The Walk of Shame

We lost the Great Race.

We started with a bus from Alex to the Suez Canal. Left a little late, but no worries. We get there and get overcharged to take a taxi to the other side of town where we find a microbus to get us to Nuweiba. We argued with the drivers for an hour and a half to drop the price from 50LE to 30LE, then we drove for hours through the bumpy night. We were stopped seven times by the police to have a look at our passports and interrogate us. Interrogate means to joke around or ask us why we are in Egypt. It's really a crack security force.

We finally make it to Nuweiba and a guy that was on the bus told us to stay with him, he knew a place where his friend lived. This guy was probably about fifty, and he introduced us to his twenty-one year-old friend by saying, "This is my very best friend, I met him three months ago." We camped in the open and flies and mosquitoes bothered us the entire time. Salt water showers left my hair with the consistency of camel hair.

Like idiots we went to sleep and chose not to take the 6AM bus (it was around 4AM at this time) and upon arriving at the bus stop we found out that the 10AM bus wasn't coming. We jumped on an overpriced taxi and made it out to Dahab from Nuweiba several hours after the other group.

So we lost on time, but depending on various factors of our trip that are still under judicial scrutiny, we either won financially by an Egyptian pound or by five Egyptian pounds. We had an adventure and we made several friends and got important phone numbers.

But we still lost.

Favorite quote from the trip:
Robert: We should have left at 6AM. Then we could have gotten there first and won.
Laura: But what would we have done when we got there?
Robert: Won.

Also, I'm in Dahab now and I've snorkeled four times, swam, and I'm about to get my diving certification. We've met several awesome people and had an awesome time, and we're scheduled to be here for several weeks (traveling elsewhere, but Dahab as base camp).

It's a good life.