The first part is an abbreviated trip with hotels and some travel costs & ratings. Following is a more detailed account (for the patient).
Photos Costs & Ratings (note I will rate hostels/pensions on a hostel/pension scale)
Cairo: Pension Vienna 4USD/night/pp 2/5 stars: Best price in town, good location, hot water, limited AC. Loud, dirty, and hard sell on tours.
CAI/ALEXandria Train 6USD o/w 3/5 stars: Clean, big seats 2-wide, on time, just a notch below Amtrak.
CAI/LUXor Train 12USDo/w 2/5 stars: 6 person compartment (Nefertiti class) on the way up which can be cramped
Luxor: Nefertiti 8USD/night/pp 4/5 stars: Decent price, excellent location, cold AC, own bathroom, hot water, pool table, free breakfast, pool table. One of the better hostels I've stayed in, although not much of a community there.
Athens: 6Euro from Airport to Plaka The Athens Backpackers 25Euro/night/pp 3.5/5 stars: A bit expensive, great location, cramped quarters. Great community and plenty to drink, but I got the feeling that the staff thought they were better than us. A bunch of them just hang out and drink together.
Santorini: ~25Euro from Athens(Piraeus)-Santorini Hotel Martini ~25Euro/night/pp 4/5 stars: Pretty far outside of the city- Hard to judge because the town was largely empty. Clean, own bathroom. This was more of a hotel.
Mykonos: ~10Euro from Santorini-Myknons via Ferry Ibiscus ~25Euro/night/pp 3/5 stars: Similar to Martini. Also far above the city and hard to judge. Clean, comfortable rooms with bathroom.
Selcuk: Kiwi Pension ~12USD/night/pp 4/5 stars: Own room, (hot) shower, AC. Also has a pool, but I didn't see it. Pool table is offbalance and not a complete set of balls. Pretty empty but a few nice people.
Istanbul ~40USD bus ride (via Cannakle) Istanbul Hostel ~15USD/night/pp 2.5/5 stars: VERY cramped quarters, shared bathroom, sort of shady staff, although I didn't have any runins with them. Great location, if you want to stay in Sulthanamet.
Thursday, September 29th Depart at 5:30PM for 7:15 flight out of Detroit. Naturally, there is traffic on I-94 so we're late for our international flight. I think we're screwed, but when we get there at 6:35 the dude at the check in counter lets us on. Wonderful.
The Flights From Detroit to CDG to CAI - Air France In addition to in-seat entertainment, I'm pleased to learn that the AF A330's have a video camera in the nose cone of the plane, which means I can watch the plane take off and go overland. I'm sitting next to a Romanian who was living in Pittsburgh, and in the next hour manage to get myself invited to Romania "any time I want". The food and entertainment are good, and despite a monster 2 year old in front of me I get a little sleep. There is a four hour layover in Paris, so we doze in the E terminal and wait for another A330 flight to Cairo.
Cairo
Getting in Despite landing at 5:30, its pitch dark. Turns out Cairo is in the same time zone as Paris (I can only attribute this to Ramadan, but its driving my internal clock buggy). I sent a message ahead to the Pension Vienna asking someone to pick us up and sure enough, someone is waiting for us out of customs. He takes us to our cab which, for some reason, plays "its a small world" when we're in reverse, and its a 40 minute cab ride into the heart of Cairo.
The Hotel. Once upstairs we meet our "host", who insists we have tea with him. Turns out, its just a ploy to try to sell us a package down to Luxor and Aswan, something we're hesitant to accept. In fact, the Lonely Planet Egypt guide warns specifically about this. It takes us nearly an hour to get out of this guy's clenches, then he walks outside with us and directs us into a Lotus Oil shop where we get another hard sell for perfume oil. Another half hour goes by and we break free of the crazies. But for 4$ a night each, who can complain?
The City On the first night we walk westward to the island of Zamalek. In my opinion this is the nicest area of Cairo and at this point we just want some peace and quiet. We walk northward from the southern bridge than back across, through the city and back towards the pension. Lots of men, water pipes and stray cats. No beer, women or traffic laws. Dinner is at a local jaunt just east of the Cairo Museum, 2 kebabs (I think) and Fanta for 3usd total.
The next day we give in and pay our hosts 20usd to drive us to Giza and around the city. Naturally, Syed, our driver takes us to a camel shop first, where they give us the hard sell for a camel ride. No dice. Up to the pyramids we go, where we walk down and around to the Sphynx. Its still early so the isn't much traffic. At the gate I learn that Egyptians pay 2LE versus the student 20LE and visitor 30LE entrance fee, so being dark skinned I give the guy 2 pounds and he gives me a ticket without a word. Unfortunately, Syed our driver turns me in and I have to give up another 18LE for myself. Luckily the ticket salesman didn't know the difference between my drivers license and a student ID.
Out from Giza we see the Citadel on top of the city, then from there we are taken home. Again we walk to Zamalek where I meet a nice Indian girl at dinner and we all go out to the bar in Zamalek. Several Vodka Tonics later I'm in great shape.
I wake up with a stomach ache. We work our way down to the train station for a 7AM train to Alexandria that I sleep through then hang out in the city. I'm not feeling well at all, and refrain from food all day. We see the new Alexandrian Library and consider the Graeco-Roman Museum but all I want to do is lie on the seawall and die, so not much happens that day. As I'm lying on the seawall an Arab comes up to me and starts jabbering in Arabic, but I shake my head and shoo him off. Probably selling me something. I point to my stomach. Yes, my stomach hurts. Yes, go away. Five minutes later he comes back and produces a box of pills and says "pharmacy" to me. Great, I say to him and reach for my wallet, because I'm sure he wants money, but when I look up he's gone. I open the box (it's stomach medicine) and find 8 pills and 5 Egyptian pounds.
Good intentions aside, the pills don't help and I sleep from Alexandria to Cairo and onward to Luxor. We share an overnight compartment (12USD with a student ID) with two friendly Indians and two not-so-friendly Eastern Europeans, and swap stories all around. The Indians say they have a nice hotel picked out, so we decide to tag along with them.
Luxor
The Hotel The overnight train gets in at 8, and the Indians have arranged transportation for us, so I ride shotgun to the hotel. Nefertiti Hotel is quite pleasant, and our driver invites us up to the terrace for tea. And then he starts to talk about tours. I slump in my chair and the Indians fend him off. Luckily he gives up after 10 minutes. Our room as aircon, two beds and a shower/toilet for 8usd night each/night, so we're pretty happy.
The City Only 200m from our hotel is the Luxor Temple, so we pay respect. I'm still feeling queasy, so after the first temple I decide to go back to the hotel and crash. Later we walk down to the Kings Head Pub in the "nicer area", where I am finally able to eat some spaghetti. Back at the hotel, I discover that the Indian girl is a nurse, and she gives me some more medication.
The next morning all four of us join an American ex-pat from Dubai and take a tour out to the Collossi of Memnos, Valley of the Kings, Queens, Temple of Hapshepsut and Alabaster factory for about 15usd each. We get our own "Egyptologist". I enquire about his qualifications and he says he went to "egyptologist school". "Cool" I say. I should enroll in this.
The tour takes much of the day, and when we return we have a late lunch then wander a bit more around the city. On the way home we encounter a pack of celebrating Muslims, for today is the first day of Ramadan. Nearly 250 young men ride two trucks down the street. Some run around and stage mock battles against the trucks with butcher knives and swords. I consider taking a picture, but then I consider getting skewered by an angry young man and back off. We have dinner with the Indians across the street from the hostel, I buy some saffron and we hop an overnight train back to Cairo.
Athens
Getting there We take a 02:45 Olympic Airlines flight from Cairo to Athens, but after spending the entire day waiting around in Cairo, are in no mood to fly. I sleep through breakfast on the plane, and when we deplane at 6:45AM I feel like I just got hit by a bus. It's an 8E train ride into the city, then additional 2E metro ride up to the Acropolis area.
The Hotel The Athens Backpackers is in the Plaka area, just east of the Acropolis, but when we get there its too early to check in. It costs about 25E each for a 6 bed dorm room right in the heart of the city. Each room had its own bathroom and aircon, and remarkably nobody snored, so I was pretty happy. Very clean, and tons of interesting (and a few not-so-interesting) people to talk too.
The City Its too early to check in on the first day, so we walk around the Plaka area for the majority of the day. Despite the reports that I had heard that Athens was dirty, I can't find a filthy thing in the city. There are tons of closed off streets, clean squares and shops to check out. I stop in a Playlife store and pick up a few sundry items. We walk up to the hill neighboring the Acropolis for sunset and take a few photos, then meander back down to the Plaka for dinner.
Our friend from Michigan meets us at 7am at the hostel, although I'm asleep. Together, we strike out to the Acropolis, Agora, Kerameikos Plaka and Temple of Zeus in that order, hitting all of the hot spots and restaurants. To get into all of the attractions costs some 16E, so I am pleased to save a bit of money. We also visit a travel agent and buy some ferry tickets to Santorini, based on recommendations from our ex pat friend from Dubai. That night we get a few beers in the Plaka then take the train to Monastiraki and walk north to a sprawling bar area, packed with Athenians and not a tourist in sight. We get a few local beers and call it a night, because we have a 7AM ferry to Santorini. On the way back I pick a lime from our tree-line street and huck it at a stray cat, and to my delight hit it right in the back. Poor cat.
The Isles
It's a total of 40E to take a ferry from Athens to Santorini to Mykonos to Samos. From Piraeus (the Athenian Port), we first took a giant Blue Star ferry to Santorini, where we stayed in a moderately priced hotel (Martini) above the city. Nice pool and view, but too cold to swim (~70F).
Walking back into the business district I run into some girls I met on the ferry, and we all make plans to get drinks later. Two gyros later, we find them at a bar called Tropical, where we have some grog and watch the sunset. I strike up a conversation with the bartender/owner who happens to be from California and have a fantastic music selection. Three bottles of wine, four rounds of vodka tonics, a round of mohito's and three bars later, the two of us decide to take our friend from Athens home because he's so drunk he thinks he's in New York.
We have a ferry at 11am the next morning, so we bid our Athenian companion off and head north on a high speed catamaran to Mykonos. Hotel Ibiscus has closed for the season, but they open up one room for us at a modest 50E/night. Into Mykonos we wander and we see the windmills, cranes and a few local bars. In particular, we make cozy with an Internet cafe in the center of the city because they have a clean bathroom and both of us are still sick. All in all, however, we spend the majority of the time lounging around, eating crepes and gyros because tourist season is nearly over and the city isn't too bustling. Everywhere we go though we see geriatrics from cruise ships and stray cats, neither of which we find interesting.
After two nights in Mykonos we board an overnight ferry to Samos, where we immediately catch another ferry into western Turkey. Along the way we meet an older Canadian couple from Toronto who leased their house out for a year and are traveling around the world. They tell me that traveling on a cruise ship for the rest of one's natural life can be less expensive a nursing home. Another chap tells me that on a cruise with 1100 people, an average of 5 people die each trip and are taken off during the night in a helicopter.
Turkey
The Turkish ferry arrives into the mainland at around noon, and we immediately take a bus inland to Selcuk. Based on our Lonely Planet Guide we find a contact for the Kiwi Pension and check in there for about 12E/night each, then we walk down the street to get some sort of sausage sandwiches for lunch. Frankly, the cooks didn't understand me so I could have gotten fried donkey burgers for all I know. We cross back to the bus station and take a mini-bus over to Ephesus, 2km away. For a modest fee we spend several hours climbing around the ruins (some reconstructed, some not) and the Citadel where St. John is buried, then return to the city and pander around until we meet a Canadian at our hostel who joins for dinner at Amazon, a restaurant near the foot of the Citadel. Adrian has been traveling around in Turkey for weeks and gives us some tips on Istanbul.
At 18usd, a bus takes us to Cannakle the next day, but by the time we get there we are unable to see Gallopoli or Troy. So again we mill around the city, which, for some reason never gets old. Cannakle is a pleasant seaside city and everyone gawks at our backpacks, so we become comfortable in the "non-tourist" city where nobody is heckling us. Adrian taught us how to play backgammon at the bar the previous night, so after checking into a local hostel we buy an awful bottle of Turkish wine and play backgammon with a couple of young British doctors.
Istanbul
Another motor coach takes us across the strait and into the European continent the next morning, and by mid afternoon we are in Istanbul. I had booked rooms at the Antique Hostel, but upon our arrival they know nothing of it. Apparently, hostelworld.com precedes hostels.com when it comes to on line booking. Needless to say, the move us over to the Istanbul hostel, right down the street, and into a dorm room of 13 (I counted) beds.
I might interject at this point that the Sulthanamet area is great to hang out in but its uber-touristy. If I went again I would stay in Taksim.
Out into the city we see the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sofia, as well as taking the T4 bus to Taksim both nights. Despite the overwhelming Muslim population (during Ramadan), the bars were full in Taksim the whole time, and all one had to do was say "EFES" and hold your hands wide to get a large local beer. The T4 bus between Sulthanamet and Taksim (for the train doesn't go under the Bosporus) was only like 2$, but we found that it was just as inexpensive to grab two locals and share a cab.
On our last day in town we visited the Grand Bazaar, east of Sulthanamet, which has got to be one of the wildest things I've ever seen in my life. Apparently this area has 7km of streets all covered in shops, and this is where I picked up the majority of the crap, er gifts for my family.
And with that, and a backpack that is twice my size we head to the airport for a jaunt in Paris and a completely-asleep flight back into Detroit.
To enter a coupon code in your post please enter the following info:
Coupon Code:
Coupon Offer:
Merchant:
Expires (optional):
Restrictions (optional):
saving...
Quick Summary is created and edited by users like you... Add FAQ's, Links and other Relevant Information by clicking the edit button in the lower right hand corner of this message.
Sounds like a fun trip. Thanks for writing it. Check out http://www.travelpunk.com and consider posting your trip report there. Knowledge helps fellow travelers! Gave you green, cheers!
Thanks for the rundown, Nat; it's always more interesting to hear a first person account than a generic guidebook synopsis, even on the places one has already been to...different perspectives, etc.. Nice pics, too (I see you met the pelicans on Mykonos...bizarre to see those huge things wandering in & out of shops isn't it?)
I'll second your implied suggestion to stay in the Plaka area of Athens; lots to see & do within walking distance...important in Athens since a lot of the city, unlike, say, much of Rome, is a "modern" city with little of interest, unremarkable architecture, etc. Handy if you decide to make soup & have to run out for a nice lamb's head or something.
Haven't had my own illness in Egypt episode yet, but I'll relay one: I have a friend who was in the Secret Service detail for Walter Mondale on a trip to Egypt in the 70's. Several of them got almost deathly sick from something (salad?) and basically couldn't eat for several days. Eventually they felt like they might could eat a little, so tried to think of something bland that was unlikely to be contaminated & decided on boiled egss. He said they got the Egyptians to get them some eggs & boiled them themselves in the hotel kitchen for about 20 minutes. Only problem was when they cracked the eggs, they were red & smelled like fish...not at all something that would settle their stomachs, just the opposite, in fact. Turns out the chickens were fed on fish scraps/guts, etc. They ate toast for a few days. I hope not to repeat this particular adventure.
cathammer said:Thanks for the rundown, Nat; it's always more interesting to hear a first person account than a generic guidebook synopsis, even on the places one has already been to...different perspectives, etc.. Nice pics, too (I see you met the pelicans on Mykonos...bizarre to see those huge things wandering in & out of shops isn't it?)
I'll second your implied suggestion to stay in the Plaka area of Athens; lots to see & do within walking distance...important in Athens since a lot of the city, unlike, say, much of Rome, is a "modern" city with little of interest, unremarkable architecture, etc. Handy if you decide to make soup & have to run out for a nice lamb's head or something.
Haven't had my own illness in Egypt episode yet, but I'll relay one: I have a friend who was in the Secret Service detail for Walter Mondale on a trip to Egypt in the 70's. Several of them got almost deathly sick from something (salad?) and basically couldn't eat for several days. Eventually they felt like they might could eat a little, so tried to think of something bland that was unlikely to be contaminated & decided on boiled egss. He said they got the Egyptians to get them some eggs & boiled them themselves in the hotel kitchen for about 20 minutes. Only problem was when they cracked the eggs, they were red & smelled like fish...not at all something that would settle their stomachs, just the opposite, in fact. Turns out the chickens were fed on fish scraps/guts, etc. They ate toast for a few days. I hope not to repeat this particular adventure.
Thanks for the props. Have you started your Zithromax drip yet?
With this $35(your price) are we to say it also includes transportation and living in hostels/hotels? This is for Egypt only. I would also like to PM you about this since me and friend(s) are planning to go to Egypt, and since you backpacked hopefully you could help us.Thanks.
nasshea said:With this $35(your price) are we to say it also includes transportation and living in hostels/hotels? This is for Egypt only. I would also like to PM you about this since me and friend(s) are planning to go to Egypt, and since you backpacked hopefully you could help us.Thanks.
Sure- For example: Hotel: 4$ Food: 8$ (free breakfast) Pyramids: 5$ Train to Alexandria and Back: 12$ Taxis in Alexandria: 4$ = 33$
You could easily beat that if you just hung out in Cairo. Unless you want to drink. That will add up. PM me and I'll send you anything I know.
dang man thats ridiculous..those prices seem like how much youd spend in india..
Yea I went on expedia.com to see how much it would cost to get flights from different points in europe from jfk to london then from paris to rome.............then from munich or berlin to jfk all together it costs about $2000 on Alitalia...I think thats pretty good if your just going to stay in those cities..or else I suppose the Eurail passes would be better? That question is directed to Nat if he used/brought the eurail passes.
nasshea said:dang man thats ridiculous..those prices seem like how much youd spend in india..
Yea I went on expedia.com to see how much it would cost to get flights from different points in europe from jfk to london then from paris to rome.............then from munich or berlin to jfk all together it costs about $2000 on Alitalia...I think thats pretty good if your just going to stay in those cities..or else I suppose the Eurail passes would be better? That question is directed to Nat if he used/brought the eurail passes.
There are several topics on this which you can search on in the forum, but I will distill them down for you real quick. Basically I think most people agree that the best way to do it is to fly into London for cheap then take a ryanair/easyjet onto the mainland, then from there get a eurail pass. So it would be something like: overseas ticket:$500 europe ticket:$25 - 50 eurail pass: $350 = 900$ This is basically what I did a few years ago.
Disclaimer: By providing links to other sites, FatWallet.com does not guarantee, approve or endorse the information or products available at these sites, nor does a link indicate any association with or endorsement by the linked site to FatWallet.com.
. 
