49: Cairo to Interlaken (Egypt/Switzerland)

Week 49 Update:

Cairo, Alexandria, Vicemar One, Interlaken

Day 338:

It was Friday morning in Egypt’s Cairo and that meant only one thing to us: Run away! The alarm woke us up around 7:00 and after having the normal nice enough shower and drinking our own proper coffee with the included breakfast we waved good bye to Andrew and Lucy, packed our stuff and walked down the flight of stairs, spilling gout onto the sidewalk by 8:30. It took a few double takes up and down the street before I could fully recognise the place and figure out what was happening. The place was totally and utterly deserted!

I looked up the road and saw Maggie as the lone vehicle parked in a place where I expected not to be able to get into the back of the car at all. The sidewalks looked like someone had cleaned them and there wasn’t a single hawker in sight. It was almost spooky, but it was Friday/Sunday morning in the Arab world. When I looked the other way I saw much the same scene. The shops were closed, the sidewalks empty and there wasn’t a single car in sight. However, past the 43meters of street that separated us from Tahrir square I saw a very different scene. The square was filling up with a steady stream of people exciting the various metro stations around it and the road was blocked off by fairly formal looking barriers. The air of a carnival was still there in a big way and I could hear people starting their chanting and shouting in the distance.

We on the other hand, packed the stuff back into Maggie, fired up the engine and after letting her warm up a little bit set off in the opposite direction. It was also just in time. As we turned the first corner we saw the military hardware lining the streets and soldiers blocking off the road we had just drive out of. It was fairly clear that the guys with the big guns and tanks had surrounded the square, but decided to stay out of sight for the time being. With seeing the amount of war machines my feelings on the square also changed. Although I experienced it as a carnival, it suddenly seemed like a carnival with a time bomb attached to it. I had to accept the fact that the thousands of people in the square were still protesting against the government that they used to have and they were still demanding things the military could not deliver at a moment’s notice. I had to accept that the tanks and motorised guns were there for a reason and that they were all ready to roll on a moment’s notice. The soldiers were dressed in full battle gear and it would only take one command from one person to nudge them into action. It was a place that I wanted to get away from quickly!

As we crossed the nearby Nile I started feeling more relaxed and because the streets away from the square were almost as quiet as the condoned off parts of the city, the driving was easy and the progress fast. We found the ring road without trouble and the turn off to our next adventurous destination came quickly after that. As we were leaving the city I saw a massive mall with a big sign reading “Carrefour” announcing the very first European style hyper market we had seen since leaving Nairobi, which felt like a lifetime had passed since then. The road turned into a multi lane motorway complete with a toll booth and other traffic which was a first since leaving South Africa, even longer before. I was just about to relax into first world driving mode when I got shook back to reality. There was a massive truck with interlink trailer in the same lane as us, but reversing back to what I could only guess was the off ramp he missed about a kilometre before. I was totally shocked and rendered almost speechless! I mean seriously: We were going along on a three lane hi way at about 100km/h. I could see a bridge over the high way up ahead and it was definitely a place the man with his 40 tonnes of metal could turn around at, but he chose to stop dead, engage a different gear, and drive backwards, looking only in his mirrors… if he had any…. Or bothered to look in them.

At least the rest of our two hour drive was fairly easy. We arrived in the ancient city of Alexandria without hitting anyone or crashing into trucks and parked on the edge of a open area close to the centre of the city. We could see a monument described as “The tomb of the unknown soldier” close by and the smell of ocean was pleasantly prominent on the wind. We had agreed to meet Andrew and Lucy there that afternoon but expected their train to arrive about two hours after us. That gave us time to try and find suitable accommodation.

Catt and Lucy earmarked a few budget hotels so we decided to start with them. We walked down the first road away from the “Corniche” sea front and ended up at another large square full of protestors before finding any of the planned accommodations. We had no idea what it was called or how aggressive those hordes of natives were planning on being. What we did know however was that it was Friday, and it was mid day. The square was totally full with people on their knees, facing east and praying to their Allah. It was both impressive and moving to see that kind of commitment and dedication these people had to their religion. For us it was not the place to be and the rumbling coming from our stomachs sent us in search of lunch.

The first place we walked into offered delicately prepared gourmet sandwiches for a very reasonable price, but their chef was in the square, praying, so could not prepare food for us. The second place we walked into was substantial in size and obviously had a less religious chef, or stricter owner. They were busy serving what we later learnt was the very first load of tourists they had seen in a month. The friendly owner offered to help us find the hotel we were looking for and seated us a table where he claimed a famous writer wrote a famous book. I had never heard of either the writer or the book though. The food on the other hand was pretty incredible and not expensive at all!

In the time that we are the owner of the place had managed to find out exactly where wanted to go and sent us on our way with perfect directions. We had actually passed the place, but their sign was nailed to the fourth floor of a 5 storey building. It wasn’t exactly obvious. While discussing that I looked across the road and saw none other than Andrew and Lucy walking in our direction. They were carrying their worldly possessions on their backs and had clearly just arrived. So we joined them in the hunt for suitable accommodations. The hotel was fairly nice to be honest. It had spacious Victorian style rooms with shared facilities and a price to match. The downside however was that it did not have what we saw as safe parking for Maggie, which was a priority for us. The place where we had parked was right in front of another hotel, The Holiday Hotel, and their rooms were similar, their parking safe as far as we could tell and had en suite facilities. They were about $2 a night more expensive, but that was a small price to pay for peace of mind. So it was settled; We would stay at the Holiday Hotel, Andrew and Lucy would stay at the other place and we would meet at 16:30 for an investigative walk along the sea front and dinner.

Our walk, and the environment we walked in was strangely “non African”. The coastline and the bay with the old Victorian buildings lining it could have been anywhere in the world. Alexandria as a city seemed almost modern, and was spotlessly clean and had a really friendly feel to it. However: The tea lady who tried to cheat us by increasing the normal price ten fold was authentic Egyptian and embarrassed that we could not be cheated. The square with the protestors was full to the brim by the time we passé that, reminding us that we were still in an unstable country and the tanks and motorised machine guns keeping just out of sight meant that we could never totally relax.

We arrived at the famous library an hour before sunset. The building was very impressive in deed but seemed almost out of place in between the older structures. It boasted to have a copy of every book ever written and reportedly had space for billions more. It had an observatory right in the front of it which was a massive sphere built in a way that it looked suspended in mid air. That was to be flood lit at night which was something I definitely wanted to see, so we decided to wait. We found a comfortable place to sit on the modern granite steps and watched the world go by for a while. There were masses of Egyptian tourists walking around, taking photographs and even asking to photograph us. We had families sitting around us and guys wanting to stop by to practice their English. We were welcomed by young and old and for an hour it felt like things were normal again in Egypt. Every time my eyes glanced over the four tanks parked on the other side of the road that idea changed though.

With the setting sun the light came on and the scene was sci-fi insane! The round metal structure had deep reflective grooves carved into it and the lights were tinted bright blue. That reflected off the artificial pond around the main library which in turn was lit up by yellow lights. It was very impressive in deed, but I still found it sad that it was allowed to have something that contrasting in a city so beautiful. I took some pictures none the less and when the sky turned black the time to leave was there. On the way back towards the city centre we walked past a tank that was sued as backdrop for Egyptian family photos. We walked past and were welcomed by the commander in a way that I sporadically asked him if he would take our photograph in front of his impressive machine. To my utter surprise he agreed. So after explaining which button it was that he had to push, we lined up in front of the camouflage side and smiled at the “birdie”.

The second restaurant we tried had local prices even for white people and the food was delicious! We had a mountain of chicken and salad and bread and were even allowed to drink the local water. We thanked the owner and promised to return the next night… just because he was honest. He seemed really pleased with that result and I was silently praying that he would spread the word: Honestly equals repeat business.

It was a lovely night in the old city so we decided to explore some more. We walked to the catacombs close to the station and got lost in the small alleys and mass markets on our way back. The streets were absolutely packed, but the people were friendly and the scenery very interesting in deed. At one stage we obviously found the area where furniture was made and sold. At least half the shops did not have doors or windows. They were simply marked out squares in alley ways. And they were just left like that over night. It was quite strange to think that it was actually safe to do that.

It was after 22:00 by the time we got back to our hotel. We were dead tired and curled into bed with perfect intentions of falling asleep fairly quickly. In fact, I was already slumbering away when I heard the loud BANG that was unmistakably gunfire… I did not get up. I did not turn the light on and I did not go out onto the balcony to see where it came from. I stayed in bed thinking that the fight was not mine and that it was an isolated event and that I could just fall back to sleep again. But boy was I wrong!

When I heard the sound of rapid AK47 automatic fire followed by shouts and screams and explosions I just had to investigate. I still didn’t turn the lights on but I did crawl out onto the balcony. I saw a large crowd across the park and what seemed like a fire fight happening around a tall building. Maggie was parked right below us and to my left I saw the inhabitants of the room next to us standing on their balcony. Another loud bang erupted from an alley and with that I saw a few hundred people scatter from behind the building in question and run towards us. At that time I also saw the owners of every other car on the street run to their vehicles and drive away. The gunfire was becoming more regular and then and the running masses grew even larger. I asked the neighbour about the safety of Maggie and with a smile he said that his car was parked next to it. We were the only two vehicles left on the street, but it was also too late to move. The roads were barricaded already and manned by armed gunmen. There was nothing I could do apart from waiting and watching.

The fight continued for an hour or two, getting closer to us all the time, but no one ever actually crossed the road to where we were. Eventually a tank arrived at great speed and with dominating noise, but that only seemed to fuel the crowd’s anger. The shouting intensified and the chanting changed from Arabic to English. The shouting of “Give us what we want” was so loud that we could hardly speak to each other. I understood nothing of it and I did not feel safe at all! Before long another two tanks arrived. Someone said something over a loud speaker and just like that, without any warning at all, the crowds started walking away. The barricades were removed, the gunmen disappeared and even the vehicles that sped away earlier returned to their own parking spots. The shops opened again and the shoppers returned. Within twenty minutes there was no trace of unrest left, apart from in my mind.

It was a very long, disturbed and restless night.

Day 339:

We didn’t really wake up because we didn’t really sleep. By 9:30 however we had managed a shower and breakfast and were ready to take on the day. The streets were calm and the evidence of the previous night’s unrest was gone. There was still a tank parked in front of the building we assumed was the target, but apart from that it seemed like everyone was simply going about their daily business.

Our daily business was to find the shipping agents for the company we had booked our passage out of Egypt with. Their name was Incshape Shipping and their address indicated that they were not too far away. The street name was obviously not on any of the maps we had as that would have made it too easy. The area consisted of a network on one way streets that were all just a little bit too narrow for Maggie to drive down. We still managed by folding the wing mirrors back and driving slower than snail’s pace. Every time we came close to where we thought we had to be the road was blocked by a tank though. It was ridiculous! We couldn’t find anyone who spoke English, we couldn’t find parking and we couldn’t even walk past the tanks.

We did eventually find parking and we did eventually find the right building. It was ultra modern inside and beautifully decorated. We were greeted by a receptionist with perfect English and shown into the office of Walhid, one of the agents. He too spoke perfect English and explained the process to us. It was ridiculously simple! All we needed to do was arrive at he gate to the port the next morning at 9:00. We would be met by one of their representatives and taken through the painstaking task of doing paperwork. As there was no police left in Egypt, I did not even have to go to traffic court like all those who came before me. While we were chatting away we were joined by another man in the office. He was obviously the boss and looked about as tired as we felt. He invited us to tea in his office which we gladly accepted.

I never got his name, but we entered into a very interesting discussion about people and politics. He explained that the unrest of the previous evening was all about buildings and what they contained. The building across the park from our hotel used to belong to the security police (a kind of state intelligence service) and contained documents describing who the spies in the community used to be. It reportedly detailed the bribes the police took and the corruption that was going on in the government. The reason for the conflict of the Friday night we chose to be there was that the men who used to work for the state police were trying to gain access to the building to destroy those documents. On the other hand, the masses representing “the people” were trying to gain access to make those documents public and find out who the corrupt people and spies actually were while the army tried to stop everyone and keep the papers safe until the new government that was yet to be elected could decide what to do with the information. “The problem” according to our supplier of tea was that something like 41% of Egyptians were poor and illiterate. All those people could easily be influenced and “bribed” with food to join in protests, demonstrations and even fighting to suit the needs of any wealthy person who wanted to make a point. We had heard rumours before that a large percentage of the people in Tahrir square were paid E£10 a day to stand their ground. It all sounded totally ridiculous to me but only confirmed my suspicions that Egypt was not a safe or stable place for us to be.

I felt strangely content and relaxed by the time we left there. Perhaps it was because I felt confident that we would actually get to leave the Middle East the next day. Perhaps it was because I was just too tired to really think of anything else. Perhaps it was because I finally understood what the previous night’s war was about. Whatever it was, it worked. We braved the narrow alleys after refusing to pay baksheesh to some idiot who claimed that he “looked after the car” only to be parked in front of our chosen sandwich shop by a lady wearing a reflective vest and promising to keep an eye on our prised possession.

The sandwich shop was deliciously cosmopolitan! The owner, a local man who used to live in Sharm El sheikh, came by for a chat. He shared his views on the politics and explained that although he knew times would be tough in the short turn, he honestly believed that things would change for the better in the long run. His food was phenomenal and his knowledge of the city, its people and the sites were equally impressive. I almost started wishing that we had more time to explore the place… almost. We did try to visit the Alexandria museum on our way there, but that road too was blocked by weapons of mass destruction.

After paying our car lady a couple of pounds for her time we parked back at our hotel. We paid another random person another random amount to look after Maggie there and walked off in search of a printer. We had to print out ferry ticket. I could not actually believe how difficult that simple task was! It took an hour to find a single internet café and then another thirty minutes to print two pages on A4. On the walk back to the hotel we gave up on the idea of changing currency but we did find a barber shop to trim my ridiculously messy hair.

In terms of grooming I had my hair cut short before we left South Africa. After that I paid for another cut resulting in a lice infestation in Malawi, a serious amount of man pampering and hair cutting in Kenya and then Catt tried her luck at hair dressing in Ethiopia. So it was time. The friendly barber could speak as much English as I could Arabic but we soon established the correct length of hair that I wanted to be left with. He set to work with clippers and scissors and before long, to Catt’s great delight I looked almost presentable again. Every once in a while I glanced in the mirror to see my darling wife making faces and tried very hard not to laugh or move while there was someone with sharp scissors around my ears.

When the deed was done and the hair was short the barber grabbed a comb and some smaller scissors, positioned my head back a little and proceeded in trimming my eye brows. I thought that was a fantastic idea but at the same time I did not dare to look at Catt. In fact, I could actually feel the floor move ever so slightly from the way her body was shaking with laughter! I closed my eyes at that stage and soon felt the cold steel of the small scissors inside my nostrils. I couldn’t believe it! The guy was actually trimming my nose hair as well. The man next to me at that stage was getting his ear hair trimmed and just thinking about the amount of amusement that would cause and the ridicule I would no doubt never live down made me want to burst out in hysterical spasms. I was spared though. Perhaps I was still too young to have ear hair worthy of his expert techniques. When I did turn around Catt was blood red and could not wait to get out of there. She managed to compose herself just long enough for us to leave the shop and I actually thought that she was going to physically roll around of the floor as she was laughing. I on the other hand thought it was brilliant! A place where you could get a full groom without any shame while being pampered in a very manly way…. I made a note to find a suitable pampering establishment when we arrived at our final destination.

That evening we met up with Andrew and Lucy again and as promised went back to the honest restaurateur and his affordable chicken. The food was as good, the prices the same and the owner as friendly as the night before. Was that the one then? Had we finally met an honourable Egyptian on the night before we were due to leave the country? It was also time to celebrate a little so on the way back to our hotel we stopped at the local bottle store. We invested in some beer and wine and spent the rest of the evening chatting away while consuming the bulk of it. It was past midnight by the time our friends wished us “safe travels” and we crashed down on the two single beds, exhausted but relieved.

Day 340:

It was a band new morning in the ancient city and the alarm startled us awake early. Considering everything that that going on there we had had a perfectly peaceful night’s sleep and both felt quite positive about the day that lay ahead of us. We scoffed the hotel’s breakfast while drinking our own coffee, packed our stuff into Maggie once again and left unceremoniously after thanking our host for keeping our car safe.

It was just before 9:00 by the time we reached the port gate. I was about to start wondering how to find our representative when someone knocked on the window and asked if we were there for the Vicemar Ferry. That was it, the contact was made. We were apparently waiting for two other vehicles so were asked to park just outside the port entrance. That in turn was made easier by the fact that the harbour policeman (They were obviously still there) opened the barrier and a clearly crazy person helped us park. The same clearly crazy person organized us some coffee and tea at local rates though, so I kind of liked him. We left Maggie in his capable hands and went in search of fresh bread to buy for our lunch and dinner.

The bakery was fantastically local and hidden in a small alley way. The usual idiot trying his luck wanted to sell his bread to us at 10 times the price but when the baker saw this, and our reaction, he marched us past the crowds and into the shop. I handed over my pound coin and he handed over a stack of 20 breads. It was officially the first time in our 6 weeks in Egypt that we managed to buy the right amount of bread for the right price. I explained that we only needed half and he promptly produced a half pound coin as change. I urged him to join ranks with the honest restaurant owner to spread the word that it pays to be that way and handed the change back to him as a tip.

Back at the port gate our crazy friend was even more crazy. He was just starting to change from amusing to irritating when the Inschape representative came by and told us to follow a police motorbike into the port. That in turn parked us in a large area marked us “passenger waiting area”. It was 10:00 and we were the only people there. We knew we had a long time to wait, so pulled out some chairs and made ourselves comfortable. I tried to be a little productive with writing and sorting photos, but was strangely cold. The sun was hidden behind clouds and the wind was fairly strong and even though we managed to hide from it behind our car, the temperature was still low.

A while later a man with a van arrived. He introduced himself as Sammy. He had been living and working in Egypt for a while and when the proverbial shit and fan met he flew his family to Holland where they were from. He had to come back to retrieve the family vehicle and that was the reason why he was joining us on the ferry. The second vehicle that arrived was a small delivery truck with Swiss number plates. That was inhabited by a father and son who looked distinctly Egyptian. We soon found out that the father had been living and working in Switzerland for some time and that the son was an extended school holiday thanks to the revolution. All three the people we met were supposed to leave on the ferry the week before which was the one that Catt really wanted to be on. The reason the Egyptians did not make it was because the truck was stolen. They managed to get it back, but had to replace the wheels before they could drive it. That was also in Cairo, so the damage caused to Maggie in the city seemed almost insignificant. Sammy did make it. He drove there from Cairo and did everything he was supposed to do only to learn that the ferry had been delayed by bad weather. He then found out that the bad weather was due to continue and decided to postpone for one week. Another Egyptian man arrived in a shiny new Mercedes Benz but he could not speak English, so I never got the gossip on him.

Just as I started thinking that we were going to be the only people on the boat a nice shiny red Land Rover and a VW camper arrived. The Landy was Worchester (UK) and was actually heading to Worchester (RSA). They had just come off the ferry we were trying to board and ended up at the same place to do their paperwork for entering Egypt. I did NOT envy them! They told us that they had a plan to go through Libya from Tunisia. They ahd postpone their trip because of the riots in Tunisia some months before. Then they went there, got rained on in the Sahara for the single night they could spend there, and could not get into Libya because of the unrest there. They then had to get a ferry from Tunis to Italy and the Vicemar from Venice to Alexandria. The whole thing cost them two weeks in time and a mountain of cash! For the second time in ten minutes I did NOT envy them!

While we were chatting the customs guys arrived with their paperwork. Our company rep helped me to fill it all in and told me the fees to pay. He took our passports and walked off to immigrations. All I had to do was wait. I kinda liked that. The man who stamps the Carnet arrived shortly after that with a mechanic in tow. The latter took stencil rubbings of chassis and engine numbers but also travelled with a number punch. When I asked what that was for he simply said that if he could not find the engine number, he made one. And to think that was the single thing I had feared since discovering our lack of number on the Zimbabwe Border almost ten months before. Not that we had problem any longer and our engine number passed without as much as a second glance.

The Carnet guy marched us into a building and made us sit on a bench. Sammy the Dutchman who was borne in Iraq spoke fluent Arabic and perfect English and he made it his duty to help me out with everything. That was nice. I was worried about the fact that I did not have a Traffic Police Clearance and also the fact that we had overstayed our customs permission by three weeks. I had my speech prepared about how we tried to extend it and failed because of the revolution and I was pretty sure that I could conjure up some tears if needed as well. However, all that happened was that my fine for overstaying was added onto the rest of the fees. It wasn’t like it was a bribe either. Well, perhaps it was, but there was a receipt… in Arabic… which I could not read. On the other hand, the fine was insignificantly small that was seriously never worth the effort of trying to find a customs official to extend our paperwork. Not only that, but the customs guy wrote my Traffic Police Clearance and asked me to sign it.

Don’t get me wrong, the process still took two hours because of the ridiculously slow pace of walking and the insane amount of tea drinking and cigarette smoking that was happening. The Swiss truck also had some issue with its paperwork and the Egyptian/Swiss father had to resort to some crying to get his stamp. But at the end of the day, with the help of the representative the process was easy, sensible and trouble free. The best of all was that he did not expect payment from us. Perhaps some Baksheesh because he did not know me, but it’s not like they could take the stamp back!

When we were all done with our stamps and tears we walked back to our vehicles and followed another motorbike to another hangar sized building. There a grumpy man looked inside each of the vehicles and after pointing at our packed rucksacks or suitcases, marched us all into the building. It took a while to understand what was happening but when I did I wanted to laugh! They were scanning our luggage. That was it. Once they were happy with that we carried the same luggage back to the cars and drove to the ship. We parked at the ramp where we all got out and walked a couple of dozen paces away. Another truck came by and scanned our vehicles… with the luggage we carried inside them. When they were happy we were not carrying the world’s supply of contraband or explosives, we started our engines and were directed onto the ship.

A distinctly Italian man shouted “Bo journo” as we handed over our boarding pass. It should have been quite clear that our car was longer than 4.9 meters and higher than 1.85 meters and that our fee should have been about 200 Euro more than what we paid, but according to the website the fine was small enough for me to take the chance. He didn’t care either. He simply smiled and asked us to drive to the top deck. We were parked next to Sammy’s van and watched the others roll up and park while taking our bags (The ones that had been scanned) as well as some other things (That were not scanned) form the car. When everyone was there we were walked to reception.

So that was it. We were four vehicles and 6 passengers in total on a ship with a top deck of 187 meters long. Maggie looked like a tiny speck on the massive expanse of blue runway and was literally tucked into one tiny corner of it. The distinctly Italian reception man assumed we were the Du Plessis’ as we were the only couple there and instructed his distinctly Philippine helper to show us to our cabin. I walked with a smile. In fact, I couldn’t really believe it! The ship was the cleanest thing that we had seen since leaving Kenya. It was only built in 2010 and was sparkling! The crew obviously took pride in their work. Apart from that, as an establishment of accommodation, it was the fanciest that we had seen on the whole trip! Our cabin was right in the front of the ship, facing forward. It had two comfortable beds in, a wardrobe and a full bathroom. Out of pure habit I turned the shower on to see the water pressure and feel the temperature and I was immediately impressed. In fact, I was so impressed that as soon as I locked the door I had a shower. It was 16:00.

Catt and I settled into our new environment without any problems at all. We were allowed to go to the car whenever we wanted, which made me giggle again about the bag scanning incident, and the coffee shop was open about twenty hours a day. The restaurant had specific times, but really expensive compared to what we were used to. Besides, we had enough food to keep us busy for most of the journey and we packed our MSR stove and coffee making implements. After a short tour of the ship we returned to our comfortable cabin and tried our very best to use up the Internet Data we had bought in Egypt. That was done while drinking a bottle of wine and even making dinner on the stove without setting off the smoke or fire alarm. I thought that was pretty handy.

It was 20:30 when we set sail. The harbour was smooth and the ship steady and while we were slightly inebriated from the wine we fully understood the significance of that moment. That was the moment that we left Africa. We had managed to cross the whole continent from foot to tip. (Tunisia has the most northern tip of Africa, but we counted Alexandria as the most northern achievable place) It had taken us 340 days in which we drove just more that 45 000 kilometres. We had survived both a referendum in Sudan and a revolution in Egypt and contrary to how I always thought I would feel at that moment, the only thing that came to mind was relief. I was honestly relieved to leave Egypt. I was relieved that we managed to get Maggie out and that we were still safe, which was funny considering that we were at sea in a metal tub. I was suddenly totally and utterly exhausted as well and fell asleep quickly while noticing the creaking of the metal frames around me.

Day 341:

There was obviously no need to wake up early. In fact, there wasn’t really any need to wake up at all. When we did wake up we noticed that it was 10:00. The skies were cloudy and the sea was rough! I could feel the nose rise out of the water and felt and heard it crashing into the waves. I even braved a little look out the porthole and saw a mass of white tops on huge waves. I was more than a little scared to be honest and just layed back down and closed my eyes again.

As a teenager I was sea sick once. After that I never really suffered form motion sickness again until the end of 2006 when Catt and I joined some friends on an overnight sail off the southern coast of England. That was on an 80 foot sailing yacht and we were watching the waves break over the nose of the boat. I never threw up, but I felt fairly rough on that occasion. While remembering all that I looked over at Catt who had turned a visibly green. With every crash of the bow into the waves I could see her flinch and not enjoy the ride in the least. At some point I braved a prone position again and even managed to have a shower. When I emerged from the tiny bathroom I was feeling rough as a goat’s knee but still voted that shower as the best we had seen since leaving our house.

Catt managed a shower an hour or so later and came to the same conclusion, but we also agreed that lying down was by far the most comfortable and that we should do as much of that as possible. In the late afternoon when the sea had calmed down some we even braved an exploratory wonder around the ship. We found Sammy at the coffee shop and invested in two large cappuccinos. They were FANTASTIC! I suddenly realized that I did not even really like the coffee in Egypt even though I had been drinking it for six weeks. Then again, the Italians did know how to make coffee!

We returned to our cabin before long and braved another meal made on the stove. We fired up the Mac laptop and watched a movie until we both fell asleep, comfortably.

Day 342:

I woke up in the early morning with water splashing on our porthole. At first I couldn’t work it out. We were, conservatively estimated, about 30 meters higher than the water and I was sure it wasn’t raining. Without opening my eyes I felt the bow of the boat rise out of the water again and I heard the crack as it crashed down into the waves again. I felt the movement as the massive weight broke the surface and then I heard it again?: Water splashing on the window. I got up slowly and moved the curtain away to have a look and immediately wished that I had not.

Right at that moment the bow was coming down. I saw it crash into the water and felt the shock through my legs. I saw the splashed water rise high above the ocean and watched as it hit our porthole. I promptly lay back down and closed my eyes. I knew it was going to be a long day!

I think it was about mid morning when I heard a knock at the door. We were both awake, showered and dressed but feeling terribly sea sick from the rough ride. I got up, unlocked the door and opened it. It was the reception man. He had come by to make sure we were still alive as he had not seen us that day. I assured him that we were surviving but he probably saw the colour Catt had turned because he then told me that the weather was due to improve dramatically in the afternoon.

He wasn’t wrong. After finishing the last our cheese, tomatoes and crackers for lunch the sea was perfectly calm and it felt the boat wasn’t moving at all. Looking out the portal I saw a straight horizon. I saw the wake the boat was making but no waves at all. That was more like it. It was comfortable to get up and walk around and we decided to brave the communal area again. By the coffee shop we found Akhmed, the Egyptian son and Sammy having a chat. We invested in another cappuccino and joined them.

Akhmed was showing us all some video that he had shot in Cairo. In it he was wearing a pro revolution T shirt. He had an Egyptian flag painted on his face and he was in Tahrir Square. He was pointing the camera anywhere he liked and he seemed to “interview” people as he walked. The date on the screen was 25 January 2011, the day it all kicked off. It was amazing to see! The emotions of the people were incredibly prominent in the footage and he even got some shots of the army trying to disperse the crowds. He was proud that he was there when it all happened and even though he obviously did not fully comprehend what was going on, he assured us that he was looking forward to the “New Egypt” as it had been called.

That evening we ate in the restaurant. Catt and I was obviously not schooled in the way of ferry restaurants as we just said “yes” to every offer. We ended up with bread rolls, pasta, meat and salad each and a bill of 36 euro. We did not realize that every item carried its own price tag and no one ever told us what that price tag was. In fact, with the portion sizes they were dishing up we could have shared one plate of pasta and a salad for about 10 Euros. Saying that, the food was incredible and we did manage to finish it all… eventually. We were also told that we were not allowed any animal products into the EU. That meant that we had 4 litres of milk to get through before making port. We expertly managed half of it over dinner, but could just not face any more of the white stuff.

It was about 21:00 by the time we managed to roll ourselves back to our cabin. The boat had started pitching again and we decided not to brave the movements for too long. We made it with not a moment to spare as well. By the time we settled into bed with a movie and some wine the crashing had started again. We were safe and managed to fall asleep without too many problems.

Day 343:

The alarm woke us at 6:00. The sun was just about to peer over the blue horizon and the sea was as calm as a bathtub. The Egyptians had a saying for that: A sea as smooth as oil slick. We were being a little lazy and still slumbering when a knock on the door informed us that we had to get ready for our arrival in Venice, Italy. So we got up, had a nice long hot shower without the added challenge of everything moving around us. We packed all our stuff into the bags that were scanned in Alexandria, took the bags that was not scanned as well and marched downstairs for some good old Italian coffee.

In the coffee shop we found the rest of the troop. Akhmed and his dad were still drinking milk and eating cheese in a desperate attempt to finish their supply. We were roped into the mission and Sammy’s help was also sought. Standing in a row, drinking the moo juice and looking through the massive windows we could see land. We were sailing in between two massive lines of light almost resembling landing lights and even though it looked like an industrial area, we could still make out the ancient buildings of Venice in the far away distance. I think that was the moment.

That was the moment where both Catt and I got shocked to the reality that we had left Africa. It was the moment when we realized that we had arrived in the first world of Europe and that our trip was nearing its end. We never intended to “tour” Europe on that trip. Our plans were simply to take the fastest and shortest route to the UK, trying to make it on the fuel that we had on board. We had no guidebooks, no maps, no real plans and only a vague idea of the direction we needed to go. It was by no means a sad occasion. I was definitely still very relieved to have left Egypt in tack and even though it was a little scary, I was also very much looking forward to being in Europe.

While waiting for the expert captain of the massive vessel to reverse us into dock we sat down at a table and had our very first look at a map of where exactly we were and where we needed to go. Our next main destination was Paris and as I drew a line there from Venice I saw the name “Interlaken” appear from under my finger. I felt a sudden rise in adrenalin in my body and a smile appeared on my face. Interlaken, Switzerland… A stone’s though away from one of my favourite places in the whole world and it was pretty damn feasible to go there! I had been there a few times before in my life, on BASE jumping expeditions to Lautebrunen town and the Jungfrau valley. I knew of places to stay there and we had a couple of friends who were professional skydivers there… So it was decided, that would be our destination for the day.

When the ship finally made port we watched as the massive ropes were winched in place to keep her steady. The ramp came down and we all started the engines of our vehicles to let them warm up a little. It was pretty chilly outside, but nowhere near as bitter as I had expected it to be. Sammy was let loose first and we waved good bye as he drove off. Next was the Egyptian businessman with his shiny Mercedes and then we were allowed to drive. On the dock we were stopped by a man in uniform and shown to the immigration porter cabin. There someone took our passports, disappeared into the building and came back two minutes later with a “welcome to Italy” smile. Customs was next. The guys there asked me to open the back doors. They had one look, asked if we had more than 10 000 euro in cash with us and waved us through. So that was it: A six minute border crossing and we were in the European Union. It was almost a total anti climax compared to the ordeal of getting the bloody visa to go there.

When we drove out of the port without a single idea of where to go we simply followed the Swiss/Egyptian man in his truck. We knew he was heading to Geneva so he could not have been too far off track. We did stop at the first service station on the high way though. Our windows were so dirty that I could hardly see out of them and we also decided to take the plunge and invest in a road map. I had hoped to have GPS maps for Europe by then. In fact, the day we left home we were at a party with the big boss of Garmin in South Africa, Fraser Mchenry. Fraser promised then to provide us with any maps we desired and I started contacting him from Sudan. At first he was very helpful and asked the serial numbers of our GPS’s but when the time came to send us a link to download the maps from he all but disappeared. He ignored me like an Egyptian traffic light and no amount of emails or messages I sent got a single response. If I knew he was going to go back on his word like that I would have bought the damn maps off the Garmin website. Then again, I was having a great deal of inner conflict about supporting a company which managed to make great promises and let me down twice!

Anyway, we found a map book in the service station. The scale wasn’t ideal, but we could at least see the towns we had to head for and the road numbers we were to use. The other nice thing was that everything seemed to be sign posted… In letters we knew and a language we managed to decipher. The only two things left to do were to find an internet connection to get our Interlaken friend’s phone number off Facebook and actually drive there. The driving part was incredible! The double lane hi way was smooth and perfect and although there was more traffic than we had been used to on major roads, everyone was actually following the rules. The most aggressive man did not have right of way any more. The trucks were not reversing back to the turn off they had missed and all the vehicles seemed to be road worthy. The slower ones (Like us) drove in the slow lane and the faster lanes were left for passing. It took at least three hours to get used to that!

We pulled over at a road side hotel and coffee shop at some point. The wifi was expensive but fast and the coffee was affordable and delicious! Tony from Interlaken on the other hand did not have his phone number on Facebook, so I had to just send him a message and hope for the best. It was a beautiful sunny day in Europe and I was pretty sure that if the skydiving season had started in Switzerland he would be jumping all day. I was a little worried that we were too early for that and that he was somewhere else in the world waiting for the season to start, but at least I knew of budget accommodation in his area.

Our first toll gate cost is 13 Euro officially making it the most expensive toll we had ever paid! We did try to avoid those roads but every time we left the hi way it took us 40 minutes to find an on ramp again. We had wasted at least an hour and a half doing that so had to make the decision to simply pay the money. For lunch we walked into a super market and were utterly shocked by the prices! We bought some bread, some cheese and a single tomato that cost the same as a kilogram in Egypt. We came up to the Italian/Swiss border at some point and fully expected customs to stop us. They seemed totally uninterested though and simply showed us through to the Swiss toll booth. There we paid 35 Euro for something I guessed to be road tax. Not the most expensive we had paid, but still unexpected.

Once in Switzerland we started the navigation process again. The problem with the paper maps were that they did not show mountains. Everything was two dimensional and the road numbers did not come with any information. We found our desired turn off without any problem what so ever only to arrive at a barrier informing us that the mountain pass we wanted to use was closed because of snow. We couldn’t see any snow at that point, but there was just no way to pass. We found the hi way again and an hour later the second place we could change direction to Interlaken. We drove through a village called “Wasser” that resembled the kind of photos you see on chocolate wrappers and found our very first sign indicating that we were heading in the right direction. As we left the village we found another barrier: Pass closed… We reluctantly turned around and stopped next a builder’s van with two guys in it. I tried, in my very best Swiss/German (Both words I remembered) to ask for directions. They tried in their very best two words of English to help me and eventually we all managed what we wanted by playing an expert game of charades and pointing at the maps. I was dead tired and because we had had no word from Tony I was beginning to think that he was not in town. I suggested that we simply find a place to stay in Wasser and mission on the next day.

There were two hotels we could see. The mountains towering over the village were totally covered in snow and we could even make out some ski slopes in the distance. The first hotel was small and quaint and typically Swiss and charged a whopping $60 a person a night. The second was bigger and more modern but charged the same for a room with a shared bathroom. I suddenly felt less tired and more determined to find our friend Tony, another hour’s drive away.

It was clear that we had arrived in the mountains by then. The road consisted of a massive network of tunnels and mountain passes and the one we were driving on was obviously the only road that was never closed. One tunnel we used was 18km long. I mean seriously! An 18 km long tunnel complete with a junction in the middle. Who thought of that one? The next was a mere 4km long and so it continued. We got spat out the other side close to a village called Miringen and the last stretch to Interlaken was mostly over land. We arrived in town as the sun hit the horizon and the street lights came on. We did not break rule number one… Then again, we were also not in Africa any more.

It had been ten years since the last time I had been in Interlaken and even then I took a train and did not know the road networks at all. I knew it was a small town but I still had no idea how to go about tracking down our friend. So we simply drove into the town centre, parked up and walked into the very first shop we saw. It happened to be a ski rental shop who was also a booking agent for other outdoor activities. I asked the guy behind the counter if he spoke English. He smiled and said “yes” in an unmistakable Australian accent. I then asked if he by any chance knew a guy called Tony Shimmin. Again he smiled and said “Of course, everyone knows Tony”. He even had his cell phone number and he knew exactly where he was at that time! He was a ski instructor in the winter and his girlfriend, Heather, was working in a ski shop. That was handy…

When I phoned Tony he was still on the slopes. It was one his friend’s 50th birthday and they were celebrating their way down the mountain to a town nearby. He instantly invited us to join him at a pub in that village and then insisted that we stay with him and Heather for the night. Perfect! The only confusing thing was that we could not see any snow. It was hard to believe that he was actually skiing 10 kilometres away from where we were. So we hopped back into Maggie and drove to Grindewalt, found the snow, parked up and walked to the Avocado Bar as instructed.

When we sat down in the massive leather couches in front of the roaring log fire and the barman asked us what we wanted to drink all my energy suddenly left me. It had taken us ten hours from leaving the Vicemar Ferry to get there which made our average speed 53km/h. The roads were fantastically good and the scenery impressively interesting. The driving wasn’t particularly stressful, but it still took the whole day and there was one very distinct flaw in our planning: Switzerland wasn’t part of the EU. It did not use euro, but Swiss Francs and we did not have any of those. Apart from that little issue, the area we were in was probably one of the most expensive places in the world, especially in the ski season. The barman changed some euro to francs at a very favourable rate… for him. And we ordered two coffees at $3.50 each. Tony arrived before we had finished them and after a short reunion flawlessly made fun of me for not having an alcoholic beverage in front of me. He remedied that quite quickly by placing an exceedingly large glass of beer on the table.

I had never been a great lover of beer. Don’t get me wrong, on a hot summers day what I am thirsty and sweaty I like it as much as the next guy, but we were in the Swiss Alps… In the snow. I took a tentative sip and felt my eyes open wider and wider. It was delicious! It was a million times better than the beer I tasted in Egypt, a trillion times better than the beer in Ethiopia and a thousand times better than the other beer I had consumed in Africa. Perhaps it was just because I was so tired and so relieved to be there, but I loved every bit of that draught.

We met the man whose birthday it was. His name was Cregal. He was born Swiss, unlike the majority of people in the pub, and his biggest claim to fame was that he was the last surviving high altitude shepherd. Every summer he took 500 or so sheep over two glaciers to pastures as high as 9 000 feet above sea level. There they were fed and fattened up and reportedly became the best and tastiest mutton in the world. He had pre orders from restaurants all over Europe and the amount of money he asked for his services was absolutely astonishing! He was also a world class skier and even though he hated teaching novices, he had to do something for money in the winter. His passion though was to mentor someone he saw as worthy and that young man was right there next to him. His other passion was single malt whiskey and he insisted that I shared one with him. A single measure in Switzerland was 40cl, not 25 as I was used to, but then again I never ordered singles at 25cl’s. The whiskey was smooth and oaky and incredibly delicious! When he offered the second round I managed to use “I’m driving” as an excuse to sneak out and drag Tony with us. It was 22:30.

Tony and Heather’s house in Interlaken was as authentic Swiss as the high altitude shepherd. It was the second floor of a three storey high wooden structure and came complete with flower boxes over all opening windows and an enclosed balcony where you could take your shoes and coat off. The furnishings were carefully planned to be functional but not over bearing and the heating was turned up to “tropical” in line with the temperatures of Heather’s native land, Zimbabwe. We had arrived an hour and a half later than Tony had promised Heather we would be there but she simply took it in her stride. He gave us a delicious plate of food and opened a bottle of wine and welcomed us like old friends.

Day 344:

We didn’t wake up as late as I thought we would. The sun was shining from a cloudless sky and the temperature was surprisingly warm. In fact, a T-shirt was all that was needed to stay comfortable in the sun outside. I abused Heather’s espresso machine a few times before lingering in their fabulous shower and getting ready to take on the day.

Tony had offered us some old skis and boots for the day, but the $60 a person ski pass was not really within our budget. Instead we decided to go into the Jungfrau valley and take a free train up to a village called Wengen. I had to let Maggie idle a little to warm up and get used to the mountain air. In a place BASE jumpers often refer to as “The valley” I parked up and showed Catt the massive towering cliffs I had jumped off. As if on cue I heard the familiar cracking sound of a parachute opening and saw the two jumpers gently glide down and land close by. It wasn’t anyone I knew, but it was nice to see anyway. The valley floor was still covered in snow but it was warm. I mean really warm! There was certainly no need for jackets and I even considered a pair of short pants. We parked Maggie on some white stuff and took some pictures before returning to the village and parking in the free car park behind the Horner Pub, famous from a scene of one of the earlier James Bond films. (I forget which one)

The short walk to the train station took us only a few minutes and the ski train up the mountain delivered us to the picturesque and perfectly Swiss Alps village of Wengen before mid day. It was like being in a fairy tale! The village had a little snow left on roof tops and sidewalks and the village green was still perfect white. On the outside though we saw the groomed slopes and the paths used by everyone to ski back to their lodgings. We took a long walk to the highest point in the village and watched in awe as the many people came whizzing past us. We looked back at the village on the far slope and I just smiled. It was incredibly beautiful and very “Heidi” and it was really the last place in the world I had expected to be towards the end of a trip through Africa.

It was late afternoon by the time we made it back to casa de Tony and Heather. I filled out fresh water tank with melted glacier water and tried to wash the worst of the dust of Maggie. We had some delicious Italian coffee while watching the sun go down and for dinner…. Wait for it… We had a c cheese fondue… In the Swiss Alps… Incredible!

If I had to do it all again:

Don’t go to Egypt?

Well, apart from that… We never could have guessed that our hotel in Alexandria was across the road from a State Police Building. We could not have planned for the sites and museums in that town to be closed because of that little thing they refer to as “The Revolution” and we did not exactly plan to have such a limited time there. I think that Alexandria as a city could be quite pleasant when you’re not stressed about personal safety and getting your car containing your life’s savings out of the country. To be perfectly honest though, I do not see myself going back there. It’s funny as well, a week after leaving Ethiopia we started thinking that perhaps it was not as bad as what we had thought when we were there. Now, a week after leaving Egypt I feel that it was perhaps a lot worse than what I had thought it was when I was there. Apart from SCUBA diving in the Red Sea I can not see a single reason for me to ever return there and even then I would only consider an all inclusive package holiday where I never need to deal with anyone or anything or “negotiate” the rip off price of a cup of tea. For the hand full of honourable people we met I truly hope that the country recovers form the unrest in a positive and democratic way and that tourism returns when it is deemed stable again. But honestly, that will all have to happen without me being there. I have had as much of that place as I could take in a lifetime.

Now the Vicemar Ferry: That was brilliant! It was clean and modern and the staff were professional and helpful. When coming from Europe I’m sure the 25 euro a day for three meals would be perfectly affordable as well. If the trip is all about Africa, it is the cheapest and quickest way to get to or from the continent and the paperwork on both sides is straight forward and easy. The Vicemar One gets a huge thumbs up from us.

The trip to Interlaken and meeting with Tony was an unexpected bonus as well. In fact, the only thing that I would change is never to trust Garmin’s South Africa’s management again and buy decent maps before I get to a place.

As a note: Andrew Mchenry, big boss of Garmap promised us a large sponsorship in exchange for track logs. The principals and amount was all agreed on, but then he recanted without explanation and started ignoring all my attempts at communication. Fraser Mchenry, Andrew’s brother and big boss of Garmin in South Africa wanted to give us free GPS’s which we graciously declined and then promised to give us free maps whenever we needed. He too spectacularly recanted on that agreement and in true Mchenry fashion is still ignoring every email and message I send him. It is unfortunately almost impossible these days not to have a Garmin GPS for travelling, but I will try my very best not to support those two guys ever again.