We did a little desert trip labeled “Following the footsteps of King Farouk, the last king of Egypt”

Roughly  70km outside of Cairo, after the Helwan toll-road, the driver literally took a 90degree left turn off the highway into the desert.  No markers or signs, just a GPS and a broken down concrete barrier showed the evidence of this unofficial route.  Apparently Bedouins use this to cross through the mountains toward the Red Sea. Why?  To smuggle hashish!

Approximately 10km into the desert on rocky dirt roads, the original tarmac road has be completely wiped out in the last 50 years by flash-floods and sandstorms, we reach the hunting outpost by King Farouk.  Apparently this was also used to house the exiled King of Albania. These days Bedouins use this for a shelter or rendezvous point and all that’s left are empty structures and dried out gardens.

Lots of dusty wind, extreme heat and harsh sun meant many of the images below had to be photoshopped a bit.
click here to read more about this trip.

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Fun was had by all, from 1 year old babies wrapped in Egyptian flags to senior women in their niqaabs now sporting Egyptian flag colors.  The absence of alcohol tends to prevent rowdiness and hooliganism normally associated with street parties.

Some photographs below.

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Firstup is hardware. I’m using a medium level Asus Notebook – K50ij series with 2gigs of ram, 320g storage, Intel Dual Core T4300.   This has surprised me with its speed and ability to multi-task with Photoshop, Corel draw, Gmail and a few other browsers. Lastly a 500g external usb powered drive for daily backups of all files, settings, software, etc. Watching movies and playing games is not a priority hence a 15” LED backlit screen suits me just fine.

For file management between JHB offices, webclients and myself. We are all using Dropbox.  The 2gig free version is more then enough to keep things going smoothly.  Website updates, advert submissions and text documents are all handled through this. A few successful referrals has bumped me to about 4gigs of online storage.

Now add in Skype, MSN, Gmail and SMS text messaging to keep constant contact with colleagues, friends and family at a near free cost.  Skype to landlines (to south african landlines) costs about R5 for a 10 minute call.  Obviously Skype to Skype is free and preferred. Free Video calls are an added bonus!

Connectivity is where Egypt shines! Broadband is fast, relatively cheap and accessible almost everywhere.

We are using Etisalat’s 3.75g hsdpa post-paid option.  1750egp (about R2360) gets you a high speed up to 7mbps USB modem and unlimited monthly usage for 6 months. Thereafter its 299pounds per month. However their ‘fair use’ policy is good for up to 6gigs. Thereafter throttled to 64k speeds.
In short, 290egp per month for 6gigs & USB modem included.  The modem has a MicroSD memory card slot which allows it to act as a flash drive too.

A cheaper option is a slightly slower USB stick modem and 1gig prepaid for 99egp (about R135) – simply recharge by paying cash at an Etisalat store or scratch cards.

Mobile phones, once again is cheap and cost effective,
SMS costs .25egp local and .80egp international.  Calls are per minute and cost between .25egp and 50egp for local calls.  We are using Skype for international calls

check out www.etisalat.com.eg for the full breakdown

Apparently the apartment we move in tomorrow has broadband at 50egp per month. While I’m not sure about the speed, it would most likely be rather fast due to an internet cafe operating in the same building. Methinks the landlord (who owns it all) piggybacks of their connectivity.

LinkDsl offers extremely cheap broadband – fellow South Africans can sob a tear when viewing their website and pricing.  We will most likely stick to 3.75g hsdpa for easier movements.

Lastly my trusty Canon 300D dslr camera has been replaced by a 1000D.  Added bonus is the SD Memory card storage and my notebook having a built in SD memory card slot.  One less device to carry with.