From Cairo to Dahab

Just over a year ago, my friend David and I coined the phrase "Things are Better in Dahab," after we overlanded out of an insane ten day trip in Israel to the overwhelmingly beautiful and sublimely relaxed Egyptian Sinai desert. Thirteen months later, Sierra and I left the Egyptian capital--what our dope smoking taxi driver dubbed "Crazy Cairo"--to step off an 11 hour bus ride at three in the morning in Dahab. And the (not so old) addage that things are better here is very much still true. We're looking forward to five days of sun, scuba, 4x4s in the desert and generous dollops of idyllic inertia.

We spent 3 long days in Cairo and saw both mind blowing pyramids as well as a dozen creepy mummies. We wore out our legs crawling into underground crypts while overzealous hawkers wore out our patience. Through a little half assed negotiating, we managed to hire a taxi driver by the day to ferry us between sights, but he turned out to be so crazy that we had to part ways after a couple of days. The food was so inedible that at our worst, we resorted to dinner at TGI Fridays and Kentucky Fried Chicken for lunch. We spent a lovely evening at a Cairo casino, sipping free drinks and even leaving with $20 of blackjack winnings. We did not ride any camels, because my crotch is still recovering from a camel assisted mountain descent last February.

The night we arrived in Egypt, we pounded the pavement for two hours at 4am looking for an available room in one of the many busy downtown hostels.

The streets in Cairo are so busy that crossing one is always a near death experience.

But darn those sand triangles were perty.