Life On The Nile

Strangely, Egypt was never one of the anticipated highlights of this trip for me. The pharaohs had always left me a little cold and if anything it was the opportunity to explore the Islamic sites of Cairo that whet my appetite. After the Mongols sacked Baghdad in the thirteenth century, Cairo rose to prominence as the greatest city of the Islamic World, and even today is the largest city in the Middle East with over 16 million inhabitants.

All that rather changed for me when I took a flight earlier today down to Abu Simbel, the gigantic temple of the Pharaoh Ramesses II which was moved block by block in the 1960s to a new and higher site when the upper Nile valley was flooded to create the enormous Lake Nasser behind the Aswan Dam. It is the most breathtaking place. You are greeted by four monumental statues of Ramesses seated either side of the entrance portal, which you pass through to walk inside the mountain and explore the fabulously carved interior, replete with images of the Pharaoh fighting the Hittites from the back of a chariot, or making offerings to the falcon god Hora and all manner of other ancient Egyptian deities. Somehow, seeing this grand temple complex so perfectly preserved after 3500 years has unlocked a greater appreciation for all the other relics and monuments I have seen scattered higgledy-piggledy throughout the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, including the grisly remains of Ramesses himself, staring up at you from his partially unwrapped mummy.

This temple impressed me more than the sight of the Great Pyramids, where you are hassled to death by the most persistent local salesmen trying to bully you into buying their overpriced souvenir shite or clamber onto the back of a knackered looking camel. It's also a bit of a shock to see just how close Cairo is to the pyramids, literally just below them, though it doesn't seem to make it onto many of the classic postcard shots. Still, there is something to say for visiting a place that even the ancients regarded as one of the wonders of the world.

An overnight train journey following the verdant green strip that is the course of the Nile has taken us to Aswan, a lovely riverside town with great souks and picturesque scenes of felucca sailboats on the river. Tomorrow we commence a three day journey by felucca to Luxor, sleeping on deck, crapping over the side, and stopping off at ancient ruins along the way. I've even bought a local Nubian ankle length chemise and headscarf to wear on the boat. It might come in handy for covering my modesty when the urge to poo comes upon me. Otherwise, it could just make me look like a bit of a tit.

Bacardi Nights

Not for the first time it's felt as though we've not had enough time on this trip. Our sprint through the Middle East has taken us to sensational sites and through spectacular landscapes, leaving you wishing you had more time to explore in depth, get a bit more off the beaten track and linger to absorb the atmosphere. There is simply so much to see and do here that the weeks could roll by without ever getting bored.

Our journey southwards in Jordan took us to Lawrence of Arabia country as we overnighted at a Bedouin camp in Wadi Rum. This is a magical desertscape with towering sandstone escarpments rising out of the wadi floor like abandoned ships in a dried up sea. The crags have been sculpted by the wind and sand into all manner of contortions and give the impression of pock marking where the rock surface has eroded. The red stone runs a gamut of colours as the sun descends in the evening offering you the full romance of the desert as depicted in countless movies, many of which have been filmed here. These days you tour around in 4WD jeeps, though when Lawrence was holed up here plotting his dramatic seizure of Aquaba during the Arab Revolt of 1917-18, it was camels which powered you around the place. That and the Hejez Railway which was the target of many sabotage actions, but which still cuts a swathe across the landscape on its long journey to Mecca and Medina. We had a riotuous night around the campfire winding down from an exhilarating day, and discovered that despite Islamic prohibitions on alcohol, the Bedouin are rather partial to Bacardi, and oddly, favour beer as their mixer of choice.

Aquaba was our point of departure for catching the ferry across to Egypt and the Sinai Peninsula. The Red Sea clearly isn't named for its colour, as I don't think I've seen a stretch of water quite so blue. The coral reefs give the inshore waters an acquamarine tinge which complements the stark yellow of the Saudi and Sinai mountains either side. Unfortunately we were not allowed on deck so had to content ourselves with porthole views of the world outside while munching on something with a passing resemblance to a cheeseburger. I celebrated my arrival by promptly cracking my head open on the lintel of the truck door while being inspected by customs, so have been touring around Sinai with my own elasticated bandage version of an Islamic headscarf, covered up as far as possible with a Yasser Arafat number which I purchased in Aleppo. Fortunately there is no permanent damage, other than to my image, which is now firmly established as reigning truck plonker.

Jordan

My odyssey through the Middle East continues apace with Jordan the latest country on our itinerary. We've arrived here at an interesting and tragic juncture, with a series of terrorist bomb attacks taking place in Amman the night before we passed through the capital city. Such atrocities are a new and unwelcome experience for Jordan. Wherever we have talked to Jordanian people in the past couple of days the conversation has quickly turned to these events in Amman. A general sense of outrage and bewilderment that terrorists should target fellow muslims seems to be the recurrent theme.

As in Syria, so in Jordan we are encountering many examples of the famed hospitality of the Middle East. Invitations to take tea abound and today I hung out for a while with a group of Bedouin women in Petra who insisted I stopped to sample their Bedouin billy boiled tea. Not bad but for the intensity of the sugar hit. In Damascus a wrong turning en route to a restaurant led to an amazing encounter. Finding ourselves confronted with a front door at the end of a winding back alley, our small group of five was bundled into the house by the amiable pater familias before we had time to register what was going on. We emerged again an hour later replete with coffee, home-made cakes and the memory of faltering conversation in English conducted in translation via two young daughters amongst the veritable tribe of kids that greeted us excitedly inside as exotic commodities from far off lands.

In between all the bouts of tea drinking we've been visiting some spectacular sites, the most impressive of which has undoubtedly been Petra. This ancient city was home to the rather obscure Nabatean people. It is concealed in the depths of a canyoned river bed and must be approached along a 900m cliff bound passage called the Siq, which in places is no more than a metre wide. You emerge as if bursting out of a cocoon into a spacious plaza with the sublime carved facade of the Treasury Building looming down at you in a rich panolopy of red and brown hues. It is undoubtedly one of the finest vistas on earth. What I hadn't anticipated was the vast scale of Petra and the sheer number of rock cut facades that fill the twisting arms of the valley. Although this is Jordan's premier tourist attraction, it is surprisingly relaxed in feel and easy to escape the hustle and bustle of the main drag with an exploratory side trip. Quaint touches from less touristy times are still to be seen, such as shepherds herding their goats across the site and running the gauntlet of the tourist mules (touted as 'taxis') which ply a trade along the main routes. What also marks out Petra is the incredible contortions of its craggy landscape and the richness of the ever changing colours in the stone.

Jordan is also among the lands of the Bible. Though not of a religious turn of mind, it's nevertheless hard not to be moved in some way by the experience of standing atop the mountain on which Moses gazed down on the Promised Land knowing he could never enter this land of milk and honey. I felt some sympathy for old Moses. Our view from the summit of Mt. Nebo across the Dead Sea and the Jordan River enabled us to see faintly some buildings on the Mount of Olives above Jerusalem - the sacred city which was so near and yet so far away due to international borders and the currents of Middle Eastern politics. Still, we could at least take a dip in the Dead Sea, a fabulously peculiar experience as you bob around like a cork in a barrel trying to comprehend why you don't seem to be sinking.

The Road To Damascus

Syria has quite bowled me over. I assumed it was going to be a more difficult country in which to travel. That I might run up against instances of anti-western hostility, religious extremism or simply a brooding police presence suspicious of visitors from Britain. We have been outspoken on Syria in recent times and doubtless there have been reasons for that, but then it has seemed all the more remarkable to reflect on the reception one receives here. This is an exceptionally friendly and hospitable place. You are greeted and treated as a friend, with courtesy and genuine interest in the places from which you hail and in your impressions of Syria. And for once one doesn't feel that the friendliness is a honeyed veneer to a hoped for sale.

Damascus is a cosmopolitan place and undoubtedly one of my favourite cities of the trip. It has a relaxed feel, more westernised and modern than you might imagine. Like the rest of Syria, and particularly Aleppo, it is also religiously very mixed. The Christian quarter is a fascinating maze of old alleys with a host of holy sites associated with the conversion of St Paul. Religious toleration is a cornerstone of Syrian life, not least because the ruling Assad family themselves belong to minority religious sect within Islam. Perhaps that toleration does not extend to Juduism, I'm not sure, but nonetheless the general atmosphere of rubbing along together well contrasts quite favourably with the situation you often see back home. To me it is epitomised in the fact that the superlative Umayyad Mosque, one of the architectural wonders of Islam, houses an elaborate shrine to St John the Baptist and is therefore also a holy place for the Christian community.

What you do notice is that Syrian society is very male in its public aspects. If you visit a restaurant or a bar you will invariably find it devoid of women, and though a western woman will be welcomed without hesitation she will certainly attract stares from some of the other clientele. The mystery of where all the women were hiding was revealed when I visited one of the many Damascene ice cream parlours. The delicious taste of creamy Syrian ice cream with crushed pistachios on top is reason enough alone to visit this country.

The other reason is the quite staggering richness of the architectural treasures that survive from ancient times. I had waited all my life for the chance to visit the crusader castle of Krak des Chevaliers, the very epitome of the medieval castle. It's interior was more ruinous than I had envisaged, but the scale, solidity and setting of the structure could not fail but to impress. However, it was the desert city of Palmyra that left the greatest impression. A beautiful limestone city in an exceptional state of preservation, Palmyra had briefly enjoyed a golden age under the fiery Queen Zenobia in which it vied to crush Rome. Alas, it wasn't long before the legions marched in under the command of Emperor Aurelian and consigned the city to historical memory and the enveloping sands.

Pushing The Boundaries

At the start of this trip I made a promise to myself that I would take the opportunity to try all sorts of weird and wonderful activities I'd managed to sidestep in my life so far. I got off to a good start with ballooning and white water rafting, but then rather let myself down by backing out of a 160m bungy jump in Nepal, having talked up my intention to take the leap of faith after a few too many ales the night before.

In Öludeniz, on Turkey's Turquoise Coast, I had a chance to redeem myself with a spot of paragliding, the prospect of which frankly terrified me. At times like these it always helps to be travelling with gung-ho Kiwis who are up for adventure and whose enthusiasm can carry you through the most difficult spots. Öludeniz is reckoned to be one of the top three places in the World for paragliding due to the coming together in one place of high altitude, strong thermals, spectacular coastal scenery and the opportunity to land on a beach. Of course, throwing yourself off the top of a mountain twice as high as Ben Nevis is not an activity undertaken too lightly, as I had plenty of time to mull over on the long, hairpinned drive up to the summit.

Fortunately, I had little time to reconsider my options as we bundled out and peered over the sharp mountain edge at the distant sight of seashore 2000m below us. My pilot, if that's the term, comprised a fascinating mixture of Turkish street bravado and military discipline, all hiding behind an outrageously orange pair of shades. He had me suited up, clipped onto him and charging over the edge of the precipice before I remotely had time to formulate a face saving exit strategy. We were lucky, as the difficult conditions for take-off worsened in the following minutes and forced two of our party of five to abort their jumps altogether.

The worst moment was probably a few seconds after takeoff as we soared away over a deep valley and I heard my man shouting in my ear: 'What a fuck up!' Thankfully, it turned out he was bad mouthing the ground assistant's failure to help us get airborn a couple of minutes earlier, rather than our own imminent and inevitable doom. Still, it was a genuine moment of pure, unadulterated terror. After that, things improved considerably. Paragliding is a wonderfully peaceful experience akin to the sensation of ballooning in the sense that you feel yourself to be moving noiselessly and remarkably slowly through the air. Once you adjust to the idea of having nothing solid below your feet you simply have to sit back and enjoy the sensational views. The glide lasted around 30 minutes and took us down with remarkable accuracy for the softest of landings on the beach. Here my pilot proved his worth for an unusual wind condition forced a number of paragliders to dump a few metres out into the sea. I was so delighted I bought the video of my descent so I can relive the fear in the years to come.

In Amongst The Ruins

Considering the debate that is ongoing over whether Turkey should be allowed to join the EU, it is instructive to reflect on the extent to which this place has helped shape our whole notion of western civilisation. The other day we visited the ruins of Ancient Troy, the setting of Homer's 'The Illiad', where Achilles battled it out with Hector to win back the enchanting Helen of Troy. Helen had been carried off by the Trojan prince Paris in the elopement of all time following a jealous tiff between a couple of the Greek gods. She came to be immortilised as 'the face that launched a thousand ships' when the Greek king Agememnon set in motion a rescue mission that would take ten years before tasting success. It's when hard gazing on these battered stones to envisage the setting for this timeless story.

Troy nowadays is a confusing jumble of stone walls dug up from nine different phases of the city's history. Yet, the story of Troy was seminal to the foundation myths of several countries anxious to assert that the pedigree of their particular nation was superior in antiquity and lineage to those of their rivals. In medieval times, the French made great play on the coincidence of the name Paris ocurring as the name of their capital city to assert that they were the true descendants of the Trojans. The English countered with an equally absurd story that England had been founded by Brutus, a Trojan prince who had escaped to Britain from the catastrophe that fell upon Troy when the Greeks infiltrated inside the city walls after ten long years of siege through the cunning devise of a wooden horse. Beware of Greeks bearing gifts as the old saying goes.

It is interesting to obverse how a story such as this one could have impressed itself on the landscape of the imagination down so many centuries and across so many cultures. Even Mehmet the Conquerer, the Ottoman Sultan who wrested Constantinople from the Byzantines, a man who had little call to busy himself with dusty tales from past times, nevertheless did bother to do so in the case of Troy.

More impressive and hardly less significant are the ruins of Ephesus, a vast expanse of predominantly Roman remains from a city which helped shape the future direction taken by Christianity at a key juncture in its emergence as a major religion. Here, in 431, in this city famously written to by St. Paul, the church took a momentous decision in asserting that Christ had two natures in one, being at once both human and divine. Henceforth, all those who strayed from this view were to be considered outside of the Church, and the long history of heresy, schism and internecine conflict that has characterised the Christian tradition got itself properly kick-started. We visited Ephesus on a foggy morning which lent much atmosphere to the columns and capitals that loomed out of the murk, even if it did make for some rather disappointing photos.

However, my favourite pile of old stones is a more modest affair. The ancient city of Termessos may have sent Alexander the Great on his way, but it was never a place to rival the splendours of Ephesus. Nonetheless, the setting of the city high in the mountains above Antalya preserved it from the pilfering hands of later builders on the lookout for cut stone, and perhaps more surprisingly, from intrusive examination by modern archaeologists. It remains today as it has been for centuries, an evocative ensemble of broken walls rearing up in higgledy-piggledy fashion from the enveloping undergrowth. It is almost as though the place were designed to be a set for an Indiana Jones movie, and somehow it seems all the better for that.