I just spent a couple of days in Hurghada with my daughter and her man. I was delighted to learn that the day before I imposed myself upon them, he had proposed to her! Wonderful news! It's times like this that I miss being in the UK. I could have been planning a wedding with her, buying dresses etc etc and generally having a great mum/daughter time together.
But I am here, in the country that has become my second home, and I will be going home as soon as I can and will definitely be there in plenty of time to buy my "mother of the bride" outfit!
Hurghada surprised me, the hotel was lovely with a great beach right outside my balcony. I had an amazing view of the Red Sea, almost being able to dangle my fingers in the water from the balcony. We didn't do much, except spend time together, but hey...... it was all about that, not sunbathing or shopping.
I did have an interesting journey there. I decided to get the bus, but made the unfortunate mistake of booking the Upper Egypt service rather than the Superjet.
The bus left Luxor at 7am on the dot! Brilliant I thought, on time! Hmmmm a bit presumptive of me. By 7.45am, I could see the skyline of Qena in the distance, bang on time, and this was after we had picked up sundry bus company workers going to the depot in Qena. Then we hit Qena! A large detour around the city found us in the bus depot fuelling station, where we were filled up with fuel, with all the passengers sitting on the bus. Once we had done that, we headed back into Qena to yet another depot where we were thoroughly hosed down..... again with all of us still sitting on the bus. Once clean, we were joined by a man with an extremely large bus tyre who managed to get the said tyre on the bus and off we went..... to yet another depot to deposit the man and his tyre there.
Finally, some 2 hours after arriving in Qena, we left and headed for the Eastern Desert road to Hurghada. A brief 15 minute stop for toilets at 85kilo cafe, and we were off again. My nearest neighbour passengers were 4 German people who were heading for Safaga. Why did I get a bad feeling about this?
We reached the end of the desert road, with Safaga directly in front of us, but we turned right and headed towards El Quseir, drove for about 20 minutes before taking a small road which doubled back towards Safaga. Ok I thought, the bus station must be this end of town. Minutes later we were in yet another bus depot being refuelled and hosed down. The nice German people asked if that was where they needed to get off the bus........they got an emphatic "no! Stay!" So they did.
We returned to the main coast road, fully expecting to turn into Safaga itself but the bus bowled its way past Safaga towards Hurghada. I was a tad concerned, so spoke to the Germans, who had no idea of where they were, and they spoke again to the driver. He had forgotten them! And then he wanted to just leave them in the middle of nowhere so they could take a taxi back to Safaga. Eventually, we turned around and took them to the outskirts of Hurghada and left them to get a taxi from there.
I eventually arrived in Hurghada at 2pm, some 7 hours after leaving Luxor! Needless to say, I returned on the Superjet bus, 4 hours door to door almost!
Just one of those stories that we just shrug off here in Egypt, We would go insane if we didn't learn to just "go with the flow"
But I am here, in the country that has become my second home, and I will be going home as soon as I can and will definitely be there in plenty of time to buy my "mother of the bride" outfit!
Hurghada surprised me, the hotel was lovely with a great beach right outside my balcony. I had an amazing view of the Red Sea, almost being able to dangle my fingers in the water from the balcony. We didn't do much, except spend time together, but hey...... it was all about that, not sunbathing or shopping.
I did have an interesting journey there. I decided to get the bus, but made the unfortunate mistake of booking the Upper Egypt service rather than the Superjet.
The bus left Luxor at 7am on the dot! Brilliant I thought, on time! Hmmmm a bit presumptive of me. By 7.45am, I could see the skyline of Qena in the distance, bang on time, and this was after we had picked up sundry bus company workers going to the depot in Qena. Then we hit Qena! A large detour around the city found us in the bus depot fuelling station, where we were filled up with fuel, with all the passengers sitting on the bus. Once we had done that, we headed back into Qena to yet another depot where we were thoroughly hosed down..... again with all of us still sitting on the bus. Once clean, we were joined by a man with an extremely large bus tyre who managed to get the said tyre on the bus and off we went..... to yet another depot to deposit the man and his tyre there.
Finally, some 2 hours after arriving in Qena, we left and headed for the Eastern Desert road to Hurghada. A brief 15 minute stop for toilets at 85kilo cafe, and we were off again. My nearest neighbour passengers were 4 German people who were heading for Safaga. Why did I get a bad feeling about this?
We reached the end of the desert road, with Safaga directly in front of us, but we turned right and headed towards El Quseir, drove for about 20 minutes before taking a small road which doubled back towards Safaga. Ok I thought, the bus station must be this end of town. Minutes later we were in yet another bus depot being refuelled and hosed down. The nice German people asked if that was where they needed to get off the bus........they got an emphatic "no! Stay!" So they did.
We returned to the main coast road, fully expecting to turn into Safaga itself but the bus bowled its way past Safaga towards Hurghada. I was a tad concerned, so spoke to the Germans, who had no idea of where they were, and they spoke again to the driver. He had forgotten them! And then he wanted to just leave them in the middle of nowhere so they could take a taxi back to Safaga. Eventually, we turned around and took them to the outskirts of Hurghada and left them to get a taxi from there.
I eventually arrived in Hurghada at 2pm, some 7 hours after leaving Luxor! Needless to say, I returned on the Superjet bus, 4 hours door to door almost!
Just one of those stories that we just shrug off here in Egypt, We would go insane if we didn't learn to just "go with the flow"
