea that I played poker in Cambodia, and he was like OMG do you know “XXX XXX” and I was like “Uh yeah, I sure do!” and then we took a photo together and sent it to him, which was pretty funny. Small world!
long exposure of the road through town
So many wedding photos being taken! I swear Chinese people fly around the world for wedding shots!
Now normally I’m not much of a morning person but it’s pretty much mandatory in Cappadocia to wake up at 5am to watch the balloons go up. There’s a couple different popular view points, or you can just wander around the launch zones which is kind of surreal because in the darkness the balloons laying on their sides really look like some sort creepy alien eggs. Plus there’s hardly any people around (the main overlook selfie stick central) and there’s hiking trails nearby so you can find some nice spots in the hills to watch the balloons and take photos, all to yourself.
It’s hot as balls in the day, so it’s a good idea to do stuff early in the morning and in the evening and nap during the middle of the day. Originally I wasn’t sure if I was going to do the balloon trip, because it doesn’t sound that exciting to me and it’s pretty pricey (by Turkish standards at least, 140 euros minimum), but I figured if I’m going to a hot air balloon trip once in my life it might as well be here! The backpackers I was hanging out with didn’t wanna do it because they’re all cheapwads though.
The standard balloons have are basically divided into 4 separate baskets that fit 5 people each, so twenty people total, plus the driver in the middle. Being a last minute booking they tossed me in a basket with a group of Russian girls (can’t complain) but they didn’t really speak English, so it was a bit awkward. Takeoff is around 6am and they let 100 balloons in the sky at a time. It is a pretty lovely experience being in the sky with that many other balloons! The control the driver has over the balloon was surprisingly good as well. There’s rarely much wind in this region, which makes it so good for the ballooning. It’s a nice experience, but really not the most exciting thing, especially as I was mostly just trying to get out of the way so these girls could take selfie after selfie for the whole hour. But I definitely don’t regret doing it, and they had champagne at the landing site to celebrate our successful (but slightly bumpy) landing.
filling the balloon
first few minutes after launch
sunrise
Balloons landing. I really like how this one turned out
And some sort of photoshoot.
After another day of bumming around it was time to move on to SE Turkey (Kurdistan) but it was a religious holiday so the cities I was hoping to bus to were all booked up, but I did find a long haul overnight bus to a city called Tatvan, which would get me close enough to where I wanted to go. Once I got off the bus I it definitely looked a bit different than the places I had been in Western Turkey. The buildings were older and more run down, cracks in the sidewalks, potholed roads, people much more conservatively dressed with the women all covered up. Some of the older men wore the traditional baggy pants and the headscarf called the kafiyeh. It was hot as hell during the the day but I still got scolded by the owner of my hotel for trying to go out wearing shorts, hah oops. I wore pants for the rest of this part of the trip.
tea time, all the time
There is not much in Tatvan, so the next evening I managed to find a bus to a city called Batman (hehehe). Unfortunately there was also nothing noteworthy for tourists to do in this town besides take a photo with the sign that has its namesake. Then it was off to a city called Hasankeyf, which is a very picturesque little village sitting on the bluffs overlooking the Tigris river. It has lots of interesting ruins and caves around, but it seems that soon the city will cease to exist, as the government is moving forward with its GAP project which will build a series of dams to get more water to the region. So possibly next year the whole city will be underwater, ruins and all. Pretty wild. Pretty sad. They’re currently building a new city a few kilometers away, on higher ground, for the displaced residents. The people who live in the city are obviously not very happy about it. It really is a beautiful little town.
lots of people just sleep outside
The view overlooking the river at the guesthouse
You can see the cookie cutter town they're building across the river
The next part of the trip was a bit annoying, as every single bus that I tried to flag down coming from Batman to the next town of Midyat was completely full, so after two hours of this crap I just started walking along the road out of town, flagging down cars to hitchhike. It took a good solid hour of trying but eventually some some young guys picked me up, and we kind of chatted with google translate. Then I got completely lost trying to find my guesthouse. Without the GPS functioning properly on Google maps I'm hopeless! It was a long day. But that was not going to stop me from getting to Midyat's top attraction, a Syriac Monastery, the oldest of its kind, that has been functioning for 1,600 years. I read you could take an English guide, but that wasn't possible, so I just had to join up with the big Turkish group.
Mardin also has quaint little old town
Goats on the loose!
whose gonna get em?!
more people getting their beds ready on the roof
Next city is Mardin: The city on the hill. Shut off to tourists for many years due to ongoing PKK/Gov't violence it is now seemingly peaceful and doing very well. It has a bustling walking street and overlooks the fertile plains leading towards Syria. Like all these other towns, there’s not a ton to do but wander the streets and back alleyways, stop in some of the Churches and Mosques, drink a lot of tea, and smoke some shisha. Two days was plenty. Without any other western tourists around, tourist hostels, and a lack of English, this region can be a bit lonely for a solo traveler sometimes.
some cute dogs and cats running around
cool doors too
Next city: Diyarbakir. The walled city. In the 90’s there was lots of violence here as it was the forefront of clashes between the PKK and Turkish government, so it was a no-go for tourists for quite a while. You can still see the scars all around the city and it was definitely had the most visible poverty of all the cities in Turkey I visited. Many people think it’s still too dangerous to visit, but I found it mostly fine. Although one evening I was walking past a group of teens hanging out and one of them tried to run up behind me and snag my phone from my front pants pocket. He didn’t succeed though! I had some unpleasant words for him as he ran back laughing to his group. Then some of the younger kids followed me around and yelled at me for a block or two, which was obviously not exactly pleasant! But besides that span of a few minutes, I really liked the city! It’s very authentic and people were friendly. Just watch out for the Government’s armored tank-cars driving around, and definitely don’t take photos of them! I learned that the hard way, oops!
There's 4 main gates to get into the city
you can walk on top of them too!
I really did have a good time walking around Diyarbakir! I got invited for tea many times and got taken out to dinner + watch football by some university aged student I had met.
My breakfast one morning!
the breakfast spot
old guys always just sitting around hanging out
Next up: Mount Nemrut: A bunch of stone heads on top of a mountain! Here’s the history: The king named Antiochus I (69-34 BC), who had a pretty damn small kingdom (called the Commagene), but a big personality, claimed he was descended from Alexander the Great from one side and Darius the Great of Persia from the other. He wanted to be remembered as a god so he had his tomb built up on the tallest mountain in the area, which was to be meant for all sorts of holy festivals after his death, so he would be remembered forever. These festivals didn't last long though, as the Commagene were soon conquered.
Protecting his grave were statues of Greek and Persian deities from his supposed lineage, such a Zeus, Apollo, and Eres (Greek) and Oromasdes and Mithras (Persian). At some point in time the heads toppled from their massive bases (nobody knows how or why) and now they rest at their feet. But still, it was one of the greatest constructions of the Hellenistic era and in the 1980's it was made a UNESCO world heritage site, which would have made Antiochus very happy.
Next up: Sanliurfa, the city of Prophets. It was known as Edessa in ancient times and is famous for being the birthplace of Abraham. The cave he was supposedly born in can be visited here. There is a notorious lake/pond called the Balikligol, where according the Koran, the cruel King Nimrod threw Abraham into a fire, but God intervened and turned the fire into water and the sticks into fish. So it’s very popular place with the locals to hang out and feed the fish. Other old testament prophets that lived in the city were Jethro, Job, and Elijah. And they say Moses lived somewhere outside of town doing the shepherd thing for a while.
This city also played an important part in the crusades, as it was taken over during the first crusade. Then it fell to Kurdish armies who laid siege to the city, commanded by a guy named Zengi in 1144 AD, which sparked the beginning of the second crusade. It fueled the Christians to amass more armies, but Edessa itself was never reconquered by the Byzantines and Islam proliferated in this area.
The Baliklol
adana kebab
Outside the city is a historical site called Gobleki Tepe, basically the world’s oldest known place of worship. I met an enthusiastic young lad in town to be my tour guide, which was cool. His taxi driver friend charged us (me) about 3x what the actual cost should be, so it was a bit scammy, but oh well.
But as for this place, it is actually incredibly interesting! It was built around 11,000 BC and was only discovered in 1995. It has basically upended how archaeologists had thought modern civilizations developed, as this was done by hunter-gatherers, before agriculture was developed, or even pottery. So a tad bit more important than just a pile of rocks!
For reference, Stonehenge was around 3,000 BC and the pyramids were around 2500 BC.
"To Schmidt and others, these new findings suggest a novel theory of civilization. Scholars have long believed that only after people learned to farm and live in settled communities did they have the time, organization and resources to construct temples and support complicated social structures. But Schmidt argues it was the other way around: the extensive, coordinated effort to build the monoliths literally laid the groundwork for the development of complex societies" Good stuff!
I can't find my other pictures of Gobleki Tepe, but it is a pretty small site. You can see how the arranged the T or L shaped monoliths in a circle.
And this was about the end of my trip in Turkey. I spent one more day in a larger city called Gaziantep, which famous for it’s pistachio baklavas (I’ve never really eaten baklavas before, and god damn I’ve been missing out!). Then one more night in Istanbul before flying to Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
Southeast Turkey was definitely interesting, as all the cities have a wealth of history going back thousands of years. Plus because there’s not so many tourists around the Kurdish people seem to be friendlier, it’s easy to hitchhike if you want, the English speaks are happy to chat you up and talk politics, Erdogan, the PKK, etc. Somewhat surprisingly they seem to really like Trump around here, like he’s some sort of brave warrior president lol. I told them maybe he was an internet warrior, that’s about it, ha. Also Kurdistan is dirt cheap. In Western Turkey they’re always quoting tourists in Euros to offset the weakness of the Lira, but not in Kurdistan! I was staying in some of the nicer hotels in town (Hilton Garden) and they would cost $25-30 a night, free breakfast, big pool, gym, etc. Tough to beat! Whole shish kebab meals would be a few dollars tops. But as I said before, there’s hardly any tourists, obviously no traveler hostel type places, little English etc, so you’re very much on your own. After almost two weeks in the region I was definitely ready to get out!
Egypt up next!
long exposure of the road through town
So many wedding photos being taken! I swear Chinese people fly around the world for wedding shots!
Now normally I’m not much of a morning person but it’s pretty much mandatory in Cappadocia to wake up at 5am to watch the balloons go up. There’s a couple different popular view points, or you can just wander around the launch zones which is kind of surreal because in the darkness the balloons laying on their sides really look like some sort creepy alien eggs. Plus there’s hardly any people around (the main overlook selfie stick central) and there’s hiking trails nearby so you can find some nice spots in the hills to watch the balloons and take photos, all to yourself.
It’s hot as balls in the day, so it’s a good idea to do stuff early in the morning and in the evening and nap during the middle of the day. Originally I wasn’t sure if I was going to do the balloon trip, because it doesn’t sound that exciting to me and it’s pretty pricey (by Turkish standards at least, 140 euros minimum), but I figured if I’m going to a hot air balloon trip once in my life it might as well be here! The backpackers I was hanging out with didn’t wanna do it because they’re all cheapwads though.
The standard balloons have are basically divided into 4 separate baskets that fit 5 people each, so twenty people total, plus the driver in the middle. Being a last minute booking they tossed me in a basket with a group of Russian girls (can’t complain) but they didn’t really speak English, so it was a bit awkward. Takeoff is around 6am and they let 100 balloons in the sky at a time. It is a pretty lovely experience being in the sky with that many other balloons! The control the driver has over the balloon was surprisingly good as well. There’s rarely much wind in this region, which makes it so good for the ballooning. It’s a nice experience, but really not the most exciting thing, especially as I was mostly just trying to get out of the way so these girls could take selfie after selfie for the whole hour. But I definitely don’t regret doing it, and they had champagne at the landing site to celebrate our successful (but slightly bumpy) landing.
filling the balloon
first few minutes after launch
sunrise
Balloons landing. I really like how this one turned out
And some sort of photoshoot.
After another day of bumming around it was time to move on to SE Turkey (Kurdistan) but it was a religious holiday so the cities I was hoping to bus to were all booked up, but I did find a long haul overnight bus to a city called Tatvan, which would get me close enough to where I wanted to go. Once I got off the bus I it definitely looked a bit different than the places I had been in Western Turkey. The buildings were older and more run down, cracks in the sidewalks, potholed roads, people much more conservatively dressed with the women all covered up. Some of the older men wore the traditional baggy pants and the headscarf called the kafiyeh. It was hot as hell during the the day but I still got scolded by the owner of my hotel for trying to go out wearing shorts, hah oops. I wore pants for the rest of this part of the trip.
tea time, all the time
There is not much in Tatvan, so the next evening I managed to find a bus to a city called Batman (hehehe). Unfortunately there was also nothing noteworthy for tourists to do in this town besides take a photo with the sign that has its namesake. Then it was off to a city called Hasankeyf, which is a very picturesque little village sitting on the bluffs overlooking the Tigris river. It has lots of interesting ruins and caves around, but it seems that soon the city will cease to exist, as the government is moving forward with its GAP project which will build a series of dams to get more water to the region. So possibly next year the whole city will be underwater, ruins and all. Pretty wild. Pretty sad. They’re currently building a new city a few kilometers away, on higher ground, for the displaced residents. The people who live in the city are obviously not very happy about it. It really is a beautiful little town.
lots of people just sleep outside
The view overlooking the river at the guesthouse
You can see the cookie cutter town they're building across the river
The next part of the trip was a bit annoying, as every single bus that I tried to flag down coming from Batman to the next town of Midyat was completely full, so after two hours of this crap I just started walking along the road out of town, flagging down cars to hitchhike. It took a good solid hour of trying but eventually some some young guys picked me up, and we kind of chatted with google translate. Then I got completely lost trying to find my guesthouse. Without the GPS functioning properly on Google maps I'm hopeless! It was a long day. But that was not going to stop me from getting to Midyat's top attraction, a Syriac Monastery, the oldest of its kind, that has been functioning for 1,600 years. I read you could take an English guide, but that wasn't possible, so I just had to join up with the big Turkish group.
Mardin also has quaint little old town
Goats on the loose!
whose gonna get em?!
more people getting their beds ready on the roof
Next city is Mardin: The city on the hill. Shut off to tourists for many years due to ongoing PKK/Gov't violence it is now seemingly peaceful and doing very well. It has a bustling walking street and overlooks the fertile plains leading towards Syria. Like all these other towns, there’s not a ton to do but wander the streets and back alleyways, stop in some of the Churches and Mosques, drink a lot of tea, and smoke some shisha. Two days was plenty. Without any other western tourists around, tourist hostels, and a lack of English, this region can be a bit lonely for a solo traveler sometimes.
some cute dogs and cats running around
cool doors too
Next city: Diyarbakir. The walled city. In the 90’s there was lots of violence here as it was the forefront of clashes between the PKK and Turkish government, so it was a no-go for tourists for quite a while. You can still see the scars all around the city and it was definitely had the most visible poverty of all the cities in Turkey I visited. Many people think it’s still too dangerous to visit, but I found it mostly fine. Although one evening I was walking past a group of teens hanging out and one of them tried to run up behind me and snag my phone from my front pants pocket. He didn’t succeed though! I had some unpleasant words for him as he ran back laughing to his group. Then some of the younger kids followed me around and yelled at me for a block or two, which was obviously not exactly pleasant! But besides that span of a few minutes, I really liked the city! It’s very authentic and people were friendly. Just watch out for the Government’s armored tank-cars driving around, and definitely don’t take photos of them! I learned that the hard way, oops!
There's 4 main gates to get into the city
you can walk on top of them too!
I really did have a good time walking around Diyarbakir! I got invited for tea many times and got taken out to dinner + watch football by some university aged student I had met.
My breakfast one morning!
the breakfast spot
old guys always just sitting around hanging out
Next up: Mount Nemrut: A bunch of stone heads on top of a mountain! Here’s the history: The king named Antiochus I (69-34 BC), who had a pretty damn small kingdom (called the Commagene), but a big personality, claimed he was descended from Alexander the Great from one side and Darius the Great of Persia from the other. He wanted to be remembered as a god so he had his tomb built up on the tallest mountain in the area, which was to be meant for all sorts of holy festivals after his death, so he would be remembered forever. These festivals didn't last long though, as the Commagene were soon conquered.
Protecting his grave were statues of Greek and Persian deities from his supposed lineage, such a Zeus, Apollo, and Eres (Greek) and Oromasdes and Mithras (Persian). At some point in time the heads toppled from their massive bases (nobody knows how or why) and now they rest at their feet. But still, it was one of the greatest constructions of the Hellenistic era and in the 1980's it was made a UNESCO world heritage site, which would have made Antiochus very happy.
Next up: Sanliurfa, the city of Prophets. It was known as Edessa in ancient times and is famous for being the birthplace of Abraham. The cave he was supposedly born in can be visited here. There is a notorious lake/pond called the Balikligol, where according the Koran, the cruel King Nimrod threw Abraham into a fire, but God intervened and turned the fire into water and the sticks into fish. So it’s very popular place with the locals to hang out and feed the fish. Other old testament prophets that lived in the city were Jethro, Job, and Elijah. And they say Moses lived somewhere outside of town doing the shepherd thing for a while.
This city also played an important part in the crusades, as it was taken over during the first crusade. Then it fell to Kurdish armies who laid siege to the city, commanded by a guy named Zengi in 1144 AD, which sparked the beginning of the second crusade. It fueled the Christians to amass more armies, but Edessa itself was never reconquered by the Byzantines and Islam proliferated in this area.
The Baliklol
adana kebab
Outside the city is a historical site called Gobleki Tepe, basically the world’s oldest known place of worship. I met an enthusiastic young lad in town to be my tour guide, which was cool. His taxi driver friend charged us (me) about 3x what the actual cost should be, so it was a bit scammy, but oh well.
But as for this place, it is actually incredibly interesting! It was built around 11,000 BC and was only discovered in 1995. It has basically upended how archaeologists had thought modern civilizations developed, as this was done by hunter-gatherers, before agriculture was developed, or even pottery. So a tad bit more important than just a pile of rocks!
For reference, Stonehenge was around 3,000 BC and the pyramids were around 2500 BC.
"To Schmidt and others, these new findings suggest a novel theory of civilization. Scholars have long believed that only after people learned to farm and live in settled communities did they have the time, organization and resources to construct temples and support complicated social structures. But Schmidt argues it was the other way around: the extensive, coordinated effort to build the monoliths literally laid the groundwork for the development of complex societies" Good stuff!
I can't find my other pictures of Gobleki Tepe, but it is a pretty small site. You can see how the arranged the T or L shaped monoliths in a circle.
And this was about the end of my trip in Turkey. I spent one more day in a larger city called Gaziantep, which famous for it’s pistachio baklavas (I’ve never really eaten baklavas before, and god damn I’ve been missing out!). Then one more night in Istanbul before flying to Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
Southeast Turkey was definitely interesting, as all the cities have a wealth of history going back thousands of years. Plus because there’s not so many tourists around the Kurdish people seem to be friendlier, it’s easy to hitchhike if you want, the English speaks are happy to chat you up and talk politics, Erdogan, the PKK, etc. Somewhat surprisingly they seem to really like Trump around here, like he’s some sort of brave warrior president lol. I told them maybe he was an internet warrior, that’s about it, ha. Also Kurdistan is dirt cheap. In Western Turkey they’re always quoting tourists in Euros to offset the weakness of the Lira, but not in Kurdistan! I was staying in some of the nicer hotels in town (Hilton Garden) and they would cost $25-30 a night, free breakfast, big pool, gym, etc. Tough to beat! Whole shish kebab meals would be a few dollars tops. But as I said before, there’s hardly any tourists, obviously no traveler hostel type places, little English etc, so you’re very much on your own. After almost two weeks in the region I was definitely ready to get out!
Egypt up next!
03-29-2019
, 09:37 AM
04-06-2019
, 05:15 AM
Okayyyy, so onto Egpyt. I'm not gonna lie, I absolutely hated Egypt (well Sharm El Sheikh) when I first got there. They try to scam you at the airport buying the visa on arrival, you've got the taxi mafia waiting outside with no other options, you get hassled walking around, they try to overcharge you for basically everything including stuff like a SIM card from an official looking shop. These guys are just trying to milk you as much as they can and they're not even trying to hide it. I stayed one day and then took a taxi a little bit up the coast to a small beach town called Dahab, and of course the taxi driver claimed i had to pay more than we agreed to pay off some police bribe, because why not. Aghgh.
Dahab was cool though, it's a chilled out bedouin town with lots of backpackery type bars and restaurants and a bunch of dive shops. It also has a reputation for being a place where European women go to hook up with the local guys. If you're not scuba diving here or hooking up with Egyptian guys it would get boring pretty quick. Unfortunately there is no such thing as hooking up with Egyptian girls. My plan was to stay just a couple of days and get some diving. The diving is good here, not great, and it's famous for it's underwater arch, which is 200+ft deep. It's also one of the biggest underwater graveyards as people (mostly Russians) used to attempt to dive it all the time on a single tank, which is a risky proposition to say the least. Nowadays you need a couple weeks training in tech diving and multiple tanks.
Dahab waterfront
Outside of town, just desert desert desert
A cool place to chill
Very few people once you get outside of the main part of town
All these were completely empty. SAD!
Team effort!
I ended up in a British dive shop, diving with a Spanish girl about my age, who I got along well with, wink wink, and an overweight german woman in her early 40's who would hang out with us during the day, but was always seeing a special friend at night! Hmm. The Spanish girl had dived about 15 times and was already looking to quit her job and try to become a dive instructor. She was a little bit crazy, in a good way though.
Some shots from around the Bedouin village
Sorry no dive photos! I really need an underwater camera. Anywho, we'd all part ways after a few days and I would return to Sharm El Sheikh.
This time a booked a small dive hotel, nestled in the sea of big resorts. If wasn't for diving I would never spend any time in Sharm, its boring and devoid of any local culture whatsoever. I didn't even muster the energy to go out and take photos cuz it's just all resorts. I guess 7 or 8 years ago it was packed with tourists, tons of Brits, Russians etc, but nowadays with domestic terrorism concerns and a Russian plane bombed out over Northern Sinai a few years ago, the Brits and Russians have stopped direct flights, and now the tourism is hurting pretty bad. Most of the resorts you walk by might only have 30% occupancy even in high season. But I guess the lack of tourists has been good for the quality of the dive sites, so that's nice!
And Sharm does has some very pristine diving! Excellent visibility. It's expensive compared to Asia, or even Dahab, but there' lots to see, and water is so warm you don't even need a wetsuit. The best dive was a wreck called the Thistlegorm, a British merchant shipped bombed in WW2, packed with tanks, motorcycles, ammunition, etc. It's huge! And well preserved. Anywho, a few days diving was enough and then it was time to move on.
Some photos of the Thistlegorm I stole from the internet
I took a short flight to Hurghada to get over to the mainland Egypt side, and headed down the coast for, you guessed it, more diving! There are some interesting little seaside towns and dive resorts scattered along, transportation is difficult though. To be honest I didn't really like the whole vibe. It's not a backpacker friendly type place. It's more of an older European crowd who fly in and stay at their dive resort of choice, Germans stay at the German ones, French to the French ones etc, then fly back home. I felt a bit out of place. Pricey as well. I randomly walked into a dive shop and they seemed super surprised to have a walk-in. They put me on the boat the next day which was cool, a group of older French couples and me, heh. Diving was nice though, tons of turtles and blue spotted stingrays.
Some photos walking around these coastal towns:
Hookah man!
I spent a little more time on coast, with some more dives thrown in, but it was really boring at night. Next I headed inland to see Egypt's famous historical sites. Apparently very few tourists take the public transportation, and some people thought I couldn't even do it, but I was able to find a mini bus (or a series of minibuses) to get to Luxor. I chose a backpacker guesthouse and set off to see the city.
getting away from the tourist part and into the local part
Love me these shisha cafes! And so so cheap.
Luxor is funny. Luxor might just be the hassle capital of the world. It's just so over the top that it's amusing. Guys coming up to you with all sorts of stupid lines to get you into a conversation with them, have i seen you before? Hey I'm a chef in your hotel and I saw you earlier during breakfast, I like your xxx article of clothing, where'd you get it from?, hey man you walk like an Egyptian! Just stupid ****, but then when you brush them off they just keep going on and on! And literally just making eye contact with these guys in the street is enough of an invitation for them to come on over, lol. Earphones were helpful!
Luxor
The big things to do are the Temples of Karnak and Luxor on the east side of the river and the Valley of the Kings on the west side. Lots of Ramses II's work. The west side is a smaller village with really nice scenery, and if I did it again I would definitely stay on that side. I ended up in a group tour to do Valley of the Kings, which like usual is a mistake. You go during the middle of the day when it's hot af and the most crowded, fortunately the tombs are underground though! We did have some sort of eccentric Russian psychic woman in our group who was probably 50, face plastered in make-up, an outfit with her massive tits just hanging out, and of course didn't speak English. If she saw (or thought she saw) Egyptian guys staring at her massive honkers for too long she'd do some sort of song and dance in Russian, shaking them all around. LOL. She then got kicked out of the tombs because she kept touching stuff after being repeatedly asked not to. A real character!
Tomb of Hatshepsut
Haircut time!
It was much better to rent a bicycle and do the valley of the kings bright n early when the sun is coming up, there's no people around, and the hot air balloons are still in the sky. Very peaceful. Then you get the tombs all to yourself, but you should bring lots of small money as the guards who let you in always want baksheesh (tips), which is a bit annoying.
Next I went down to Aswan, which is the hopping off point for the temple of Abu Simbel. A lot people do this trip by sailboat (felucca), but I had already signed up for a week long liveaboard diving boat at the last minute, so I figured that be enough time on a boat. And of course people told me you couldn't go by local bus, but I managed to. There was bit of a frackus on the bus when they were collecting money at the end, and I had already previously agreed with the driver to pay ~ $4, but the people on the bus said I should only pay $2, and then bus driver and some of the guys on the bus were yelling their heads off at each other for a few minutes, obviously not happy the driver was overcharging me. We settled on $3, ha. I appreciated the support!
Aswan is nice, lots of Feluccas cruising by in the Nile, and it's got a bit of different character as there are many Nubians (Sudanese) around.
The main thing to do is take a bus 250km to Abu Simbel, another Ramses the Great production. After the opening was washed away in sand it was only rediscovered in the early 1800's. What a time to be an explorer in Egypt! Then it was set to be flooded by the Aswan dam so the whole thing was picked up and moved to higher ground in the 1960's. Pretty impressive.
After Aswan I hopped on a train north to the city of Edfu, which has one of the most well preserved temples in Egypt, The temple of Horus. I liked Edfu, no tourists stay here, you just get the ones that are on the boat trips who visit the temple for an hour and get back on their boats. So when I visited mid morning I had the whole place to myself. The town was cool as well, lots of people invited me in for tea, and some guys randomly took me out of town through the grassfields to a huge coptic church in the middle of nowhere. But the government guards with AK's wouldn't let me in without a passport though, weak. It was easy enough to hitchhike back into town though.
Coptic Church in the background
After Edfu it was back to the ocean to get to my liveaboard boat. It is surprisingly difficult to get from the Nile Valley back to the coast. When I asked tour companies how much it would cost me, they said had it to be a private car with a special permit and would cost like $125 or $150 for a half day of driving. Seriously? I found the local bus station, and even though it took a long ass time, it was uncomfortable, and I get grilled by an army guy, I managed to get where I need to go for only a couple of bucks.
Port Ghalib
So now I was in Port Ghalib, a swanky little place where the liveaboards stay docked and they charge you up the ass for everything. I found my boat and met all the crew, I was one of the first ones aboard. I was pretty excited for this trip, it's a renown Red Sea itinerary where you visit 3 sites all pretty far off the coast. If you're looking to see sharks, this is your trip! Most of these boats are booked up for months in advance, but I was able to slide into an open spot at the last minute, so I felt lucky. Of course I didn't inquire as to the makeup of the boat, but apparently it was me, 1 korean guy, 2 Egyptian guys, and 22 Spaniards! God damn it! In my head I was naively expecting a diverse group of people from all around the world. I already knew exactly how this trip was gonna go with 22 spanish speakers. Hopefully the Korean and Egyptians would be cool! A few hours later the South Korean guy, who would be my bunkmate boarded, and he was really nice and had dived a lot, but his English was limited at best. Yarghh.
I also had to rent equipment and had been in touch with someone who I gave some very clear instructions as to the specs I needed. Then they give me my gear and the mask is ****, the wetsuit is crazy thick and designed for someone who is like 6'6" 300lbs. Dafuq? The Red Sea is warm as hell, who would wear an 8mm wetsuit?! Plus I look like a 10 year wearing his daddy's clothes. I get this Russian lady on the phone that I've been emailing to Demand Satisfaction! She says she can't do anything about it because it was shipped in from another town. Grrr. I'm pretty pissed off at this point, because this gear is just ridiculous, and this triggers her and she starts going off at me for for being an idiot expecting rental equipment to fit! ****ing Russian customer service, seriously. I was able to get a different mask, but I'd have to deal with clownsuit.
Anyway, everyone gets in over the course of the day, does the meet n greet, we sleep on the boat the first night and the leave early next morning. We dive closeby during the day and then cruise overnight to get to Daedalus. This famous dive site is (was) known for hammerheads, but they don't tell you that apparently the Yemeni fishermen have killed most of them so nowadays they're tough to find. Hmm. And the thing about these dive sites is that if you're not seeing the big stuff, the rest of the underwater scenery is pretty damn dull. 0/1.
I've got some photos the Egyptians sent me, somehow this fish was deemed to be photoworthy on this dive, which tells you something!
Next dive site, mostly the same. No sharks. Some interesting stuff, but nothing really exciting. Pretty big let down. 0/2. And of course you shouldn't go diving expecting to see everything, but when you pay big money for a liveaboard it hurts a little. Plus the boat life is lame af. As predicted the Spaniards have their own clique and it's just our little group of four to ourselves. The Egyptians guys were cool at least! Also, nobody on the boat drank hardly at all... what kind of liveaboard is this?! The only other liveaboard I've done was in Australia, and the weather and diving was absolute ****, but the boat life was so much fun! Sigh.
Nice sunset scenery
Last dive site: 2 Brothers. Now we're talking! This place was just teaming with sharks! Reef sharks were almost always around near the surface patrolling around at 15ft or so. At the end of our dives we'd form our pack together and they'd swim up really nice and close! One the girls got followed by one near our dingy at the surface and she had keep swimming back and batting in the face with her fins. It was clearly just curious and not looking to attack, but still a bit scary! You always want to stay below the sharks, never above them, if you can.
On one of the next dives we saw a monster of a manta, a thresher shark, and a hammerhead back to back to back. When it rains it pours! My first hammerhead, wheeee! This dive site more than made up for the previous disappointments. So we all went back happy. Although I will never ever ever do another liveaboard without knowing what the group roster looks like!
Sharkies!
Spanish dancer
Last stop: Cairo. I actually liked Cairo more than I thought. Everyone always talks about the traffic and the pollution, both of which are pretty terrible. But Egyptian museum is fantastic and the Old Town is just great great great for wandering around, so many cool old mosques and buildings. There's also a district that does a lot of the city's recycling which is interesting to see. Bags of trash for days! It's obviously a dirty and smelly place but it's fascinating to see such a large homegrown recycling project.
Have to check out the pyramids of course
Took a stupid camel photo.
Also this is gonna sound really dumb, but I just kinda forgot about the Sphinx. Originally when I was walking around the pyramids foot on foot I just assumed I'd run into it, but at some point it had completely slipped my mind. It didn't hit me till a few days later, ha. I what kind of idiot goes to see the pyramids and doesn't see the Sphinx??! That's one of those things on the worldwide bucket list! I actually don't care all that much, but it still irks me a bit.
the bazaar
Trash town
Garbage city
So that's about it for Egypt. Overall, pretty mixed feelings about the place. Obviously it has tons and tons of cool historical stuff to see, and very cheap right now, but definitely way too much hassling in the tourist areas and there is a culture of just trying to fleece the tourists for as much as you possibly can, to a degree more extreme than the vast majority of countries I've been to. Even in mom and pop grocery stores, which usually are pretty honest, I had the owner try to pull a fast one on me on more than one occasion! At the same time tourism is down in Egypt and people are hurting, so I can understand why it happens.
And the diving is really good! But besides Dahab, I just don't like how it's set up where most of your only options are dive resorts inhabited by older europeans who just fly in for the week or so. And of course in these little coastal cities there is nothing at all going on at night outside of the resort. I much prefer the diving setup in Asia that has a more young, diverse crowd. Being a solo backpacker I felt very out of place at times.
But of course I was glad I went! It was my first Arab country and I did enjoy walking the cities and getting a feel for the local life. And smoking all the shisha! A whole month was maybe a little too long and looking back my logistics were a bit wonky, but oh well. The Kingdom of Jordan is coming up next...
Dahab was cool though, it's a chilled out bedouin town with lots of backpackery type bars and restaurants and a bunch of dive shops. It also has a reputation for being a place where European women go to hook up with the local guys. If you're not scuba diving here or hooking up with Egyptian guys it would get boring pretty quick. Unfortunately there is no such thing as hooking up with Egyptian girls. My plan was to stay just a couple of days and get some diving. The diving is good here, not great, and it's famous for it's underwater arch, which is 200+ft deep. It's also one of the biggest underwater graveyards as people (mostly Russians) used to attempt to dive it all the time on a single tank, which is a risky proposition to say the least. Nowadays you need a couple weeks training in tech diving and multiple tanks.
Dahab waterfront
Outside of town, just desert desert desert
A cool place to chill
Very few people once you get outside of the main part of town
All these were completely empty. SAD!
Team effort!
I ended up in a British dive shop, diving with a Spanish girl about my age, who I got along well with, wink wink, and an overweight german woman in her early 40's who would hang out with us during the day, but was always seeing a special friend at night! Hmm. The Spanish girl had dived about 15 times and was already looking to quit her job and try to become a dive instructor. She was a little bit crazy, in a good way though.
Some shots from around the Bedouin village
Sorry no dive photos! I really need an underwater camera. Anywho, we'd all part ways after a few days and I would return to Sharm El Sheikh.
This time a booked a small dive hotel, nestled in the sea of big resorts. If wasn't for diving I would never spend any time in Sharm, its boring and devoid of any local culture whatsoever. I didn't even muster the energy to go out and take photos cuz it's just all resorts. I guess 7 or 8 years ago it was packed with tourists, tons of Brits, Russians etc, but nowadays with domestic terrorism concerns and a Russian plane bombed out over Northern Sinai a few years ago, the Brits and Russians have stopped direct flights, and now the tourism is hurting pretty bad. Most of the resorts you walk by might only have 30% occupancy even in high season. But I guess the lack of tourists has been good for the quality of the dive sites, so that's nice!
And Sharm does has some very pristine diving! Excellent visibility. It's expensive compared to Asia, or even Dahab, but there' lots to see, and water is so warm you don't even need a wetsuit. The best dive was a wreck called the Thistlegorm, a British merchant shipped bombed in WW2, packed with tanks, motorcycles, ammunition, etc. It's huge! And well preserved. Anywho, a few days diving was enough and then it was time to move on.
Some photos of the Thistlegorm I stole from the internet
I took a short flight to Hurghada to get over to the mainland Egypt side, and headed down the coast for, you guessed it, more diving! There are some interesting little seaside towns and dive resorts scattered along, transportation is difficult though. To be honest I didn't really like the whole vibe. It's not a backpacker friendly type place. It's more of an older European crowd who fly in and stay at their dive resort of choice, Germans stay at the German ones, French to the French ones etc, then fly back home. I felt a bit out of place. Pricey as well. I randomly walked into a dive shop and they seemed super surprised to have a walk-in. They put me on the boat the next day which was cool, a group of older French couples and me, heh. Diving was nice though, tons of turtles and blue spotted stingrays.
Some photos walking around these coastal towns:
Hookah man!
I spent a little more time on coast, with some more dives thrown in, but it was really boring at night. Next I headed inland to see Egypt's famous historical sites. Apparently very few tourists take the public transportation, and some people thought I couldn't even do it, but I was able to find a mini bus (or a series of minibuses) to get to Luxor. I chose a backpacker guesthouse and set off to see the city.
getting away from the tourist part and into the local part
Love me these shisha cafes! And so so cheap.
Luxor is funny. Luxor might just be the hassle capital of the world. It's just so over the top that it's amusing. Guys coming up to you with all sorts of stupid lines to get you into a conversation with them, have i seen you before? Hey I'm a chef in your hotel and I saw you earlier during breakfast, I like your xxx article of clothing, where'd you get it from?, hey man you walk like an Egyptian! Just stupid ****, but then when you brush them off they just keep going on and on! And literally just making eye contact with these guys in the street is enough of an invitation for them to come on over, lol. Earphones were helpful!
Luxor
The big things to do are the Temples of Karnak and Luxor on the east side of the river and the Valley of the Kings on the west side. Lots of Ramses II's work. The west side is a smaller village with really nice scenery, and if I did it again I would definitely stay on that side. I ended up in a group tour to do Valley of the Kings, which like usual is a mistake. You go during the middle of the day when it's hot af and the most crowded, fortunately the tombs are underground though! We did have some sort of eccentric Russian psychic woman in our group who was probably 50, face plastered in make-up, an outfit with her massive tits just hanging out, and of course didn't speak English. If she saw (or thought she saw) Egyptian guys staring at her massive honkers for too long she'd do some sort of song and dance in Russian, shaking them all around. LOL. She then got kicked out of the tombs because she kept touching stuff after being repeatedly asked not to. A real character!
Tomb of Hatshepsut
Haircut time!
It was much better to rent a bicycle and do the valley of the kings bright n early when the sun is coming up, there's no people around, and the hot air balloons are still in the sky. Very peaceful. Then you get the tombs all to yourself, but you should bring lots of small money as the guards who let you in always want baksheesh (tips), which is a bit annoying.
Next I went down to Aswan, which is the hopping off point for the temple of Abu Simbel. A lot people do this trip by sailboat (felucca), but I had already signed up for a week long liveaboard diving boat at the last minute, so I figured that be enough time on a boat. And of course people told me you couldn't go by local bus, but I managed to. There was bit of a frackus on the bus when they were collecting money at the end, and I had already previously agreed with the driver to pay ~ $4, but the people on the bus said I should only pay $2, and then bus driver and some of the guys on the bus were yelling their heads off at each other for a few minutes, obviously not happy the driver was overcharging me. We settled on $3, ha. I appreciated the support!
Aswan is nice, lots of Feluccas cruising by in the Nile, and it's got a bit of different character as there are many Nubians (Sudanese) around.
The main thing to do is take a bus 250km to Abu Simbel, another Ramses the Great production. After the opening was washed away in sand it was only rediscovered in the early 1800's. What a time to be an explorer in Egypt! Then it was set to be flooded by the Aswan dam so the whole thing was picked up and moved to higher ground in the 1960's. Pretty impressive.
After Aswan I hopped on a train north to the city of Edfu, which has one of the most well preserved temples in Egypt, The temple of Horus. I liked Edfu, no tourists stay here, you just get the ones that are on the boat trips who visit the temple for an hour and get back on their boats. So when I visited mid morning I had the whole place to myself. The town was cool as well, lots of people invited me in for tea, and some guys randomly took me out of town through the grassfields to a huge coptic church in the middle of nowhere. But the government guards with AK's wouldn't let me in without a passport though, weak. It was easy enough to hitchhike back into town though.
Coptic Church in the background
After Edfu it was back to the ocean to get to my liveaboard boat. It is surprisingly difficult to get from the Nile Valley back to the coast. When I asked tour companies how much it would cost me, they said had it to be a private car with a special permit and would cost like $125 or $150 for a half day of driving. Seriously? I found the local bus station, and even though it took a long ass time, it was uncomfortable, and I get grilled by an army guy, I managed to get where I need to go for only a couple of bucks.
Port Ghalib
So now I was in Port Ghalib, a swanky little place where the liveaboards stay docked and they charge you up the ass for everything. I found my boat and met all the crew, I was one of the first ones aboard. I was pretty excited for this trip, it's a renown Red Sea itinerary where you visit 3 sites all pretty far off the coast. If you're looking to see sharks, this is your trip! Most of these boats are booked up for months in advance, but I was able to slide into an open spot at the last minute, so I felt lucky. Of course I didn't inquire as to the makeup of the boat, but apparently it was me, 1 korean guy, 2 Egyptian guys, and 22 Spaniards! God damn it! In my head I was naively expecting a diverse group of people from all around the world. I already knew exactly how this trip was gonna go with 22 spanish speakers. Hopefully the Korean and Egyptians would be cool! A few hours later the South Korean guy, who would be my bunkmate boarded, and he was really nice and had dived a lot, but his English was limited at best. Yarghh.
I also had to rent equipment and had been in touch with someone who I gave some very clear instructions as to the specs I needed. Then they give me my gear and the mask is ****, the wetsuit is crazy thick and designed for someone who is like 6'6" 300lbs. Dafuq? The Red Sea is warm as hell, who would wear an 8mm wetsuit?! Plus I look like a 10 year wearing his daddy's clothes. I get this Russian lady on the phone that I've been emailing to Demand Satisfaction! She says she can't do anything about it because it was shipped in from another town. Grrr. I'm pretty pissed off at this point, because this gear is just ridiculous, and this triggers her and she starts going off at me for for being an idiot expecting rental equipment to fit! ****ing Russian customer service, seriously. I was able to get a different mask, but I'd have to deal with clownsuit.
Anyway, everyone gets in over the course of the day, does the meet n greet, we sleep on the boat the first night and the leave early next morning. We dive closeby during the day and then cruise overnight to get to Daedalus. This famous dive site is (was) known for hammerheads, but they don't tell you that apparently the Yemeni fishermen have killed most of them so nowadays they're tough to find. Hmm. And the thing about these dive sites is that if you're not seeing the big stuff, the rest of the underwater scenery is pretty damn dull. 0/1.
I've got some photos the Egyptians sent me, somehow this fish was deemed to be photoworthy on this dive, which tells you something!
Next dive site, mostly the same. No sharks. Some interesting stuff, but nothing really exciting. Pretty big let down. 0/2. And of course you shouldn't go diving expecting to see everything, but when you pay big money for a liveaboard it hurts a little. Plus the boat life is lame af. As predicted the Spaniards have their own clique and it's just our little group of four to ourselves. The Egyptians guys were cool at least! Also, nobody on the boat drank hardly at all... what kind of liveaboard is this?! The only other liveaboard I've done was in Australia, and the weather and diving was absolute ****, but the boat life was so much fun! Sigh.
Nice sunset scenery
Last dive site: 2 Brothers. Now we're talking! This place was just teaming with sharks! Reef sharks were almost always around near the surface patrolling around at 15ft or so. At the end of our dives we'd form our pack together and they'd swim up really nice and close! One the girls got followed by one near our dingy at the surface and she had keep swimming back and batting in the face with her fins. It was clearly just curious and not looking to attack, but still a bit scary! You always want to stay below the sharks, never above them, if you can.
On one of the next dives we saw a monster of a manta, a thresher shark, and a hammerhead back to back to back. When it rains it pours! My first hammerhead, wheeee! This dive site more than made up for the previous disappointments. So we all went back happy. Although I will never ever ever do another liveaboard without knowing what the group roster looks like!
Sharkies!
Spanish dancer
Last stop: Cairo. I actually liked Cairo more than I thought. Everyone always talks about the traffic and the pollution, both of which are pretty terrible. But Egyptian museum is fantastic and the Old Town is just great great great for wandering around, so many cool old mosques and buildings. There's also a district that does a lot of the city's recycling which is interesting to see. Bags of trash for days! It's obviously a dirty and smelly place but it's fascinating to see such a large homegrown recycling project.
Have to check out the pyramids of course
Took a stupid camel photo.
Also this is gonna sound really dumb, but I just kinda forgot about the Sphinx. Originally when I was walking around the pyramids foot on foot I just assumed I'd run into it, but at some point it had completely slipped my mind. It didn't hit me till a few days later, ha. I what kind of idiot goes to see the pyramids and doesn't see the Sphinx??! That's one of those things on the worldwide bucket list! I actually don't care all that much, but it still irks me a bit.
the bazaar
Trash town
Garbage city
So that's about it for Egypt. Overall, pretty mixed feelings about the place. Obviously it has tons and tons of cool historical stuff to see, and very cheap right now, but definitely way too much hassling in the tourist areas and there is a culture of just trying to fleece the tourists for as much as you possibly can, to a degree more extreme than the vast majority of countries I've been to. Even in mom and pop grocery stores, which usually are pretty honest, I had the owner try to pull a fast one on me on more than one occasion! At the same time tourism is down in Egypt and people are hurting, so I can understand why it happens.
And the diving is really good! But besides Dahab, I just don't like how it's set up where most of your only options are dive resorts inhabited by older europeans who just fly in for the week or so. And of course in these little coastal cities there is nothing at all going on at night outside of the resort. I much prefer the diving setup in Asia that has a more young, diverse crowd. Being a solo backpacker I felt very out of place at times.
But of course I was glad I went! It was my first Arab country and I did enjoy walking the cities and getting a feel for the local life. And smoking all the shisha! A whole month was maybe a little too long and looking back my logistics were a bit wonky, but oh well. The Kingdom of Jordan is coming up next...
04-13-2019
, 08:19 AM
Thanks Golddog!
So from Cairo I flew to Amman, Jordan (surprisingly expensive given the distance), but didn't stay in Amman, I went straight to the bus station and caught the bus to Wadi Musa, which is the city outside of Petra.
It's a pretty boring city, but the backdrop is nice overlooking the rocky outcroppings where Petra is located. Prices are also a lot more expensive than Egypt, and the beer is like $10 a pint, ouch.
Petra reached it's height as part of the Nabataean Kingdom around 400 BC, who were Arab traders. It was taken over by the Romans eventually and it's significance declined as more sea-based trading routes were used. It was forgotten about for a while by the west and rediscovered by some Europeans in the early 1800's.
The important thing when visiting Petra is getting there early! The gate opens at 6am, so you want to be up for that. It's kind of creepy/surreal walk through the Siq in the dark, which is the walkway through the canyon to get to the treasury. It just starts getting light by the time you reach the treasury and you can glimpse a sliver of it through the canyon walls, pretty cool.
What most people don't realize is how big Petra is, so there's a bunch of trails and stuff to explore, which is great when its early and there is no one else around!
The best way to do it is to take a nap during the middle of the day when all the tourists get there and it's hot as balls, then get back out there late afternoon.
The instagrammers' favorite spot! I watched three girls in a row do all their makeup and get their dresses looking perfect before doing little photoshoots in this particular spot, ha.
Next up, a desert excursion: Wadi Rum. I just kind of showed up without booking anything in advance, hoping to join some sort of group. The little town is kind of annoying because it just feels like a tourist trap and everyone trying to oversell you on their jeep trips and everyone telling you that you'll just have to pay for a solo trip, which is stupidly expensive. I eventually found an american guy and chinese girl to split an afternoon trip + camp with. The desert is gorgeous but they bring you on this set itinerary that every single other jeep is doing when you have this huge fantastic barren desert to explore. Pretty lame. The camp at night is fun though, lots of other travelers to meet around the fire. It would be worth it to organize a more private camping tour where you can roam free in the desert and not follow the caravan of other tourists. Oh well.
In the village
nice sunset spot
our camp ground
more nice sunsets
Then it was back to Wadi Musa, and back up to Amman, which is a good looking city. Although the main attraction is the citadel on top of the hill overlooking the city, which says it closes at 7pm, but what they really mean is the gates close at 6pm and they kick everyone out at 7pm. So there was a whole bunch of unhappy tourists trying to get in, to no avail (myself included). You'd think they'd change this as to not have to deal with a bunch of grumpy tourists every single night, butnahh. But besides that, the city was relatively nice, clean, and modern, especially compared to Egpyt!
View from just outside the citadel:
I didn't stay long though, just one night, then I was off to Israel the next morning, which is well known as a pain in the ass border crossing!
So from Cairo I flew to Amman, Jordan (surprisingly expensive given the distance), but didn't stay in Amman, I went straight to the bus station and caught the bus to Wadi Musa, which is the city outside of Petra.
It's a pretty boring city, but the backdrop is nice overlooking the rocky outcroppings where Petra is located. Prices are also a lot more expensive than Egypt, and the beer is like $10 a pint, ouch.
Petra reached it's height as part of the Nabataean Kingdom around 400 BC, who were Arab traders. It was taken over by the Romans eventually and it's significance declined as more sea-based trading routes were used. It was forgotten about for a while by the west and rediscovered by some Europeans in the early 1800's.
The important thing when visiting Petra is getting there early! The gate opens at 6am, so you want to be up for that. It's kind of creepy/surreal walk through the Siq in the dark, which is the walkway through the canyon to get to the treasury. It just starts getting light by the time you reach the treasury and you can glimpse a sliver of it through the canyon walls, pretty cool.
What most people don't realize is how big Petra is, so there's a bunch of trails and stuff to explore, which is great when its early and there is no one else around!
The best way to do it is to take a nap during the middle of the day when all the tourists get there and it's hot as balls, then get back out there late afternoon.
The instagrammers' favorite spot! I watched three girls in a row do all their makeup and get their dresses looking perfect before doing little photoshoots in this particular spot, ha.
Next up, a desert excursion: Wadi Rum. I just kind of showed up without booking anything in advance, hoping to join some sort of group. The little town is kind of annoying because it just feels like a tourist trap and everyone trying to oversell you on their jeep trips and everyone telling you that you'll just have to pay for a solo trip, which is stupidly expensive. I eventually found an american guy and chinese girl to split an afternoon trip + camp with. The desert is gorgeous but they bring you on this set itinerary that every single other jeep is doing when you have this huge fantastic barren desert to explore. Pretty lame. The camp at night is fun though, lots of other travelers to meet around the fire. It would be worth it to organize a more private camping tour where you can roam free in the desert and not follow the caravan of other tourists. Oh well.
In the village
nice sunset spot
our camp ground
more nice sunsets
Then it was back to Wadi Musa, and back up to Amman, which is a good looking city. Although the main attraction is the citadel on top of the hill overlooking the city, which says it closes at 7pm, but what they really mean is the gates close at 6pm and they kick everyone out at 7pm. So there was a whole bunch of unhappy tourists trying to get in, to no avail (myself included). You'd think they'd change this as to not have to deal with a bunch of grumpy tourists every single night, butnahh. But besides that, the city was relatively nice, clean, and modern, especially compared to Egpyt!
View from just outside the citadel:
I didn't stay long though, just one night, then I was off to Israel the next morning, which is well known as a pain in the ass border crossing!