The pyramids at Giza

After a good night's sleep, we decided to start our exploration with the most famous of attractions - the pyramids at Giza. None the wiser for our experiences last night, we once more decided to brave the Cairo public transport system, and take a bus.

Finding the right bus took us a good while again, as only the third bus station turned out to be the right one! But we eventually managed to get the right one, so off we went to Giza (the pyramids are located at the outskirts of greater Cairo, about 10 kilometres from the centre).



We met a helpful chap called Mahmoud on the bus, who told us we should not go to the main entrance, rather we should go to an alternative “official ticket booth for travellers and students”. This turned out to be his friend Mahmoud (II), who offered camel services! Having been to the pyramids before, I figured it might not actually be a bad idea to go by camel, since the touts around the pyramids can be a real pain in the backside. And, according to Mahmoud II, he was even recommended in Lonely planet (actually, Lonely Planet recommends MG stables, whereas Mahmoud II’s outfit was called FG stables – but according to Mahmoud II the “G” means they are from the same family ;-).



The camel ride was good fun actually, although I have to say Moses (my camel) wasn’t very co-operative. He seemed to go exactly where he wanted, and when he wanted (on the whole, Mickey Mouse, Mathilde’s beast, seemed more genial, or maybe Mathilde was just the better rider). The pyramids were very impressive, of course. Most people say the same thing about the Sphinx – it’s a lot smaller than expected (also, it came as a revelation to me that the sphinx is actually male – he just lost his beard over the years).

The trip back was quite an adventure as well. As we were trying to decipher the numbers of the buses passing by, a helpful chap called Mahmoud III (I kid you not!) suddenly showed up, and told us we could take a mini-bus with him to the main road, and then take the big bus to Cairo. We though: “why not”. Quite quickly the bus turned onto a side road, and suddenly Mahmoud III told us that we would first go and see his sister’s new born baby! We thought, “OK, let’s see what happens”. So eventually, we ended up in a small Bedouin village god knows where. After following Mahmoud III for a while, we decided we’d wasted enough time and asked him to take us to the bus stop. We did eventually (after meeting his family!) manage to get a bus, which surprise, took us back to where we started near the pyramids!

Later in the evening, we booked a trip to the desert for the weekend. Guess what the name of the travel agent was?



After this we took the metro down to Maadi, to meet up with my friends from Edinburgh (Pablo and Olga). Maadi was certainly different from downtown Cairo, a lot less chaotic (even the driving is nearly civilised). Maadi is where the well-offs of Cairo live (including the expats). I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many SUV’s in one area… We had a very nice Thai takeaway at their place (felt almost like being back in the UK), and talked about the good old days…

Arriving in Cairo

After not enough hours of sleep, we got up at 4:30 and headed for the airport (my head was still a bit sore after the Schnapps from last night), to catch our flight to Cairo. The flight went OK, with a stopover in Vienna. After the formalities at Cairo airport, we decided to be brave and take the local bus to downtown Cairo. We eventually found the bus stop, and the bus also eventually arrived (identifying it wasn’t easy, as everything was written in Arabic!).

Getting from the bus station in Cairo to our hotel turned out to be a more daunting task, even if it was only about 3 blocks away. The traffic in Cairo is really something (not sure how to describe it exactly, words like “murderous”, “lethal” come to mind) – with cars completely ignoring traffic lights, pedestrian crossings and rules (well, there are some rules, but I don’t think you’ll find them in any law book!). Put it like this, crossing the street was quite a scary experience (strangely enough though, you do get used to even that after a while…).

We eventually reached our hotel, and checked in. The hotel had 2 stars – obviously the Egyptian stars have a somewhat different meaning to Europe (I would expect a reliable hot water supply and a decent shower to be requirements to get 2 stars, at least ;-). But we didn’t complain, the place was clean enough, had its own charm, and was very central.



In the evening we had a walk downtown. Quite fascinating, the city actually seems to come alive in the late evening (more alive – I don’t think Cairo could be considered quiet any time of the day!). We strolled around the street sellers, had a very so-and-so dinner, and of course tried the local beer (called Stella, funnily enough – without the Artois) at the very cosy Windsor hotel bar (Michael Palin, who staid here in 1991 whilst filming “Around the world in 80 days”, apparently said that the place enjoyed an “almost unreal individuality”).

Finns in Antibes

There haven't actually been many Finns visiting lately, so I guess it was about time :-) Carita, a friend of my mum's, had decided to come and spend her 60th birthday in sunny southern France, along with her brother (who actually decided to surprise her with his presence!) as well as her daughter Mikaela, Jean and their 2 little ones.



On Sunday, we went for dinner with Micke and Jean. It all started impressively, as we spent about half an hour trying to find a restaurant in Antibes my parents recommended (I guess we didn’t exactly impress our friends with our local knowledge…), only to find that the restaurant was closed… We did eventually find a nice restaurant called Le Jardin, where we had a nice meal. Afterwards we fulfilled a dream of mine and visited the Absinth bar. Very nice bar indeed, with great old adverts, and serving all flavours of absinth you could wish for (OK, it is a bit touristy). What a pity I was driving…



On Monday, it was time to celebrate Carita’s big day. It turned out to be a typical Swedish-Finnish affair, with drinking songs, schnapps and merriment. And this time I wasn’t driving ;-).

Baou de la Gaude

Another pretty day on the Riviera, so time for another walk. After all the driving and queuing around St-Trop' yesterday, we decided to do another local walk. So we drove up north to Gattieres, from where we undertook the strenuous walk to Baou de la Gaude - located at an altitude of 796 meters.

The walk was actually pretty heavy going, compared to the other hikes we’ve done recently. But as I often say to Mathilde (who doesn’t agree) – the harder the walk is, the more enjoyable it is.


The Alps of the Parc National du Mercantour, in the distance.


At La Colle, 842 meters altitude


More distant Alpine views...


The perched village of Gattieres.

Saint-Tropez

We've been on the Cote d'Azur for almost a year now, and one of the supposed highlights is of course St-Tropez. I say supposed, because a lot of people say it's over-rated. So anyway, we figured it was time for us to go and see for ourselves... Also a good opportunity to try out our new Panasonic DMC-TZ3 digital camera - with its x10 optical zoom (so from now on, dear reader, you may notice a slight improvement in the quality of the pictures on this blog - as the pictures so far have mostly been taken with Nokia mobiles ;-).



So, off we went, down the A8 towards St-Trop'. As people had warned us traffic would be a nightmare, we headed off pretty early, about 9 o'clock. Well, a lot of good that did. About 20 kilometres before reaching our destination, the queues started. Not that surprising, really, considering it was the start of school holidays, and also some kind of big sales day (as we found out, most people seem to go to St-Tropez to shop - and not just top-of-the-range luxury stuff).



Saint-Tropez itself was a bit of a mixed bag for me. My initial impression was one of disappointment. We headed down a ridiculously crowded shopping, and ended up in the equally ridiculously crowded and commercialised Vieux Port. But as we spent a bit of time exploring Saint-Tropez, it did turn out to be a very pretty place, and quite nice on the whole. You just have to get off the beaten track a bit, down the small streets off the main drags. And the setting is absolutely amazing, located in a pretty bay, surrounded by mountains. And unlike the Alpes-Maritimes, the Var department (where Saint-Tropez is located) seems a lot less developed. After a rather disappointing lunch (the service must've been the slowest ever so far on the Riviera - although I have to admit the Tarte Tropezienne I had for desert was quite edible ;-), we headed up to the old fortress, from where we had some great views over the town and the surrounding areas.



Fearing more traffic jams, we left in the early afternoon, and decided to explore the surrounding area a bit. So we headed down south to the Phare de Camarat, from where we did a short walk down the coastline - again, we were rewarded by some really beautiful views.

From there we visited a couple of pretty Provencal villages, Ramatuelle and Gassin. They were both, as villages usually are in this part of the world, very picturesque, offering great views over the surrounding areas. Especially Gassin, which was apparently elected “one of the most beautiful villages in Europe” (which of course doesn’t have to mean a whole lot ;-), was a revelation.



It was getting dark, and my stomach was grumbling, so we had to push on. We decided to stop and have dinner in Sainte-Maxime. After exploring the options (and there are a lot – Sainte-Maxime being one of the main tourist resorts in the Var), we opted for a cosy little place in the old town. A nice end to a very nice day!

St-Jeannet & the Circuit du Castellet

Another glorious day on the Cote d'Azur, so time to dig out the hiking boots again and go for a walk... This time we decided to do a walk from a village near Cagnes-sur-Mer called St-Jeannet. It's a very typical, picturesque, Provencal village in a great location, perched beneath the Baou de la Gaude and Baou de St-Jeannet.



The walk itself took us between the two baous, and then towards Castellet (after which the walk is named) - a ruined castle sitting on one rim of a valley. There wasn't much left of the castle, unfortunately, but the views were great. It was a very busy walk too, with English ramblers, mountain bikers, motocross riders and people walking their dogs crossing our path. The end of the walk took us past the foot of the Baou de St-Jeannet (which was very busy with climbers – apparently very popular with them) back to the village.



After the walk, we spent some time exploring the village. A very nice, olden world type of place. Never ceases to surprise me, these villages seemingly stuck in time, just a stone’s throw away from Nice and Cannes.

In the evening, I had to watch the last formula 1 race of the season of course. Amazingly race (almost like a pre-scripted thriller, a cynic might say)! Thanks to some solid driving from him, good team work by Ferrari (Massa kind of letting Kimi win?) and some bad luck and nervous driving from Lewis, Kimi clinched the world championship (assuming MacLaren's dodgy protest doesn't go through). Third Finn ever, nice one Kimi. (now he can party for a month so that the tabloids have something to write about ;-)

Big waves and a rugby final

Having tidied up after the party last night, we decided to head to Nice in the afternoon to see a film and then the high-light of a brilliant and dramatic Rugby world cup - the final between England and South Africa. It was a very windy day indeed, with absolutely huge waves! Never seen big waves like that on the Med... After watching the spectacle on the beach for a while, we went to see the film in Rialto, called "This is England", a very good English (obviously!) kitchen-sink drama - actually managed to make (at least some) skinheads seem sympathetic. And I loved the Yorkshire accents :-)


After a bit of shopping, we met up with Sami, Mikko and Marianne for a nice dinner in an Italian restaurant in Cours Saleya (with very generous portions!). After the meal, we tried to find a pub where we could watch the rugby - in vain of course. So we ended up watching it at Mikko's. It was a good game, even if there were no tries. Not unsurprisingly, South Africa came away with a win (the final score was 15-6 to the Springbooks, after some excellent kicking from Montgomery). No miracles from Jonny this time around...