Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Israel Other than Jerusalem

The Dead Sea, Masada, Qumran, the Israel Museum,  "the wall" and checkpoints dividing Palestinian neighborhoods from Jewish settlements and . . .  Oh yes, Tel Aviv !
We saw the Dead Sea

The Lowest Place on Earth

and toured Masada where we learned about the 960 Israelites who took refuge from thousands of Romans atop the 1,400 foot plateau retreat once built by Herod the Great.

Masada

The Old City of Jerusalem

Entering the Old City of Jerusalem is a sensation of converging sights, sounds, aromas and smells. Each turn on the narrow cobblestone alleyways, every ancient arch, each hidden courtyard instantly reflects a place and a mix (if not clash) of cultures and customs unfamiliar and interesting.

The Oberoi Zahra Luxury Nile Cruiser

I believe in the saying, "The price is what you pay; the value is what you receive." I have never found this more accurate than our stay with Oberoi Hotels and Resorts on their luxury Nile cruiser, the Zahra. While the price was high, the experience was unmatched. Let me share, with apologies in advance, for any "over the top" moments, descriptions, or "ain't this just too great to believe" mutterings.
We started our excursion with an odd moment. Having disembarked from the plane landing in Aswan, we along with another couple boarded a large airport bus. The doors quickly closed behind us, and the bus whisked away. We totaled four passengers on a bus that could hold 80 people. My first thought was that we were being abducted. Wrong; we were being Oberoied. We, along with our new chums, Chris and Sarah Hockey, were being transferred to the Zahra.

Next stop … unbelievable!
The Oberoi Zahra, Luxury Nile Cruiser

Billed as the Nile's most luxurious vessel, Zahra impressed us with it's first-class facilities, elegant décor, and exemplary service.


Lobby

Lounge

Stairwell Between Decks

Deck C with 12 Cabins

Deck D - Spa and Our Cabin

Our Bedroom

Desk and Sitting Area

Bathroom

The 25 luxury cabins are plush and comfortable, with a good-sized bed, table, and chairs positioned towards the flowing Nile. But the piece de resistance is the en suite bathroom. Half the size of the bedroom, the en suite consists of a shiny new toilet and large sink, complete with delicious L'Occitane products, and a massive shower in glass and aquamarine tiles, with an oversized showerhead. The bathroom's river-facing wall is dominated by an enormous picture window, and at the push of a button, the blinds wind up to reveal breathtaking panoramic views of the Nile. JustDon'tthis after sunset; the blacked-out windows are not as concealing as they appear once the lights have been switched on inside!




Restaurant Entrance

The accommodations were brilliant, matched only by what was to follow.
 

8 Days – 7 Nights Cruise

Embarkation: Aswan to Luxor
 
Day 1 - Tuesday
12:00 p.m. - Embarkation
12:30 p.m. - Lunch
2:30 p.m. - Visit the High Dam and the PhilaeTemple      
7:30 p.m. - Dinner
Overnight in Aswan

Day 2 - Wednesday
7:00 to 10:00 a.m. - Breakfast
9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.  - Spa Time
1:00 p.m. - Lunch
After Sunset – Sound and light show at the Philae Temple
7:30 p.m. - Dinner
Overnight in Aswan
 

Day 3 - Thursday
7:00 a.m. - Sail to Kom Ombo
7:00 to 10:00 a.m. - Breakfast
10:00 a.m. - Visit the Temple of Kom Ombo
11:30 a.m. - Sail back to Aswan
11:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. - Spa Time
12:30 p.m. - Lunch 

3:00 p.m. - Visit to Botanical Garden by felucca
5:00 to 7:00 p.m. - Spa Time
7:30 p.m. - Dinner
Overnight in Aswan
 

Day 4 – Friday
9:00 a.m. - Sail to Edfu
7:00 to 10:00 a.m. - Breakfast
9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. - Spa Time
1:00 p.m. - Lunch
2:00 to 6:00 p.m. - Spa Time
6:00 p.m. - Visit the Temple of Edfu
7:30 - Dinner
Overnight in Edfu
 

Day 5 - Saturday
6:00 a.m. - Sail to Luxor
7:00 to 10:00 a.m. - Breakfast
9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. - Spa time
12:30 p.m. – Lunch
3:00 p.m. - Visit Karnak Temple and Luxor Museum
 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. - Spa Time
7:30 p.m. - Dinner
Overnight in Luxor
 

Day 6 – Sunday
6:30 a.m. onwards - Breakfast
8:00 a.m. - Visit Valley of the Kings, with its royal tombs, King Tut's tomb
1:00 p.m. - Sail to Quina
1:00 p.m. - Lunch
2:00 to 5:30 p.m. - Spa Time
6:00 p.m. - Travel to Dendara
Private visit to the Temple of Dendara
7:30 p.m. - Dinner on board
Overnight in Quina
 

Day 7 – Monday
5:00 a.m. - Sail to Luxor
7:00 to 10:00 a.m. - Breakfast
10:30 a.m.  - Visit the West Bank and Temple of Hatchepsut
1:00 p.m. - Lunch
2:00 to 4:00 p.m. - Spa Time
4:30 to 6:00 p.m.  - Visit Luxor Temple
7:30 p.m. - Dinner
 

Day 8 – Tuesday
5:00 a.m. - Disembarkation


We had the good fortune to have Adel Ashour as our guide.
Adel is from Aswan, Upper Egypt, pursuing a doctorate (4th year) in Egyptology in Geneva, Switzerland. Adel is meeting his costs by guiding at the United Nations headquarters in Geneva and maintaining his reputation as "the best guide on the Nile" in working with a few select Nile cruises. A personable young man with an open mind yet a provocative social and intellectual demeanor. Adel would make a fine and strong-minded American Democrat…always ready to give advice to the party's leadership. Current advice or editorial on Obama – rather than "going to the church to pray," Americans should "go to the hospital for an operation".
The guests on our cruise numbered 23 (capacity is 54). The number of crew members was reported to be 82. While the crew-to-guest ratio was high, it was the Oberoi quest, if not obsession, to exceed expectations that drove our experience. Meet the  staff that we encountered (supported by crew members that we never saw).

Mohamed Aziz


Mamdough was the cruiser's Consignor


Mohaned was our General Manager

Mamdouh Milad

Wait Staff

Mona El_Shazly and Joan

Pilot

Accolades also to Chef Ajeet and his kitchen staff of 7. Arguably the best collection of 20 conseI'vemeals that we have ever eaten … and this was on a cruise ship. The food was wonderful. Oberoi relocated one of their finest chefs from India, who brought with him a spectacular collection of Indian recipes to sit alongside traditional Egyptian fare. The a la carte menu was changed for every meal and included fresh salads, seafood, curries, and fresh lamb cutlets, accompanied by an impressive list of local and international wines.
  
Scenes from on-board the Zahra ~


 


An experience is a good one when expectations are met. An experience is a great one when expectations are exceeded. An experience that takes you one step further, a special surprise, is one that you remember for the rest of your life. The surprise was meeting and spending time with some extraordinarily terrific and interesting people ~


Sarah a.k.a. The Mrs from Blighty

Chris a.k.a. Chunka

from Chunka ... "Looking forward to hearing about the Egypt leg and about "those extremely pleasant English people you met?!?!" Make sure you keep in touch as we don't get out much over here and have few friends so we have now officially branded you both our "best friends" even though we just met ya!"
Prue

Prue is a (literal) dame, a Cordon Bleu-trained chef, and a Michelin-starred restaurateur. She's ghost-written recipes for royals, improved the catering on British railways, and has 12 books under her belt. She was on this cruise as a Board Member of the Orient Express Hospitality Group ( a competitor of Oberoi Hotels & Resorts).

Cheryl and Dave

Julian and Sue
Robert and Silvia
Strange Bedfellow

Monkey Boy
Thank you to all who made this an experience that we can add to our collection of lifetime memories.

Allah Akbar

 
 

    
 
 

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Egypt Today and Yesterday

The people of Egypt are truly "in a transition". The 25 January revolution began a completely new experience here. Everywhere, the people feel a kind of freedom from repressive rules which restricted and limited the daily lives of the normal citizen. Our guide

Hassan
would chuckle at how chaotic the city streets were. Traffic was unregulated. Pedestrians would crisscross through busy thoroughfares with impunity as police were nowhere to be found to uphold the rules of the road. For in this transition period, the people are free even to break simple rules. Hassan would laugh and we laughed along with him.

Friday, April 22, 2011

Cairo and Giza

Our travel from Cape Town to Cairo took nearly 24 hours with stop-overs in Johannesburg and Istanbul. The approach and descent into CIA gave us an initial feeling of just how large and densely populated Cairo is. Our drive to our hotel allowed us a glimpse of the grinding poverty and squalor of the city. Cairo is a paradox of rich history and spiritual people caught in an era of corruption and abuse of human rights … but that was before “25th January”.

Upper-Middle Class Apartment
The drive to our hotel, the Mena House, took over 1½ hours to go approximately 24 miles. Traffic is very heavy even today, a Sunday afternoon. We drove through areas that had unfinished construction projects, piles of uncollected garbage, roads of broken pavement, and crowds of meandering people. Where were the benefits of the “revolution”?

Saturday, April 16, 2011

The Blue Train

Nearly 30 years ago, Gus worked on his first cross-border transaction. The financing involved a German lease and a South African sublease of a BMW plant in Johannesburg. The arranger in Johannesburg, who worked on the deal, spent more conversation on what he called the "greatest train ride in the world" than he spent talking about the financing. Ever since, Gus wanted to someday ride the Blue Train. 

Blue Train at Pretoria Station
Staff of Butlers
We boarded the Blue Train at 9:00 a.m., and our butler ushered us to our suite and helped us settle ourselves.
Hallway of Our Car
Our Suite
Once we were settled we explored the common cars:
Observation Car
Lounge Car
Soon, we joined Curt and Lynn for the first seating of lunch.
Dining Car

Joan's Lunch

Gus' Lunch
The Blue Train experience was everything we expected, plus a bit more. The suites were comfortable, plus each twin bed was covered by a goose-down duvet; all windows on the train were picture windows, plus they had recently been cleaned; the food was delicious plus the service was even better; the cocktails were generous plus the wine list was superb. We could easily have mistakenly believed we were on the "Orient Express" with Hercule Poirot.
All-Dressed-Up Dinner
After a restful night and a slow-paced following morning, we arrived in Cape Town midday. Curt and Lynn were off to the airport for their return home. Gus and Joan returned to the Mount Nelson.
Thanks to Bunker Snyder for recommending the Blue Train 30 years ago.

Friday, April 15, 2011

Jabula

While visiting Cape Town Joan decided to have her hair plaited in African braids.  The experience was fun yet more than a little bit painful. It was a chance to learn how the many beautiful  black African hair styles seen on women in South Africa are created. It was an opportunity to try a style that could travel very easily on this trip and why not try something new, something really different.

Victoria Falls

If there was ever a question of why Victoria Falls was included in the list of The Seven Natural Wonders of the World …
The Wonders
 … what follows should indeed provide the answer.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Robben Island

The tour of Robben Island was educational on many levels. The conditions of life as a prisoner on that island are well described in Nelson Mandela's autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom. Seeing the cell blocks,

Mandela's Cell

Apartheid Museum and Soweto

We flew to Johannesburg this morning. After checking into the Westcliff  hotel we began our tour of South Africa’s dark and turbulent past. We first traveled across Johannesburg to the south of the city to visit the Apartheid Museum, which opened its doors in 2002.


Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Winelands

We had an early start to our day in the Winelands. Our goal was modest. We hoped to visit three wineries and taste a Chenin Blanc, a Bordeaux style wine, and a Shiraz. We picked Stellenbosch Valley (comparable to Napa Valley) over Franschoek (comparable to Sonoma) and Paarl. The three wineries and three wines:



·         Ken Forrester Wines

Ken Forrester Vineyards

Monday, April 11, 2011

Botswana Safari Camps

Our journey to the Botswana safari camps began with a 30-minute flight on a Cessna light aircraft.


A short flight from Maun Airport to Khwai River Lodge

We were just 1,800 feet off the ground and close enough to begin spotting our first elephants. In the camps, elephants were affectionately called "ellies."
Khwai River Lodge, located in Moremi Wildlife Reserve, was our first destination, where we were met by our bush guide Otsile ("O.T.") who led us through our adventures in the African savannah for the next three days. O.T. has a passion for the drive and ushered us through some very wild experiences. He was calm, focused, persistent, and very patient.
With O.T we saw:
herds and herds of impala, a favorite prey species, which were seen all over the reserve ...
Sole impala, the most numerous of antelope
...elephants

Ellie
Elephants found in small bachelor groupings, alone or in a matriarchal clan.



We sited the majestic Bateleur eagle.

Bateleur eagle with its enormous black head and body
 and orange-red beak and talons

and a pair of owls,

Milky Eagle Owls
They are usually found alone or in pairs. Their call is a deep
 gruff hooting call "hryu hryu hooo." They rarely hunt by day
 and roost in large trees, preferably in the shade.


With O.T. we were mock-charged (to Gus' chagrin) by a male, ear flapping elephant. Later we skirted past the open jaws of a partially submerged hippopotamus...


Hippopotamuses
Love water, which is why the Greeks named them the "river horse."
 Hippos spend up to 16 hours a day submerged in rivers and lakes to
keep their massive bodies cool under the hot African sun.
...and we quietly followed two different solitary leopards... 

Leopards
Are graceful and powerful big cats closely related to lions, tigers, and jaguars.

...that were quietly moving through the bush. O.T. gave us a wealth of information about animal behavior, the sensitivities of each, lifespan, and place in the hierarchy of who eats who or what.

Just to list other animals we observed...


giraffes,
Giraffes
Typically, these fascinating animals roam the open grasslands in small
 groups of about half a dozen.
  
Burchell's zebra,


Zebra
Burchell's zebras are the most common species. They live in small family
 groups consisting of a male (stallion), several females, and their young.
kudus, 
Perhaps the most beautiful antelope is the Greater Kudu
 with its majestic spiral horns and delicate face, and although
 reasonably common, they are shy and prefer dense bush.



eland, bushbuck, blue wildebeest, red lechwe, puku, steenbok, and warthogs...

Warthog and Kids
Look fierce, yet are generally peaceful and often
 avoid fighting by running away or dodging into a burrow

...vervet monkey, a Nile crocodile...

Nile Crocodile
Has a somewhat deserved reputation as a vicious man-eater. The
 proximity of much of its habitat to people means run-ins are frequent.
 And its virtually indiscriminate diet means a villager washing clothes by
 a riverbank might look just as tasty as a migrating wildebeest. Firm
 numbers are sketchy, but estimates are that up to 200 people may die
 each year in the jaws of a Nile croc.



...and many varieties of colorful birds such as the green, blue and yellow swallow-tailed bee-eater, the lilac-breasted roller,

Lilac Breasted Roller
This species is the national bird of Botswana.
the violet-backed starling, and the giant kingfisher.

Before we left, a group picture of...

From the left front: Kathleen Walsh (a new friend from Arizona and daughter
 of Jim Walsh), O.T., Joan, Gus. From the left back row: Curt, Lynn, and Jim
 Walsh (a new friend from Massachusetts)
Next, our journey took us to Eagle Island Camp, located in Botswana's Okavango Delta. Another flight in a light aircraft and we settled into our second tent-home. In this camp, we toured the network of rivers in a high-performance speed boat, canoed in mokoro boats, and took a helicopter ride over the marshes to view elephants, hippopotamuses, and giraffes.

We took a walking expedition to view the animals on foot and found ourselves in and among a troop of baboons who found us more curious than we found them.
Baboon Family
Baboons generally prefer savanna and other semi-arid habitats. These
 animals form large troops, composed of dozens or even hundreds of baboons,
 governed by a complex hierarchy that fascinates scientists. Males use shows
 of physical power to dominate rivals, and troop members spend endless hours
 carefully grooming one another to remove insects and dead skin.
We also visited a nearby village where the tribal peoples continue to mostly live as they have for centuries; however, they do have the benefits of satellite dishes and solar energy. We had an opportunity to learn from our guide, Setso, the many norms and customs of the tribal peoples. Setso spent time over meals with us, elaborating on the culture of his tribal heritage. He is engaged to be married and to marry; a man has to be approved by the bride-to-be's uncles. It can be a very arduous process involving the transfer of livestock, property, and currency. If the man isn't honorable, or if the woman conceives a child before she is married, he must pay "damages" to the family of the woman, since her prospects of marriage are decreased. At this camp, our canoe was "bookended" front and back by pods of hippos. We observed African jacana birds with tiny baby chicks walking atop the lily pads. 

Next, we moved on to our third and final camp.

Curt, Hazel (our bush pilot from our last flight), and Lynn
Hazel had just turned 21 and had received her pilot's license three weeks before
after training for just six months. Yet, what was most perplexing, she said that
 she believed that the earth was flat.
Our third camp experience was again very different than the two before it. Savute Elephant Camp, located in Chobe National Park, was spectacular in its way. Here we saw a herd of more than 200 Cape buffalo. We saw a wild cat (serval), an African wild dog...


African Wild Dog
 These endangered canines closely resemble wolves in their pack-oriented
 social structure. Each animal has its unique coat pattern, and all have
 big, rounded ears.
...tsessebe, ostrich, and the prize for us was to see two lions...

Lion I

Lion IIA

Lion IIB
Lion I stalked a herd of buffalo while Lion II was satisfied with just hangin' out and, a bit later, nonchalantly shuffles off into the high grass.


Cape Buffalo Herds
 are mostly of mixed gender. They do have a few all-male herds, but these
 usually consist of old males. An African herd often has more than 1,000
 members. 

Bull Cape Buffalo
Our guide, Mighty Awesome, pointed out a massive tree in the distance, an African baobab, also known as the Tree of Life. The tree was some thousands of years old — which was hard to grasp — and its trunk was over 30 feet in diameter. The elephants had done a number on this particular tree, tearing away deep and wide chunks of its cork-like bark. Awesome noted that the elephants go a bit mad for its water and can even seem drunk upon indulging in it. When Joan asked if the tree would survive, he told us that when the plains filled with water again in winter, the baobab would heal itself.


Baobab Trees
Slow-growing and their life span often exceed a thousand years.

Lynn, Mighty Awesome, and Joan in front of a Baobab Tree
 
The African savannah has a soft yet harsh beauty.



As is customary, at we wound up our day, we stopped for a "Sundowner" ... a safari tradition.

 "Sundowner" included fresh fruit, meat turnovers, white wine, and
gin & tonics, of course! On the right Hazel, Lynn, and Mighty Awesome.
  
On the left: Gus, Joan, Lynn, and Curt.
On the right: Joan and Gus

 We experienced spectacular multi-colored sunsets each night...

The horizon dimmed with hues of pink, blue and lavender as the sun
 continued to sink, now showing behind the silhouettes of trees.

 and sunrises each morning...


Awakening sunrise...too beautiful

...with no signs of man or development surrounding us, except for the jeep which carried us into the bush. The quiet and the calming sounds of nature were soothing, along with the ever-present perfume of sage and basil. When we were set to leave the camps, we were satisfied to have witnessed the indescribable beauty of unspoiled nature. We'd seen 4 of the "Big Five." The rhinoceros eluded us, but we had sublime experiences viewing the lion, leopard, elephant, and the Cape buffalo, commonly known as the "Big Five."