O Captain, My Captain

You put a lot of trust into the captain of the ship. He pilots the ships and makes sure everything is ok. Piloting is especially important when on the Nile and your in a felucca (traditional sail boat), because there's a ton of huge cruise ships that also cross the Nile. This guy, to the left here, surprisingly was an amazing captain. He also smoked, literally, 18 hours a day.

Initially, I was against the idea of sailing up the Nile for 2 days. I thought it may be too cliche and the experience dull. I don't know if I talked myself into it, or the guy selling me this tour, or the dreaded Korean-Brazilian I met talking about it, but I decided to do it. The romantic in me wanted to be in a sail boat, instead of a train, sleep under the stars, and eat whatever there was on the boat. This turned out to be a great idea.

This was our vessel. I shared it with the captain, his "first mate", 2 of the nicest people from Sweden, and a guy from Columbia. It was a small boat, but no matter, for 6 people, it was quite comfortable. The 4 passengers slept outside under the tarp, while the captain and his mate where inside in what they called "The Magic Room". The Colombian guy didn't really speak English and looked like a douche, so we really didn't have much to say to each other. The couple from Sweden were in Cairo because of an arts scholarship, but didn't find the inspiration they were hoping for.

This is not surprising.

Cairo isn't exactly an arts inspiring city.

All of us ended up on the same boat, sailing the Nile, trying to relax and get away from all of the craziness that are Egyptian cities.

We had lunch on the boat, and as I am Asian, I decided to fulfill my stereotype and take a picture of it. It was actually really good. Nothing like falafels, pita, beans and tomatoes. At this point, I noticed my first potential problem. Everything is washed in the Nile. Nile river water is cold and seemed refreshing and clean, but if you remember, Cairo is dirty, so is most all of Egypt. Most of the trash is thrown into the Nile or some gully that feeds into the Nile. There's also something called West Nile Virus. Put two and two together, and you'll see my concern.

Without any second option offered, I quietly accepted the fact that I will probably have the runs for the next couple of days and should watch out for any signs of flu-like symptoms and/or worsening GI issues. But this wasn't going to ruin my time, I will be ok.

Egypt is 98% desert. The only land that has water are a few oasis in the west and the Nile banks. But the areas that are not desert was amazingly lush and green. Maybe it's the contrast that you see, or maybe the grass is just much greener, but there's something about it that is absolutely stunning.

We started sailing at 1PM, and sailed until it was dark, which was a disappointingly short period of time, since sunset is about 6PM. We tied the boat down, and went ashore to a "Nubian village", or so the captain described. The "Nubian village" turned out to be nothing more than a small town with Nubians living there. There wasn't exactly Nubian culture or especial architecture, it was just Nubians living there. We did end up finding a coffee shop, got some Turkish coffee, and learned to play dominoes. Dinner was served on the boat, in the dark, and you ate whatever was in front of you.

This bull was not happy I was on his bank. Almost charged me.

The next day, we woke up, with no real concept of what time it was, and saw our captain smoking and cooking breakfast. As I said before, he smoked 18 hours a day. This was what his smoking schedule looked like:

I smoke two joints in the morning...I smoke two joints at night

1. Wake up, pack sheesha and smoke it while cooking breakfast.
2. Eat, while first mate rolls a couple of hash blunts.
3. Smoke said hash blunt.
4. Smoke at least 3 cigarettes
5. Pack sheesha again and smoke while cooking lunch.
6. More blunts

So, for more than 8 hours a day, I had a high captain. The rest of the time, it was just tobacco.

The trip was really enjoyable, though short. I felt quite relaxed and ready to for the craziness of Egypt. Who knew the next day the world was going to go crazy????