danger zone

years ago- about eight weeks before I was about to leave for a planned trip to Egypt and Jordan fresh violence broke out in the middle east.  my father was adamant that I would be crazy to even think of going.  I asked my mother what her opinion was and she told me "I would go."  and so I did- and not only did I go and have a superb trip, I met my friend Jennifer on the trip. 

small group travel is good news and bad news- if you get a good group like the one we had in Egypt - it adds to the experience- a bad (like our China group) detracts.  the Egypt group was made up three couples and ten single folks traveling either alone or with friends. 

so you might be thinking- where is this leading?  well my friend Jennifer (from the Egypt trip all those years ago and later SE Asia - just the two of us- and even later Austria and Venice for opera etc.) and I are scheduled to leave for Tunisia on March 24th.  and you might have noticed the dictator of Tunisia fled the country yesterday after extensive rioting.  I thought I would see what the State Department had to say on the matter and their alert expires well before we are scheduled to leave- phew! no dilemma. 

my mom and I - and I will bet Jennifer as well- will be heading in that direction in the not too distant future. 

meanwhile I will leave you with some photos of the first trip with Jen.

one of the highlights was a balloon adventure at dawn over the Valley of the Kings- we had two balloons and Jen and I were in the yellow and green one.

 Jen - in the beige knit cap - looking out (facing away from the camera)

views from the balloon over excavations and planted fields through the morning mists

on another morning we went early to the tomb of Nefertiti - there are a limited number of tickets available for the entrance to the tomb, which was incredibly well preserved - these were low light un-retouched photos from the inside

and one further memory.  we stopped one day for lunch at a place where this young lady was making flat breads - we consumed "mass quantities" of these breads with various mezzes- I still remember how good they were (and I bet Jen does too.)

and here is a photo of part of the group- Jen on the left and me third from left- we were visiting a temple along the Nile and our guide suggested we dress in local garb that day- we certainly got stares from pretty much everyone.

I apologize for the pre-digital photos- they certainly lack the resolution we have today. but I think the sense of the trip comes through.