Almost there

January 11, 2008 ... 2:30am wake up, on the bus at 3:00am to the monastery, and a brief walk up to the monastery. It's 3:35pm as we commence our trek up Mount Sinai. Contrary to the tour literature this is not an "easy" hike. The stars are glorious. It's fairly dark as the moon is but a sliver. We're walking up a mountain rock path with torches and headlamps. I'm going to slow and Jane is having troubles breathing. We decide to take a camel up the rest of the way. It's 4:30am and we're only 1/3 of the way up, with the more steep part coming. The camel ride was quite enjoyable. There's frost on the ground and a bit of a wind chill. It's about 5am when we reach the tea houses. This is as far as I go. There's 750 stairs up to the summit but there steep, narrow and varying heights. My hip flexors definitely won't take it. Most of the group goes up. Dave celebrates his birthday on top of Mount Sinai enjoying the sunrise up over the cloud cover. A Korean group sings hymns as the sun comes up. The walk down is much easier in the daylight. Back to the hotel for breakfast and showers before we're back on the bus to Cairo at 10:30am. The drive is long and uneventful. We pass under the Suez Canal. We luck out as a couple of ships are passing through and it looks like they're sailing on the desert. Unfortunately due to security no stopping for photos. On the other side of the canal we stop at a roadside diner for lunch. It's pretty "iffy" so most of us order fries as we're afraid of the conditions. We arrive in Cairo around 5pm. Dave and I decide to have a nap first as I'm feeling ucky from the bus ride. We end up out for the count. January 12, 2008 ... our last day. Cairo museum. We spend approx 2.5 hours here with a guide and only see a small portion of the items on display. It's massive, things are everywhere - very overwhelming. Again no pictures. Here we get to see King Tut's treasures, those that were found in his tomb from the Valley of the Kings. As well we pay extra for the "mummy rooms". Interesting, some mummies even have teeth and hair still. The group splits up with some of us heading out for linen and then the markets. I have no success with the linen shopping. No much selection in the queen/king sizes. The taxi ride to the market is a thrill, four of us piled in the backseat - Dave, me & Stuart with Marie on our laps. We can't stop laughing. For our last night the group heads out for one last meal together. We surprise Dave with a belated birthday celebration as Nadine our tour leader has made arrangements for a cake. We break up the party just before 10pm to head back to the hotel as our taxi will be there for 11:15pm and we need to pack a couple more things before we head home.