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A Sentimental Journey Across Egypt, Libya, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Italy XIII
Day Twelve
(continued from ish 225, day twelve, as well, again, and something about donkeys.)
So I've woken up.
And it's sunny, as it tends to be in Egypt.
The donkeys have gone, as have the big tomb-like things we wandered through, accompanied by a certified guide who was on the Valley of the Kings staff and told us about finger marks in the ceiling and young little whippersnappers that came around and fell into some new damn tomb when people had been spending years of their life painstakingly reading hieroglyphics to try and figure out just where they buried a pharaoh who was keen to keep his treasures and burial place a secret. You can't just expect to find a tomb your first time out, they'd explain, but would the younger ones listen? No, of course not, just like they themselves didn't listen when they were younger, and the young ones of today would go trekking out, tromping this way and that, kicking sand and dirt about, clambering up and down dusty hills, making the locals laugh with their jokes, and then falling down a damn tomb their second or third time out, completely unlike they had when they were younger. When they went out as young lads and lasses they tromped about and fell down a lot, but only because there was a hell of a lot more of the valley that didn't have proper paths and walkways constructed and never once did they fall down a hole only to discover it was Tutshephet the Second's tomb, where he buried himself and his family and a fascinating history of how the Nubians and a group of elders from the lost continent of Atlantis got on. Just a lot of nothing, until they started to do too many tours and guide people around the same bloody tombs time after time and what the hell chance of finding a new tomb did they have when they spent all their time leading tourists around old ones did they have, would you answer them that?
So too was gone the bottles of wine, the shaded glen, the birds singing, a hammock, and the beautiful non-Egyptian sailor girl, whom I would have to stop calling sailor girl sooner or later, as we'd been off the water for a few days now.
Actually, that last bit might have been a dream. In fact, it might all have been a dream. The whole trip -- desert, Nile, cities, sandy bread, Egyptians -- it might have all been a dream.
Yes, a dream...
However, the dusty streets of Luxor were not, in fact, a dream, and nearly getting hit by a calesh that had gotten a bit out of control (this bit is arguable, if you're in the mood, as caleshes seem to be constantly just on the verge of breaking out on to the pavement, scattering tshirt vendors and pedestrians alike under the horse's hooves) was also not a dream. The vague smell of donkey off my clothes also convinced me that the donkeys were probably not a dream, either. And the fact that it was sunny, which it probably would not have been, had I been, say, in England.
The next thing I knew, we were on a bus, in the middle of a convoy, to Hurghada, by the Red Sea.
It was not a dream, but the non-Egyptian sailor girl was also on the bus on the two hour accompanied journey from Luxor to the Red Sea, and she was sitting across the aisle from me.
I slumped in my seat and endeavoured to appear as if I were engrossed in a book, and I slowly inched one hand out across the seat cushions, out towards her hand...
Day Thirteen.
The Red Sea.
It's neither red, nor a sea.
Well, it is a sea, but it's not red.
And not easily partable, I might add.
If you're familiar with, say, La Jolla, CA, Lahinch, Co. Clare, Padstow, Cornwall, Nauset Beach, MA, the Red Sea is almost apologetically warm, for a large body of water. Almost too easy to enjoy oneself in, considering.
disclaimer:
Folks, it's that time of year again.
Time to say, "well, it's been great and everything, but there's a load of money from the publisher sitting in a bank account and a whole chateaux-like thing sitting in the south of France and William needs to earn his pay, for pete's sake" and head off for a bit, turning things over to my lovely assistant, William Murphy.
William is flying in from Worcester next week and will be taking over operations here at the darling Sane Magazine for a few weeks/months while I get my feet firmly back on the ground and just generally sort of hang out and so forth.
I'm not retiring, necessarily, nor am I done forever and a day with Sane, but all queries and such shall please be directed to Will, as he's more than capable of handling this sort of thing, and probably answers his emails more often than I do.
There will be the conclusion of the travelogue, surely, but past that the content is down to Will.
So kids, play nice, and I'd like you to say, "Hi, William." Go on...
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