Luke Richardson Author

On the road again

Sitting in the empty departure lounge of our local airport, the rain lashing against the darkened windows even though the time had just passed 4pm, Martha my wife, and I questioned why we’d never done this before. It was January the 1st 2023, New Year’s Day, and we were trading in three weeks of cold winter England, for some Egyptian sun. It felt like, and continues to feel like, the best idea ever.

 Planning our trip to Egypt some months before, I had struggled to find anything direct between one of our local airports and we really didn’t want to have to make the three-hour journey to one of London’s airports. What I did find, however, was a flight to Alexandria with a ten-hour stopover in Milan. A city that neither of us had ever been to before, I extended that stop over to thirty-four hours, and so the first day of our trip was spent drinking crisp white wine in local cafes, eating pizza oozing with cheese and tomato, and scurrying away from the rain which had clearly followed us across Europe. Sure, we were on a research mission for a book about re-discovering pre-diluvian societies, but I didn’t expect to actually experience round two of the great flood.

After forcing down our third pizza of the day, with (I think) the fourth bottle of Italian wine, we waddled to the airport. With our flight leaving at 5am, we’d decided not to get a hotel, but instead would get the last train out to the airport and spend a few hours waiting there. That’s thing with a 5am flight, whatever you do your night’s sleep is ruined. Finally, sleepy, and grumpy, we padded on to the plane several hours later and snoozed all the way.

 Arriving in Alexandria was, as I’ve experienced travelling to Asia and Africa before, an assault on the senses. We stumbled out into the morning light, forced into herds of taxi drivers, bag carriers, fruit sellers and multitudes of other people whose purpose there remains a mystery, and proceeded to search for the bus.

“Bus isn’t running,” a beady eyed taxi driver told us, sipping his steaming coffee. “It stopped after COVID and hasn’t come back. I can take you.” He told us his price which, doing some calculations between British and Egyptian pounds in my head, seemed pretty reasonable. Still, we had intended to get the bus, and get the bus we would.

“They always say this,” I whispered to Martha. “Oldest trick in the book.” So, pushing through the crowd, we lumbered towards where we thought the bus stop should be. But it wasn’t. After ten minutes of searching, and finding no sign of a bus, nor the place it was supposed to stop, followed by several huffs from me and rant about the importance of keeping internet information up to date, we returned to the taxi rank.

Of course, the same gentleman was there waiting for us. He simply shrugged in a way that said, “I told you so,” and led us to his car.

This was our first run in with a helpful Egyptian, but it certainly wasn’t the last. It wasn’t the only time it caught us off guard either. Maybe I’m a cynic, but I tend to be naturally suspicious of people who offer help, directions, advice, lifts, or recommendations without being asked. During our time in Egypt, though, some of the best meals we ate and some of the best places we visited were as a result of trusting the knowledge of these locals. With that in mind, if you ever visit Alexandria, just get the taxi from the airport.

The city of Alexandria lies on the Mediterranean coast. ‘Lies’ is probably the wrong verb because with around five-million residents, it’s moving the entire time. There’s loads of history, castles, markets, beaches, and a university. From the back of the taxi, on the hour-long journey there, we watched the desert fade into oil refineries, fire belching from their towers. Then reaching the outskirts of the city proper, large villas peppered the landscape, which soon become small apartment buildings, before morphing in to towering concrete monoliths. This was also our first introduction to the chaos of Egyptian roads. Quite why the authorities bother painting lines on the road, I’ve no idea, as cars, lorries, buses, motorbikes, and carts drawn by horses or donkeys all fight for space. I watched it all slide beside the window and decided, as I’d already suspected, that Egypt was going to be fun.

We arrived at our hotel after a slow, horn-blaring crawl along the corniche. The “corniche” I leaned shortly after, after instructing taxi driver to take us to the corniche, from the corniche, was the name for the entire road. It’s French I suppose. In England we would probably call it ‘the Seafront’. Either way, I must have looked like an idiot in front of that taxi driver too.

Before the trip I had read that Alexandria offered a “more relaxed” experience than other places in Egypt. I think the writer had even used the term “a breath of fresh air.” Where that fresh air was, or where the relaxation was occurring, I have no idea because we never found it. Alexandria, from our two days meandering through the city, was noisy, colourful, chaotic, but charming at the same time. We spent the first afternoon walking around the city, forgetting and re-learning everything we ever knew about crossing roads in Europe, and eating some tasty food.

On the second day, we headed into the city centre, stumbled around the university district for a while and then visited the Qaitbay Citadel. That evening, over fruit smoothies in a beautiful beachfront restaurant, we decided that the following day we would leave Alexandria. Sure, there was still more to see, but you’ve got to leave something for next time, right? Plus, we’d seen pictures of our next destination and couldn’t wait to see if it measured up in real-life. We were going to Siwa.

Music Siwa

Planning the trip weeks before, the Siwa Oasis hadn’t even crossed my mind. In fact, I didn’t even know it existed. It was only researching Egypt in more detail that I learned about this tiny town surrounded by the Sahara Desert on all sides. Once I learnt about the place, though, I couldn’t get it out of my mind. A real oasis, hundreds of miles from anywhere. One road in and one road out. It sounded like something from a novel, and novels are what I do. With that flawless logic in mind it was decided—we had to go.

The only problem, it wasn’t on the way. Siwas actually isn’t on the way to anywhere at all. To get to Siwa we would have to travel eight hours in one direction, then eight hours back, then another four to Cairo. We thought about it, talked about it again, watched a video on YouTube, and decided we would do it. So, bright and early the next morning, we headed for the bus station. Coincidentally, that YouTube video about Siwa also taught us something which stopped me looking like an idiot to taxi drivers—they have Uber in Egypt. The simplicity of just selecting the destination in an app, then ordering the car made journeys from here on much easier, cheaper, and less embarrassing.

The journey to Siwa, as you’d expect, was long. After just over four hours of travel we reached Marsa Matruh which is a resort town on the Mediterranean coast. Here the bus stopped for half an hour to refuel and for us to pick up snacks—of course we needed snacks, we were going to desert!

Pulling out of Marsa Matruh, the buildings quickly faded into level sand, and that was that for hundreds and hundreds of miles. The road stretched out before us as though a giant God-like hand had just draped it across the desert. It’s a busy road too, mostly with trucks rumbling to and from, constantly overtaking each other on the single carriageway road to gain a couple more miles an hour.

Four, four and a half, five, five and a half—the time just rolled into one—several hours later we rumbled, the bus hissing and wheezing after its marathon journey, into Siwa’s central square. We’d only stopped twice on the desert crossing. Once at a rest top that could have been the settling of an apocalyptic film—it was the only building visible in all directions. The small shop sold a collection of dusty snacks and the proprietor charged ten Egyptian Pounds to use the facilities. I thought that was a lot, but considering the next bathroom was several hundred miles away, I wasn’t really in a position to negotiate. The second stop was at a security checkpoint. A tired soldier moved through the bus checking everyone’s passport. 

“Welcome in Egypt,” he said, handing ours back. It was a phrase everyone seemed to know. 

We stumbled off the bus, stretched our muscles back into use and set about finding the hotel I’d booked the night before. After several minutes of looking, Google Maps sending us to places that clearly weren’t ‘The Panta Lodge,’ we had a tuk tuk driver take us. The man nodded as though he understood every word, before we sped off away from the town centre. Clattering along the dirt roads, the night got darker and darker. Verdant jungle plants flashed past on both sides. After several tight turns, we arrived shaken and disoriented at our hotel. This was exactly what I’d imagined an Oasis to look like. Trees curved over the shimmering pool and people sat around a firepit smoking shisha pipes.  

After taking some time to let our muscles flex back into their proper positions, we had the youngest son of the family who owned the hotel—a young man called Ashran—take us back into the town and recommend a restaurant. We ordered half the menu and ate ravenously, before returning to The Panta Lodge and falling asleep to the chorus of jungle insects.

We spent our first day in Siwa exploring the town. We wandered up to the ‘Mountain of the dead’, which is a hill carved out with tombs. I climbed to the top for the view of the entire oasis. A mile or two on either side the large lakes which surround the town glinted invitingly, and beyond that the sand walls of the desert loomed. It’s a strange but incredibly beautiful place. We watched the sun set from the Shali Fortress in the centre of the town. The fortress is built on a small hill out of mudbricks. Its unusual construction is made to look more striking by the erosion of rain and wind. The effect makes the whole fortress look as though it’s melting into the sand. After the sun had slipped her way beneath the desert, we ambled down from the fortress and found a small, local restaurant.

Although Egyptians aren’t against the drinking of alcohol, like some countries in the Middle East, there just isn’t much of it around. In Alexandria we’d looked for bar, but only found one which was a tiny, grim, hole in the wall sort of place. We had one drink each, then left in favour of non-alcoholic drinks somewhere much nicer. With that experience in mind, we decided not to search out booze in Siwa. If we ended up in a place that served it, great. If not, we would drink like the locals. We took that to heart on our first night in Siwa. We found a shisha bar and wiled away several hours drinking tea and smoking apple tobacco.

The second day in Siwa, we had set aside to do what many people come to Siwa for—the saltwater baths. We hired Ashran for the day, and off we went in his tuk tuk. The saltwater lakes are a bumpy forty-minute ride from Siwa town centre. The roads are so rock strewn and dusty, that I don’t think you could do it more quickly in any sort of vehicle. We saw some travellers heading out there by bike, but didn’t envy their efforts.

Although there are some naturally occurring saltwater pools, many of them are created in the process of digging salt out of the lakebed. I assume this salt is then used for stuff, like putting on your chips. The result, aside from tasty chips, are spectacular cerulean blue pools cut from crystallised salt. As we had Ashran as our guide, he took us to our own private pool where we swam, or rather, awkwardly floated. The water is so salty that swimming in it is actually really difficult. I tried breaststroke but found my arms floating above the water and kicking just resulted in my feet slapping the water’s surface. After several minutes, I perfected a sort of doggie paddle, which seemed to work quite well.

After some time in the pool and coffee served from the back of another passing tuk tuk—Egyptian entrepreneurship at its finest—we left the salt lakes behind and trundled back in the direction of Siwa. Perfectly designed by nature herself as a mid-journey bathing point, The Cleopatra Spring is a warm water spring located between the salt lakes and Siwa town centre. Although the spring is surrounded by a handful of cafes and shops dedicated to the tourist trade, it still retains a charm. Trees hang over the green water and Egyptian music floats through the air.

 My skin now itching from the salt, it was straight in the freshwater spring for me. The water was surprisingly warm. Refreshed and desalinised, I joined Martha and Ashran for several cups of Tea Siwa, the strong and bitter flavour of which is balanced with countless spoons of sugar. I did notice that while the Egyptian people we met keep healthy by not consuming alcohol, and eating lots of fresh food, they have an incredibly sweet tooth. Sugar is added to everything, much to my delight. We sipped our tea and chatted with Ashran about his life in the Oasis. I loved how proud Ashran was of his home. Why wouldn’t you be, I suppose? He also, in his broken but basically good English, would add the word ‘Siwa’ onto everything. Tea became TeaSiwa, the ubiquitous Arabic flatbread became BreadSiwa and, when a band began belting out Arabic music from the other side of the spring, that was MusicSiwa.

 Spotting us tapping away to the music, Ashran dragged us towards the band. Within minutes we were swept up with locals, dancing, smiling, and clapping to the music. This was clearly, MusicSiwa at its finest.

 The afternoon wearing on, Ashran told us it was time to go. We were to watch the sunset over the desert from a place which was half an hour’s drive away. We bundled back into the tuk tuk and headed away from the party. As the music from the band finally faded, Ashran kept the singing going, in the end teaching us the words of one of the local songs.

As with everything in Siwa, reaching the desert’s edge was strange experience. The sand rears up ahead like great wall, forty or fifty metres high. Quite why this great ocean of sand would just stop here, I have no idea. To me it seems proof of some divine design, at the hand of whatever belief you might hold. Ashran stopped the tuk tuk beside a small café which looked as though it was at the end of the world. For the inhabitants of the café, the sun had already set behind the great sand wall. Crawling on hands and feet, we scrambled, panting, and wheezing, up the incline. Reaching the top, now dazzled by the sunlight, we gazed out across the desert’s barren moonscape. The sand rose and fell like a frozen ocean for miles and miles until it dropped out of view. I suddenly felt very small—just one person in this vast expanse—and exhausted, having travelled a colossal fifty metres from the tuk tuk below.  

We laid out, settling on the sand as the sun struggled towards the horizon. A dog, probably a stray, padded up the incline behind us and stretched out on the sand too. We were in his territory now, but he didn’t seem to mind. As the sun finally slipped down beneath the sand again, Ashran started up his song. This time we joined in, at least on the parts we knew.

The following morning was an early one as we were on the bus back across the desert. We’d decided to break the otherwise twelve-hour journey with a night in Marsa Matruh. The doors of the bus hissed closed we watched the buildings of Siwa drift past, then we were on the desert road for hours, and hours.

You know those provincial places that don’t really offer anything? Like Luton, in England. That’s sort of what Marsa Matruh felt like as we tumbled off the bus several hours later.

It’s got a bus and train station, a beach, and several restaurants. Still, we were determined to explore and see what we might find. On returning to our super-cheap hotel—ten English pounds a night—we were forced to agree that our first assessment was correct. There are a few resorts on the seafront, currently closed on account of it being January, several restaurants, tea shops, markets, but nothing really to interest us. It didn’t matter, we were off early in the morning to The Big Smoke—Cairo.

Searching for the Second Sphinx

Partly because of my romantic notion of train travel, secondly because we felt as though we’d already spent too many hours on the bus, we chose to take the train to Cairo. I wouldn’t go so far as to say this train was a bad idea, but we didn’t do it again. At nine hours long, the journey was exhausting and chaotic. Beginning bright-eyed at 7am, we were lulled into the thought that the hours would pleasantly drift along, treating us to unique views of the Nile Delta. And for the first few hours, we were right. The train rolled through small towns and villages, picking up and setting down people all the while. But, the closer we got to Cairo, the more crowded it became. When we finally rattled and coughed into the city, it was standing room only. Then we had to fight our way out of the station.

Cairo, to me, felt like some of the crazy and beautiful cities of Asia. It’s noisy and polluted, but beautiful too. Ensconced safely and gratefully in the back of the taxi, we picked our weary way across the city towards the hotel. Darkness had fallen some time ago, and the lights of the city spread out on either side of the raised highway. And then, like approaching a long sunken ship in mirky waters, great triangular shapes appeared on the horizon. All tiredness was forgotten, we watched like enchanted children as The Pyramids, silhouetted against the sky, grew nearer and nearer.

Within an hour we were on the roof terrace of our hotel, The Falcon Pyramids Inn, with a glass of wine in hand, looking up at the strange, but beautiful structures. We’d made it to Cairo, and tomorrow it would be time to explore.

Having politely declined our hotelier’s offer of a private tour, both with or without a camel, we set of earlyish to explore The Pyramids ourselves. Just a few minutes’ walk from The Plateau entrance, we were confident we could walk there pretty much unaided—I mean, it’s pretty difficult to lose a four-hundred-foot stone triangle, right? Then there’s always the giant stone cat to help point you in the right direction. We had, though, underestimated the perseverance of good old Egyptian entrepreneurship. By the time we arrived at the gate we had been offered tours on camels, horses, quad bikes, private guides, and several other things, although I’d stopped listening. Once inside, paying 220 Egyptian Pounds for a ticket, the selling didn’t abate. But by then we were pretty much used to it. A firm no was often enough, although some people became persistent, following us down the road a few feet. I’m a relatively experienced traveller and have dealt with this sort of stuff the world over. These people aren’t aggressive, they’re just trying to make a living from a tourist trade that’s yet to recover from several years in the gutter. I feel for them, but still don’t want to ride a horse, or a camel. I’m far from an activist on animal rights, but pointlessly using creatures for human amusement doesn’t sit well with me. Even less so to get some cringeworthy tourist snap. Maybe I’d ride a horse if the terrain required it, but over the level sands of The Giza Plateau, my own Converse clad hooves will do just fine.  

The Plateau is such a large area that once inside we were pretty much left alone. We walked for hours, around The Sphinx, around each of The Pyramids and up to the viewing area which we were told was “impossible” without the use of the horse or camel. The beautiful thing about it is that unlike many ancient monuments, you’re pretty much free to go where you want. You can walk right up to The Pyramids and even sit on the lowest stones. There were guards scalding those who climbed further up—probably because they don’t want the hassle of picking them up should they fall off.

Looking around The Plateau, it’s also easy to imagine how ancient monuments, temples, or even a second sphinx could lie just beneath the sand. It’s a vast area, undulating into dunes and rocky outcrops. Countless secrets or mysteries could lie there—and that’s like jet fuel to a writer like me.  

Momento Mori

The following day we went into explore the modern city of Cairo. We started at the Civilization Museum, which now houses the pharaonic mummies. Although the purpose of mummification seems to be a mysterious one—something to do with travelling into the underworld, I think—it’s fair to say they did a pretty good job. To see these bodies, still with teeth and hair after all this time, is pretty remarkable. It’s also a memento mori—remember you will die. These people were some of the most powerful in the world, ever. Yet, here they are, still subject to the ravages of time. There was far more we could have seen in the museum, but after a couple of hours we headed off to the Mohammed Ali Mosque. Standing proud above the city, this is one of Cairo’s grandest structures. It’s a beautiful building with great views across the city. I love visiting religious buildings and have been fortunate to do so the world over. We slid off our shoes and padded in the footsteps of faithful around the courtyard and then into the domed gloom of the mosque’s interior. The place is serene yet majestic.

We finished up the day exploring the souks in and around El Moez Street. These streets, with hanging fabrics, stalls of spices and fruits, look like the settings of the action films I know and love. I could imagine the foe peering out through one of the latticed windows, or hiding in giant wicker basket, waiting to jump out at the right moment. This area unfortunately didn’t make it into The Giza Protocol, but I’m sure I’ll revisit Egypt in writing sometime.

Attempting to head back to our hotel that evening, we fell afoul of Cairo’s congested traffic. With total gridlock on all the roads surrounding El Moez street, Uber couldn’t deliver. So, we negotiated hard with a regular taxi driver, and he agreed to take us. When I say negotiated hard, the conversation went like this:

Taxi driver: £300

Me: £200

Taxi driver: £300

Me: £250

Taxi driver: £300

Me: £280

Still, at less that £15 English, it wasn’t bad for over an hour’s drive. But there was a real gift in that journey because the driver played the same song about six times straight. Martha managed to remember it well enough to hum to Abdul (our new friend / hotel owner), and he told us the artist. Hearing the tune now takes me back to that journey, inching through Cairo’s traffic, tired, fulfilled, and grateful. Momento Mori.  

Should you be interested, here’s a link to the song on Spotify. Tigi Netjawaz Bilser by Sara Al Zakaria. Abdul told us that it’s actually a modern popular song about a breakup. We just liked the tune.

Garbage City

I love visiting off-the-wall and unlikely places. When I’m in a city, I don’t just want to take in the normal tourist sites, want to get to the heart of it. I don’t want to queue next to people wearing ‘I love Egypt’ shirts, sipping soft drinks out of paper cups, or (heaven forbit) taking pictures of each other riding camels. No way!

With that in mind, when I first heard of the district of Mansheya Nasir, known colloquially as ‘Garbage City’, I just knew it was the sort of place I had to go. And yes, the keen eyed amongst you may have noticed that Mansheya Nasir did make it into The Giza Protocol. It was the district in which Little Mo grew up—one of my favourite characters in the book, by the way.

A short taxi ride from central Cairo, Mansheya Nasir is famous for two things. First, at the top of the hill is the St Simon Monastery. This is a collection of churches, the largest able to seat over two-thousand people, all cut into the rock of the cliff face. It’s a fascinating, pretty incredible place. There is also a zip wire which affords brave (maybe stupid) travellers a very unique view of the city. I wasn’t having any of that, so after checking out the churches, I wandered into Mansheya Nasir proper.

Strolling down through the tightly wound streets of the district, it becomes instantly clear why this area got its name. Outside the houses great bales and sacks of plastics, tin and glass are ready and sorted. Curious, I peered around the bags and into the ground floor of the buildings. Several women are sat in the centre of the room, sorting dextrously through piles of mixed junk. To me it looks like junk, to them, it’s their life blood. Hearing the aggressive beep of a horn, jump out of the way as a truck which is too large to fit comfortably between the buildings struggles past, picking up the sorted bags. Another truck follows some minutes later, dropping off another load for the residents to sort it through. It’s a dirty job, but one that clearly makes Cairo a much more sustainable city than perhaps we achieve in Europe.

Walking further into the district, though, any initial feeling of pity I have for the residents disappeared. It looks just like any other neighbourhood. There are kids playing football—they pass the ball to me and I almost trip over it trying to kick it back. David Beckham I am not, although maybe one of them is the next Mo Salah. I walk past a group of old men sat on their balconies smoking. I glimpse a stall selling vegetables so fresh and large that those in our supermarkets seem limp in comparison. Then, seeming incongruous at first, I pass a beauty salon. Pictures of manicured nails and coloured hair hang in the window. Walking on, I scorn myself for finding that unusual. Why wouldn’t these people, after a day sorting through the waste of the city, want to look beautiful?

Passing out of the narrow streets, back into the dazzling sunlight, I feel strangely moved by the experience. What I’d seen didn’t just feel unique and interesting, but it makes me feel inspired and almost enlightened. I feel as though I’ve looked through a window into another world. A world that’s always there, working away beneath the surface, but one that very few people get to see.

I wander down the litter strewn embankment to the freeway. The ten lanes are filled to bursting point, and the traffic thunders past at quite a speed. I pull up the Uber app and sort a taxi. It arrives two minutes later, but on the other side of the road. I can see it, a silver Toyota, sitting a hundred feet away. The traffic roars past. I see a pair of older people ready to cross. Surely, if they can get across there, so can I. Following their every move, we pick our way across the road. They seem to have instinctive knowledge of how the traffic will move. They see cars speeding up or slowing down before it happens. To me it’s just a wall of hurtling metal and rubber.

We reach the other side unscathed.  Breathing more than one sigh of relief, I slip into the back of the taxi. We pull into the traffic in the direction of the bus station. I need to buy tickets because unfortunately it’s time to leave Cairo.

Happyland Luxor

We arrive in Luxor at nine am after eight hours on the overnight bus. It wasn’t as bad as you might think. I’d splashed out and booked as the GoBus VIP trip, which cost slightly more but afforded us larger seats, an onboard entertainment system (which I didn’t use), and a mid-journey meal (which I didn’t eat.) I didn’t do either of these things because, through some amazing luck, managed to sleep the entire way. Martha was slightly less fortunate, but still managed to get a few hours as the bus hissed its way south.

 Our first impressions of Luxor are positive ones. The streets are quiet—no traffic, no car horns. There are pavements and cafes, and the place is clean and orderly. Still, however, we are bombarded with the usual torrent of salesmen the very moment our feet touch the tarmac. To avoid said salesmen, we duck straight into a nearby café and slump into a beautiful stationary seat. We order coffee and breathe a sigh of the relief. Then two of the salesmen burst into the café and join us at the table. One introduces himself as Mr Perfect, the other a taxi driver called Ali. In the end we relented and let them tell us about what Luxor had to offer, the price of each excursion, and why buying these excursions from anyone else was a terrible, terrible idea. As a compromise for not opening my wallet there and then, I took Mr Perfect’s number and we hire Ali to drive us to our hotel. Neither were really necessary, but the compromise seemed to calm the men and we all enjoyed coffee without them trying to sell us anything more.

The wonderfully named Happyland Luxor costs an incredible £10 English a night for a twin room with a private bathroom. All decked out in quirky terracotta and colourful rugs, Happyland attracts a full range of travellers. During our time there we met some Australian twenty-somethings, an American woman in her forties, an English man in his fifties and an Italian in his fifties who had been travelling for nine months already. It’s exactly the sort of place I love to spend time while on the road.

After a well-deserved nap on a proper bed, we headed out to explore Luxor. We grabbed some food—kebab meat in a flat bread with tahini and salad—then wandered towards the Nile. The broad waters shimmered in front of us, cut by the wakes of small boats skimming from one side to the next. A large cruise ship—not as big as those you’d see at sea, but large all the same—sounded it’s horn as it broke from the quay and headed in the direction of Aswan.

“Next time,” I say to Martha. “Next time for sure.” A Nile cruise is, unfortunately, something we’re going to have to miss on this trip. But, with our unplanned time in Siwa, we knew there would be compromise. It was so worth it.

We finish the food and head in the direction of Luxor Temple. From the outside, the place doesn’t appear that impressive, but once inside we change our minds. We’ve chosen a good time do come too as there are possibly a dozen other tourists inside. Great stone columns rise like those of a cathedral, except these are made from solid chunks of stone. Large plinths sit on top of the columns, impossibly heavy and impossibly high. Every surface is covered in beautifully carved hieroglyphs, too. I only wish I could read them. Encapsulated by the strange beauty of the place, we take dozens and dozens of photos. Again, it’s wonderful how you can walk right up to the stones. If these stones could speak, I think, they would have some stories to tell. Then again, maybe they can speak, maybe I just can’t understand what they’re saying.

After the temple we wander through the nearby souk, then head back to Happyland. Passing a liquor store, we pick up a bottle of wine and a few beers too—it still feels like a novelty have a beer at the end of the day. That evening we have dinner on the roof of the hotel. The hotel owner, a flamboyant guy called Mahmud, runs a simple restaurant offering four choices of dinner—chicken, beef, rabbit, and vegetarian. All come with rice, bread, salad, and soup to start. It’s a bargain at £150 Egyptian, which I think was about £4 English.

I wake up in the morning to my phone buzzing. It’s Mr Perfect. Grown tired waiting for me to call, he’s made the first move and has sent me 65 WhatsApp messages and called 10 times. Knowing that we’ve already done unimaginable (booked our trip to The Valley of the Kings with Mahmud at the hotel), I block delete his number. I feel a pang of pity and hope the rejection will teach him not to be so full on. If you ever make it to Luxor and meet Mr Perfect, send my apologies.

There’s no time to mourn, however, as we need to eat breakfast and get on the bus at eight thirty. It seems that almost everyone in our hotel is going on the trip today—we talk to them all, except for a pair of grumpy Mexicans who didn’t seem to want to chat.

It takes about forty-five minutes to get to the Valley of the Kings. Our tour guide—a very knowledgeable Egyptian guy who’s name I’ve forgotten—gives us an introduction to the history of the region. We pass between fields growing sugar cane and stop several times to allow the small trains they use to harvest the canes cross the road. Marking a stark contract to the desert we’ve seen so much of the landscape is green, lush and almost tropical.

Arriving at The Valley of the Kings, we push through the ticket building and out onto the little vehicles that transport us up into the valley. It’s busy, probably the busiest tourist site we’ve visited while in Egypt. We’re also here early. We’d got into the habit of taking the morning slowly, having a lake breakfast, and getting out and about around midday. It’s not even ten am and we’re already here.

Once inside The Valley of the Kings our tour guide pulls us aside and talks us through the history of the place. It’s fascinating. He talks both about the construction of the valley in ancient times, and the excavation work that continues there today. Then we go and see several of the tombs. The ticket we’ve bought allows us to see three tombs. Still pretty ignorant about the history, we choose our three based on how busy they look. It was a good strategy. We spent several minutes in each tomb, studying closely the colourful paintings which line the walls, and imagining both the teams of people who built such structures and the pharaohs who commissioned them.

Back on the bus, we head in the direction of Hatshepsut’s famous temple. Built directly into the cliff, the temple comes into view several minutes before we arrive. It’s sleek and appears strangely futuristic by its design. Once there, again having to hustle through the queuing tourists, our guide pulls us aside and tells us about Hatshepsut’s unlikely rise to power. Pushing her young stepson aside, she took power herself. Then she rejected burial in The Valley of the Queens, instead wanting to be buried beside the kings. The temple itself is beautifully resorted and offers views back down towards the luscious green Nile.

That evening we share food and beers with several of the tourists who had been on to The Valley of the Kings with us. It’s nice, whilst we’ve met a lot of people on our travels, this is first time we’ve spoken with other travellers in this way.

The following morning, we head out to Karnak Temple. Just a couple of miles outside of Luxor, Karnak is one of the largest temple complexes in the world. In truth we’re feeling a bit weary after a busy day and a late night, but it’s out last day Luxor. It’s now or never, so to speak. Karnak was well worth the effort. The temple sprawls from out with various complexes, in various states of repair. We take particular enjoyment in exploring those at the edges of the compound. Most of tourists don’t seem to stray from the centre, making us feel almost alone scrambling through the ruins. It’s wonderful, again, to be so tactile with history. We’re amongst it, almost. After exhausting the temple, we wander back into Luxor along the route of The Avenue of Sphinxes. The avenue itself isn’t yet open, it looks to be under restoration, but we’re able to walk beside it along the road. Linking Karnak with Luxor Temple in a direct straight line, we can see that The Avenue of Sphinxes will be a tourist highlight. Roads are directed around the avenue, or cross it via bridges, meaning that in the future visitors will be able to make the journey on foot without interruption.

Back in Luxor, we head to the bus terminal to book our tickets to Hurghada. We’re not particularly excited about visiting the Red Sea resort town, but that’s the location of our flight home.

As we had expected it to be, Hurghada is flashy, bright and reeks of the tourist dollar. Bars crowd the streets offering Heineken for two quid, Costa Coffee stands next to Starbucks. It’s everything we’ve tried to avoid during our trip. Still, we have a great hotel which is a bargain price and has a pool. We spend the last day lounging by the pool, before heading to a beachfront bar where beer and wine are the order of the day. It’s not the Egypt we know and have grown to love, but it’s good all the same. To that Egypt, we will certainly return.

Many of the places we visited here, particularly those in Cairo and Giza, have formed the settings in my book The Giza Protocol. Some of the people we met too, have been immortalised in those pages.

If you haven’t yet, read, The Giza Protocol here.

I’ll re-visit Egypt in my writing, I know it. There are so many more places that would make the backdrop for a fantastic thriller novel.

These travels are made possible because of the people like you who read my books. Thank you.

A further thank you to the growing group of people who support me on Patreon. These people pledge a few dollars, pounds, or euros a month to help me fund these research trips between launching books. In exchange, it’s my pleasure to share my travels with them through postcards and other gifts from the road.

Some Patreon supporters even get the opportunity to read my books early.

If that resonates with you, check out my Patreon here.

Don’t feel obliged, the fact you are here is more than enough.

Again, thank you for being here. I can’t wait to share my next adventure with you.