OceanWideLove: Egypt (2010)

Justin and I went to Egypt in December of 2010. He had just proposed, and his Christmas present to me (besides a ring, hello) was a trip to Egypt. Oh, life abroad.

This was our first international travel together, besides me visiting him in Abu Dhabi, and we could not have been more excited to go on this adventure! They always say if you can travel with your significant other, you can get through anything, and we were about to find out if we could make it out alive (from killing each other, of course).

We arrived in Alexandria, Egypt on Christmas Day, and had to take a 3 hour train ride to Cairo. Once we got to our hostel, after riding in the sketchiest cab I have ever seen, it was time to get some rest for the long day ahead the following day. We woke up early and had a sweet little breakfast waiting for us of croissants with jam and some hard boiled eggs. I remember our hosts being so sweet to us and always checking to make sure our stay was comfortable. Justin had a tour guide scheduled for us for the day, and he came to pick us up from our hostel.

When I thought about going to the pyramids, I thought there would be a grand entrance made of gold with gates that opened and it would be this magnificent site. I mean, it is one of the most well-known wonders of the world. We drove for about 30 minutes through the craziest traffic I have ever been apart of. There were no road lines, order, or thought process when it came to driving. You just honked your horn and went where you needed to. I'm pretty sure I closed my eyes a few times in fear of my life. All of a sudden there was this big tan wall in front of us. Our guide says, "Look, there are the pyramids!". I could literally see it from the road we were on! We were surrounded by garbage and everything was very dirty. I was really surprised that such a beautiful, historic monument did not seem to be very well taken care of.

Once we got out of the car we came upon some guys with camels. Our tour guide told us that we would need to ride a camel through the desert because it was quite a long tour and walking would not suffice. I mean how could we argue riding camels up to the pyramids!? We hopped on our camels, mine was named banana and she was evil. She kept trying to turn around and bite me the whole trip! She did not like me at all, even though I talked very nicely to her and pet her. How rude.

Once we got into the desert, it was just as I had imagined it, just without the gold gates. It was seriously one of the coolest experiences I have ever got to be apart of. We got to see The Pyramids of Giza, The Sphinx, and see a couple of tombs as well. Our day was jam packed. I can't wait for you to see the pictures. Just know, they don't even do it justice.