TRIP: England, Greece, Turkey, and Egypt April 2, 1998-May 16, 1998.

Trip Photographs



In total it was an exciting trip, though definitely not an easy one. We slept in at least fourteen different beds; some mattresses sagged, some had springs that dug into us, most were thin and hard, so we are glad to be back in our own bed with Metoo our cat sleeping on us again.

We left San Francisco on April 2 (April first seemed like a bad day to start), flew to London, picked up a rental car and drove straight to Stonehenge. The weather was cold and gray and a sharp wind was blowing, but Stonehenge was still a powerful experience; the massive stones seemed to be huddling together on the hilltop for warmth. Construction began there circa 1800 BC and at one time there was a double ring of eighty-two 5 ton blue stones which had been transported from a quarry in Wales 130 miles away, and another thirty 26 ton uprights (sarsens) each planted with ten feet showing above ground that were dragged here from twenty miles away. There must have been a compelling reason for people to have gone to all this effort, and these megaliths must have witnessed some incredible scenes.

We left Stonehenge and continued west through farm country to Glastonbury, the spiritual heart of England, where Joseph of Arimethea is thought to have fled after the Crucifixion. Joseph may have built the world's first Christian church there in AD 63. The grounds that the wattle and daub church (now gone) was built on would later become the site of a great Abbey.

Glastonbury Abbey was one of England's centers of learning and scholarship until Henry VIII ordered it dismantled in 1539. The abbot had dared question Henry's authority over the Catholic Church; for this he was beheaded and quartered and the abbey torn down. The crown's position was that the abbot had been illegally pocketing funds, however the crown did increase it's land holdings by as much as one third of all English lands by 'suppressing' the Catholic Church. Now only broken walls stand on the gently sloping lawns where once there were thirty great buildings bustling with activity.

It was on Abbey grounds in 1191, according to Gerald of Wales, a contemporary, that the bodies of King Arthur and Guinevere were discovered. They were found sixteen feet down, below a stone slab with the inscription: "Here in the isle of Avalon lies buried the renowned King Arthur, with Guinevere, his second wife." Their bodies have since disappeared, supposedly reburied, but they caused a considerable stir at the time, revitalizing Glastonbury as a place of pilgrimage.

Near the other end of town, surrounded by beautiful English country gardens, is Chalice Well where Joseph of Arimethea is said to have hidden the Chalice-perhaps it is the abundant iron in the water which coats everything it flows over a deep rust color, that gave rise to this belief. It felt like holy ground and we found ourselves speaking in whispers. The rain stopped, the sun came out and the flowers looked bejeweled.

In 1991 I had stayed at a B&B in nearby Boltonsborough for two months while I explored Crop Circles and Neolithic sites, and now hoped to reconnect with the ladies (sisters) who ran it. They had retired, sold the B&B, and were living a short distance away in an old barn they had converted into a beautiful country home with lovely flower gardens. Carol, Shirley and I had become quite close and were delighted to see each other again. We sat in their living room and the three of us regaled Barbara with humorous stories about each other as we all laughed, ate cookies and drank tea. They invited us to stay the night and we accepted and took them out to dinner at a rustic tavern nearby. We drank a bit too much and had a wonderful time. That night we slept in what was to be our last comfortable bed for the next six weeks.

Next morning in their spacious sunlit kitchen we were joined by their (amused) Aunt Alice who lives somewhere in the house, watches a lot of TV and only appears for breakfast, and Michael, a neighbor both sisters had once dated with whom I had become friends in '91. Michael, now seventy, use to make miniature sets of arms and armor for museums and collectors until arthritis crippled his hands a few years ago. Soon the five of us were eating eggs on toast, drinking tea, taking part in several conversations at once, and laughing. Good people, a good way to start.

Barbara and I had planned this trip so we would be traveling from easier conditions to more difficult ones and from recent sites to more ancient ones as we made our way toward Egypt across parts of three continents and onto a fourth (America, Europe, Asia and Africa).

After a long breakfast we said our good-byes and headed north to Bath to visit the restored Roman hot-spring baths built over sacred Celtic ground where the goddess was once worshipped. Among the most poignant items on display in the Bath Museum were small sheets of lead (approx. 2" square) inscribed in Latin, discovered when the springs were renovated in the 1600's. Many were curses leveled at people who had stolen money, sandals, and even togas from the ancient bathers; one listed eight prime suspects for the goddess to investigate. That night we drove back into the countryside and got a room in a B&B at the foot of a hill decorated with a huge design of a horse (Cherhill White Horse, 220' tall) carved through the soil to reveal the white limestone underneath.

Early next morning in a light rain we climbed Silbury Hill-a massive 130 foot high earthen mound formed over a six tier limestone construction around 2645 BC (two centuries before the Great Pyramid in Egypt); it has been estimated that it took eighteen million person-hours to complete. Who built the mound, or why, is not known, but many now believe it represents the great swollen belly of pregnant mother earth, and they find elements in the surrounding landscape which seem to support this vision.

We spent the rest of that morning wandering around nearby Avebury-like Stonehenge a megalithic site, though a much grander design and large enough to contain a whole village (it does) or a dozen Stonehenges inside it's vast circle of stones. Most of the stones are now considerably smaller than they once were because from the 15th through the 17th centuries they became the targets of spirited destructive energies. Local ministers, believing they sensed evil in the great stones, stirred up their congregations then led them out to topple and smash the megaliths. Even so, many of the remaining stones still command such presence that they have been given personal names by the locals.

Driving on to Oxford we checked into a hotel then spent the afternoon in the Ashmoleon Museum. It contains one of the world's best and most beautifully displayed collections of Egyptian antiquities (many other cultures as well). We stayed in Oxford for three days in order to keep revisiting the collection, and were invited by a curator, who appreciated our interest, to have a private tour of a locked section of the museum.

When first visiting the Ashmoleon in 1991 I had a strange experience in the Egyptian section. I had just entered the room when suddenly intense and unfamiliar feelings swept through me. Stepping forward and peering into the case facing me I saw the mummy of an Egyptian priest lying in his sarcophagus; a small sign it beside gave details of his life. Never having been to Egypt, the information did not mean much to me, however, still shaken, I copied it all into my notebook.

Two years later while traveling in Egypt for the first time, as I stood studying some colorful bas-reliefs on a wall in Medinet Habu, a Ramses III mortuary complex on the west bank of Luxor, I was abruptly overcome by the same intense feelings I had in the Ashmoleon and then realized that I recognized the reliefs, knew what images were coming next, saw strong similarities to my own work , and had the eerie sensation of tools in my hands. Later, back home in California, I dug out my 1991 trip notebook and discovered that the Egyptian priest I had seen in the Ashmoleon had indeed come from Medinet Habu. In 1996 I was able to revisit the temple several times and though I looked for hours was unable to locate that same wall again.

Back to our recent trip: one afternoon Barbara and I drove from Oxford to Andoversford to have dinner with my good friend Roger and his wife Diana. Roger is a retired forensic police officer who has given me considerable assistance assembling my antiquities collection. Last year he was out flying in a small plane with a friend and because the drought had dramatically affected the crops Roger was able to spot the outline of a Roman villa-which later turned out to be the largest ever discovered in England. A few months ago the BBC devoted three one hour television programs to Roger and his discovery.

Roger and Diana took us to see the old stone house they were renovating, and as we were walking in the back field, Roger bent down, picked up something white, and handed it to Barbara...a marble tile from another Roman estate. He recently reentered a university to get an advanced degree in archaeology, but has been so busy going off on explorations (one was a recent trip up the Zambezi River in search of a lost city) that he seldom has time to attend class. We had a most enjoyable visit with these two delightful and fascinating people, ending with a leisurely dinner in a nearby pub.

The British Museum in London was our last major stop before leaving England. Part of the museum was closed for repairs, but there was still much to see. Of special interest to us were the antiquity collections and the Elgin Marbles-English Lord Elgin had purchased the marble friezes from the Turks occupying Athens in 1807 when the Ottoman Empire included Greece. The next day in Athens we would see where those marble statues belonged....on the Parthanon. Happily, England now seems to have agreed to return them to Athens in time for the next Olympics.

Athens-our plane landed at noon, the clouds parted and the temperature rose a good 15 degrees; however, the air was also severely polluted, as it would be in every city we visited for the duration of the trip. Barbara and I enjoyed romantic meals at outdoor cafes located in the heart of the ancient section of town (the Agora) nestled at the foot of the Acropolis amidst a maze of narrow alleyways. We visited the three major antiquity museums, and spent hours wandering alone through the woods on the Acropolis, marveling at the abundance of ancient pottery shards we saw scattered underfoot.

We began to run short of time and decided to take a tour to Delphi. It was a three hour bus trip from Athens, but a beautiful drive and well worth it. Delphi lies high in the Parnassos Mountains and is home to the ancient world's most famous oracle. Plutarch, a priest of Apollo, wrote that Delphi was discovered by a shepherd investigating what had driven his flock into a frenzy; when he approached the cave he too came under its spell and began uttering prophecies, as did all the townspeople who would get too close. Barbara and I were able to slip off by ourselves and sit on the edge of the Temple of Apollo, whose ruins lie directly over the oracle cave, meditating long enough for each of us to get some sense of the unique energy there. I felt a nearly overwhelming presence deep in the ground beneath us and my imagination was flooded with images. We would have liked to have spent much more time there.

The next day we caught a small commuter plane to Santorini, half of a volcanic island left after an enormous eruption circa 1450 BC destroyed the rest of it. Ships can now sail into the flooded cauldera and it is quite thrilling, as you draw closer, to realize that the white haze you have been seeing along the top of the volcano's 1100' high wall is actually Fira, the main town-a cluster of beautiful whitewashed houses and shops clinging to the volcano's inner edge.

Santorini proved to be the most relaxing and naturally beautiful stop on our trip. We rented a little yellow motorcycle (automatic, easy to drive) and set off to explore the island, having great fun driving down dirt roads in search of quiet, secluded, out-of-the-way places. One such place was a beach covered entirely with small rounded pumice stones that crunched underfoot like icy snow. Another was a magical cave.

From below we saw what looked like a patch of snow on the mountain, and after searching located a path that seemed to lead up in that direction. It was incredibly steep, causing us to have to stop frequently to catch our breaths, but we finally arrived at a small white-washed and blue chapel with a great tree shading it and the adjacent courtyard. Behind lay the entrance to the cave. We entered the darkness following the sound of dripping water to a place where a fresh-water spring flowed into a crystal clear pool which then cascaded into a series of other pools, creating a beautiful blending of sounds-a vein of pure water running up the inside of the volcano to empty into this sacred space. Melted candles on the cave floor around us told us that others also considered this place holy.

Santorini is a fairly small island, only about 14 miles from end to end, in the shape of a C, and on it are the ruins of two ancient cities: Akrotiri and Ancient Thera.

Akrotiri, which is still being excavated, was discovered in the 1860's by workers quarrying volcanic ash to make water-resistant cement for the Suez Canal. A huge roof has now been raised over the entire site, and slowly an ancient town is emerging from underneath thirty feet of volcanic debris. The fabulous frescos on display in the Athens Archaeological Museum came from here, to be returned once the excavation is completed.

Ninth century BC post-eruption Ancient Thera is the other major archaeological site. It lies at the top of a cobblestone-switchback road (white-knuckle driving) on one of the highest parts of the island. Standing among the toppled white marble columns and paved walkways we could see ten other islands in the hazy blue distance and imagined what a beautiful place this must have been to have lived...except for the volcanic part.

Santorini is a charming combination of history, natural beauty, beaches, hotel rooms with amazing views, friendly people, and good food. Try to avoid the summer crush; May and September are perhaps the best times to visit. We rented a room in a pension (100 yards from town) with a balcony overlooking a blue and white chapel for $14 a night (we were there off-season in mid-April).

After three and a half days of relaxation we flew back to Athens, switched planes to Istanbul, and again to Ankara. We checked into a hotel near the Hittite Museum, which was what we had come to see. Sixty attractive young Russians women were staying in our hotel and after we had become friendly with the desk clerk (who had lived in Australia and spoke English with Turkish/Australian accent) he told us that they were exotic dancers/prostitutes-sad evidence of the economic strife back in Russia. Men kept calling our room in the middle of the night asking for Natalie.

The Hittite Museum has a truly amazing collection of artifacts representing all known ancient Turkish cultures, and we spent the better part of a day there, going through the entire museum three times. Otherwise, Ankara didn't seem to have much to recommend it. On our first evening in town we went walking up the hill to the ruins of an Ottoman castle overlooking the city. Along the way we passed through a small market, saw animal parts lying in the dirt road, then had two ten year old boys follow us and offer me sex for money, only to have them halfheartedly throw stones at us when I declined. What upset us most were not the stones, but the thought that some tourists must have been paying them. We turned back and gave the boys some of the candies we carry to share with children.

Our preference is to stay in modest hotels and go out walking as much as possible to get a better sense of the cultures we visit. It can be a difficult way to travel, but we usually find that the further we get from other tourists, the better we are treated, and the more smiling faces we encounter.

After two nights in Ankara we were glad to catch the bus for Cappadocia. Turkish buses are wonderful, the best. Beside being big, comfortable and spotlessly clean, they have a steward on board who brings around drinks and scented hand lotion.

Cappadocia is a volcanic plain three and a half hours SE of Ankara by bus. Ten million years ago three neighboring volcanoes erupted and covered the area with a thick layer of ash that hardened into a soft stone called tufa. Over the millennia water and sand have eroded the tufa leaving thousands of strange and fantastical shapes-like brilliant Spanish architect Gaudi run amuck. The landscape is windswept and desolate, with few trees, so the ancient people took advantage of nature's gift and hollowed out the tufa mounds to create homes and shops for themselves.

Later, when Christianity came to the area, small, beautiful churches were dug into the tufa and brilliant frescos were painted on the interior walls. Muslims would later pass through and deface much of the art (human images do not appear in Islamic art because of Koranic law against idolatry), but a few amazing examples have survived, especially in Goreme Valley. We wandered around the valley for hours, climbing up and down precarious rock cut steps to the churches, testing the acoustics with our voices and imagining the rooms filled with heavenly singing. The churches seemed so perfectly shaped that you imagined you would become the songs you sang.

After leaving Goreme Valley and driving a short distance down the mountain we stopped to visit an unusual two level church. We had just climbed down the stairs to the lower level to see the confessionals when suddenly tears began to stream down my cheeks. It was confusing until I realized that wave after wave of subtle energy was pouring off the walls. Perhaps the porousness of the tufa had absorbed some of the ancient worshiper's intensity.

The oldest of Cappadocia's 35 known underground cities may have been started as early as 1700 BC. The one we explored was designed to house 20,000 people...comfortably! It's rooms, in all shapes and sizes, were connected by low, narrow corridors, and avoided forming any predictable overall design, thereby creating an amazing three-dimensional maze.

Deep vertical shafts were first dug to subterranean rivers to supply the underground cities with water and a means of disposal, then smaller horizontal shafts were cut connecting the main shaft to the underground rooms, providing fresh air at all levels. Huge millstones stood ready to be rolled into doorways if the inhabitants were discovered and attacked. This particular city's inhabitants had even carved an underground escape tunnel five and a half miles long, large enough for two people to run in abreast. Foreign armies frequently rampaged back and forth through the territory, and the underground cities greatly increased the locals chances of survival.

We stayed in Urgup in a hotel hollowed out of a tufa hillside. One days-outing we shared a van/taxi with a couple from Australia who had come to Turkey for the annual gathering at Gallipoli to honor the tens-of-thousands of Aussies, New Zealanders, and Turks who lost their lives in a series of horrific battles there in 1916. We ran into them again 400 miles later in Ephesus after they had been to Gallipoli and they told us that thousands of people had showed up, most coming from Australia-thousands standing silently on the beach holding candles, the gentle surf behind, then raising their voices together in song. Tears filled our friends eyes as they described the service.

A light snow was falling on Cappadocia as our bus left heading west to Konya, home of the Green Mosque where the great Sufi mystic-poet Rumi is buried. Rumi founded the Whirling Dervishes (Mevlevi) there in the 13th century, and they would whirl to achieve closeness to God by detaching from the reality around them. Ataturk (father of modern Turkey) outlawed the Dervishes in 1925, so Barbara and I would have to wait until we arrived in Cairo to see a 'Whirling Dervish' whirl.

Rumi would extemporize to his beloved disciple Husam who would write down the exquisite spiritual poetry:
"Come, come again, whoever, whatever you may be, come
Heathen, fire worshiper, sinful of idolatry come:
Come even if you have broken your penance a hundred times;
Ours is not the portal of dispair and misery, come."

and (translated by Coleman Barks with John Moyne ©):

"Praise to the emptiness that blanks out existence. Existence:
This place made from our love for that emptiness!
Yet somehow comes emptiness,
this existence goes.
Praise to that happening, over and over!


Another reason for stopping in Konya was to visit Çatal Hüyük, site of the world's oldest known human community, dating back to 7200 BC and lying some thirty miles south of town. We took a cab there with our hotel manager who had never been, but I think he also came along to be sure we would be safe.

Çatal Hüyük is a large grass covered tell (mound caused by centuries or millennia of human habitation) and except for the two summer-only excavation sites there isn't much to see. However, at those sites, Barbara's and my pulses quickened as we drew close enough to see a variety of ancient manmade items sticking out of the open hillside. The guard, who accompanies visitors to make certain they do not touch anything, had been a cab driver in Konya for ten years until after driving archaeologists out a number of times, he fell in love with Çatal Hüyük and got a job there as the guard. Few tourists stop, and he was happy to show us around. A delightful man. If you visit please tip him as he is a poor man with a large family.

Next, a ten hour bus trip due west to Selcuk, a small town on the edge of Ephesus, within sight of the crystal blue Aegean. The bus let us off on the roadside at ten o'clock at night, but fortunately there were a number of men standing around who offered to help us, and soon we were checked into a modest pension. The room was only $6 a night for both of us and included a large breakfast of eggs, salad, fresh bread, jam and tea. An added treat was that every weekend, just a three minute walk from our pension, the town closed four blocks of a wide avenue to accommodate a colorful farmers/craft market.

Ephesus, the best preserved ancient city in the Eastern Mediterranean, is a huge site more than a mile across filled with white marble temples, homes, shops, grand avenues, and an amphitheater which seats 25,000 where they still have an occasional concert. We wandered through the ruins on several different days, enjoying it most when we were off by ourselves sitting quietly, imagining..

It was 'Mary's House' however that drew us to the area. In 1812 a German nun by the name Anna Catherina Emmerich, in delicate health since childhood, was praying in bed when suddenly she began having seizures and bleeding profusely from her hands and feet (her stigmata was later declared genuine by an ecclesiastical commission in 1814). She then fell into a deep trance and while in trance dictated visions she was having of the lives of Jesus and the Virgin Mary, particularly the Virgin Mary after the Crucifixion. Anna's visions were recorded in seven volumes published shortly after her death in 1824. In one she gave a detailed description of the location where the Virgin Mary lived her last years.

In 1891 a priest from nearby Izmir thought he could find Mary's House from Anna's description and organized a search party. Seven days later, thirsty and on the verge of giving up, they were directed to a spring by a local farmer. What they found there (five miles above Ephesus) perfectly matched Anna's description: a steep wooded mountainside, a clear view of the Roman ruins and the Aegean Sea, a spring in this otherwise arid countryside, and the ruins of a chapel built on the foundation of what later tested to be a first century house. The spring rises to the surface below what was once the bedroom.

The Bible recounts how on the way to be crucified Jesus stopped to tell his Mother that his disciple John was to be her son now, and then turned to John and said that Mary was now his mother. We know that John later spent many years in Ephesus and is buried in his Basilica in Selcuk (we visited his tomb). Certainly John would have taken Mary with him as it would have been much too dangerous for her to stay alone in Jerusalem. There were also ancient celebrations in Selcuk, described in local church records, which support the belief that Mary once lived there. Pope Paul the VI, recognizing the site's importance, visited in 1967.

A local 'fairy' tale originating around 500 AD tells of seven young princes who took refuge in a cave at the foot of 'Mary's mountain' from the Christian persecutions. They fell into a deep sleep and did not awaken or venture out again for 175 years. Their story would became the inspiration for the character Rip Van Winkle. It is interesting that the princes, like Jesus, resurrected in a cave.

The Virgin Mary's chapel is small, with a bronze statue of Mary standing above the flowers on the alter. The statues hands are missing, broken off during the war earlier this century between the Greeks and the Turks. Along both inside side walls of the narrow chapel are sand boxes filled with pilgrim's candles which illuminate the room with a warm flickering light. One of two nuns from the Convent of the Sisters Minor of Mary Immaculate is always on duty to assist visitors.

Barbara and I were fortunate to spend time alone in the chapel, it is often jammed with people, and after coming out into the bright sunlight, the nun on duty, Sister Antonia, came up and we began talking. I liked her immediately. She had a wonderful way about her, a beautiful smile, and after we had spoken for a while I asked her where she was from originally. She smiled and replied "Well, I was born and raised in San Francisco." It turned out that her family went to the same church and school Barbara's family did. Small world. Before becoming a nun Sister Antonia had received a degree in architecture from Berkeley, then worked as an agent for the IRS. Barbara and I returned the following two days to continue our conversations with her.

Next evening saw us on the overnight bus to Istanbul, the only city in the world that straddles two continents. Barbara leaned back in her bus seat, closed her eyes, smiled and said, "Wake me when we get to Istanbul." We crossed the Bosphorus on a ferry at dawn (salmon colored sky, gray blue water, wheeling seagulls) and were fortunate to find an available a hotel room with a clear view of the Blue Mosque a few blocks away.

We stayed in Istanbul for three days and visited many of the usual sights: the huge Covered Bazaar honeycombed with shops, the open air market, Topkapi Palace (and it's jewelry museum with emeralds the size of baseballs), the Harem, the Archaeological Museum, the Underground Cistern, the Egyptian Obelisque (three fifths of which was broken off when the Turks attempted erecting it in the 18th century-it had been carved in Egypt in 1547 BC and originally weighed over 200 tons), the Kariye Museum (Christian church) with it's exquisite mosaics, the Sultanahmet (Blue Mosque), the University, and our favorite, the Hagia Sophia, a masterpiece of Byzantine architecture now showing alarming signs of age. It may sound like we raced around, but we didn't, we walked most places, visiting some several times, and ate leisurely meals. There are beautifully restored townhouses on a narrow cobblestone road behind the Hagia Sophia where one can rent lovely period rooms with breakfast at reasonable rates.

Warning: when we were in Turkey (4/98) the currency exchange was 240,000 lira to the dollar; so, $100 equaled 24,000,000 lira. It was easy to get confused, so we took time to memorize lira note values...especially after paying $75 for an orange drink at the airport (kidding).

On May 2 we caught a plane for midgets to Cairo. It was hot and dusty when we arrived but we did not care much because Egypt was to be the highlight of our trip, for which the other stops had been preparation. I have always been moved by Egyptians' friendliness, courtesy, and generosity, and have several very close friends there. The word most often heard by tourists is "Welcome." We took a room in Hotel Cosmopolitan in downtown Cairo, just a few blocks from the Egyptian Museum.

Immediately we noticed the armed police everywhere, outside the museum, on street corners, at travel agencies, and five on duty outside our hotel 24 hours a day. The police were there to reassure and protect tourists because of the recent massacres. Radical Islamic group Hamas has been trying to force Egypt to become a fundamentalist Islamic state, and they intend to do this by frightening away the tourists, their three billion tourist dollars, and their corrupt twentieth century western ideas. This would be a great tragedy because Egypt desperately needs the tourist income to survive; already unemployment hovers near fifty percent and we saw a lot of shocking poverty.

On our first night in Cairo we visited a mosque in the old city to see the 'Whirling Dervishes'. Actually, it turned out to only be one 'Dervish' with a back up band of three drummers, two tambourine players, and a flute player. Although there was no charge and it was in a mosque, it was definitely entertainment rather than spiritual practice. The dancer was fabulous however, taking his brightly colored skirts off one at a time over his head as he whirled, at one point laying on the ground and spinning a skirt over him so he was completely hidden.

Early next morning we took the thirty minute pre-rush hour cab ride to Giza and the pyramids. They were an amazing sight to see looming over the rooftops as we approached the edge of Cairo. We soon discovered, however, that the Great Pyramid was closed for ventilation repairs. Disappointed, but determined, we walked over to the administrative offices and asked to see the director, famous Egyptian archaeologist Dr. Zahi Hawass. He was in the U.S. lecturing, but after showing the next-in-charge the Egyptian images in my book, In Praise of Women, Barbara and I were graciously assigned a young archaeologist who gave us a private tour of the Great Pyramid and the three Queen's pyramids (which have only recently been opened to the public, but only one a day). .

Policemen on camels stood watch on the desert horizon.

It is difficult to describe the Great Khufu Pyramid, it has such a massive, unique presence. It was constructed in the twenty-fifth century BC using over 2.3 million stones weighing on average 2.5 tons with some stones weighing in excess of 60 tons. The stones were carved with such precision that you cannot squeeze a piece of paper between them. In order for King Khufu to complete his pyramid complex in thirty years (he ruled for thirty-two years but may have finished his complex in only twenty), a new stone had to be set in place every two and a half minutes, ten hours a day. Considering that outer casing stones once clad this enormous pyramid in a brilliant smooth white skin eight feet thick, and that there were only 1.5 million people living in all of Egypt at the time (Cairo alone has more than 15 million now) it is easy to understand why wild theories about its construction abound. It once stood 481' high, was 756' along each side, did not vary by more than half-an-inch from perfectly level around it's entire circumference, all on a base of over thirteen acres! When Napoleon, who loved solving mathematical problems, was in Egypt he calculated that there was enough stone used in the three large Giza Pyramids to build a wall ten feet high and one foot thick around France. An amusing thought for those who have suffered the sneers of Parisian waiters and hotel clerks.

The Great Pyramid is the only one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world still in existence. It is said: "All living things fear time, but time fears the Pyramid." To stand at its base looking up is a nearly overwhelming experience, astounding, humbling, awe inspiring, spiritual. There is no other place like it on earth, and it is staggering to imagine that one man had the vision, the imagination, the power and the knowledge to bring it into existence. It is now known that King Khufu's pyramid was built by willing laborers, so the king also had to have been incredibly charismatic.

Our archaeologist-guide left us and Barbara and I continued on to the Solar Boat museum. The huge disassembled boat , 147' long, was found buried in a granite pit beside the Khufu Pyramid just forty five years ago (it is estimated that perhaps only 20% of what was buried in Egypt has surfaced). The boat was then painstakingly reassembled in the original manner using rope, not nails, to bind it together. We would come back to the Giza plateau half a dozen more times, visiting the Sphinx, the pyramids (there are nine in all there), and exploring the surrounding desert. .

Another place we loved spending time was the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. That collection is the largest and best on earth by far, quite astonishing, over fifty rooms filled with amazing objects, and we were told that the basement stored an even greater number of items than were on display. We took little flashlights with us because many of the displays are poorly lit, and it made all the difference in bringing colors and details alive. To cool off during our long museum visits we would hang out in the air-conditioned treasure rooms (filled with gold jewelry inlaid with precious stones).

After five days in Cairo, we flew south to Luxor, a town that I have enjoyed so much on previous visits to Egypt that I imagined I would one day rent or buy a home there. There is so much to experience: the people, the Sahara Desert, Luxor Temple, Karnak Temple, the Valley of the Kings (Queens, Nobles, and Workmen in adjacent valleys), Medinet Habu (Ramses III's mortuary temple), Dier el-Bahri (Queen Hatshepsut's complex) and the Ramesseum-where the fallen, shattered statue of Ramses II inspired Percy Shelley to write:.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away. .


Barbara and I had hoped that the massacre of 58 tourists and four Egyptians by six terrorists (who then committed suicide rather than be taken alive) six months ago at Queen Hatshepsut's temple just outside Luxor, was an isolated act by madmen, and we were shocked and deeply disturbed to feel that very dangerous energy alive and well all around us. Granted, there were still many friendly people, but I have never traveled anywhere where I felt in so much danger from the locals. It is a terribly sad situation because tourism in Luxor is down over 90%, and the people who survive on tourist dollars (nearly everyone) are suffering greatly. It seemed to us that Luxor could easily become a ghost town. Shops and hotels stood nearly empty and my Egyptian friends had gone. Amazingly, in the middle of this tense situation we saw some tourists walking around in tight shorts and tanktops, showing a flagrant disregard for the Egyptian's culture and beliefs, and creating danger for all tourists. .

Within a few hours of arriving we went and reserved seats on the next plane out (departing the next afternoon) which would leave us in Luxor for a total of 28 hours. Since we had already rented a motorcycle, we decided to see as much as we felt we safely could. We paid especially close attention to everyone around us, and being on a motorcycle was actually safer than taking a bus or cab because we could leave as quickly as we wanted and drive over a wider variety of terrain.

Our hotel was right across the street from the Nile; we had a fabulous view from the balcony and watched the feluccas sail by in golden light as the sun set over the far bank. Later that night we walked through Luxor Temple which was beautifully lit up by spotlights-twenty foot tall statues of Ramses II came striding out of the darkness. Egypt evokes feelings in me that I have never experienced anywhere else.

Next morning after breakfast we cycled across the new bridge just south of town that connects the east and west banks (a half hour drive), visited three tombs in the Valley of the Kings and Queen Hatshepsut's complex just outside (where the massacre took place). The way into the Sahara desert behind Medinet Habu was blocked by police so we were unable to go where I found some amazing agates on my last visit (polished by thousands of years of sand blowing against them-like pearls of the desert).

Fortunately we were in time to catch the ferry back across the Nile because the intense Egyptian sun was starting to wilt us. Back in Luxor it was so hot (115 degrees) the horses left deep hoofprints in the asphalt, and it had been even hotter on the West bank. We sat in an air-conditioned restaurant overlooking Luxor Temple until it was time to catch a cab to the airport.

We were not especially happy at the thought of spending our final week in Cairo with it's heat and pollution, but to our amazement it was drizzling rain when our plane landed; the pollution cleared, the temperature lowered to a comfortable level and we had quite a pleasant week. The air was so clear that we were able to see sixteen miles across the desert from the Giza Plateau to the pyramid complex at Sakkara, and nine miles further to the pyramids at Dashur. This incredible view had been part of the ancient Egyptian's religious experience. .

Despite the problems, Egypt is still one of my favorite countries. Travels there have not been vacations for me but rather major life experiences. So that was our trip. We left Cairo on the morning of May 2 and arrived back in San Francisco 24 hours later, in the afternoon of the same day, having followed the sun our whole way home.