The view from our roof on El-Khartum Street

View from our roof...

Tonight we took this picture. It was by chance. Our satellite reception had broken down a couple of weeks ago, and Farouk and Samir were trying to repair this. The dish is on the roof and there Farouk showed us proudly "his" madrassa (the French school opposite our house, where he works) as well as the view to the mosque near us (to the right and in front) and "Qasr El-Baron" or Baron Palace (left in the back).

Baron Palace was the former residence of Baron Empain, the man who "built" Heliopolis, in the beginning of last century. It was built in 1910 and resembles the Cambodian temples of Angkor Wat. With the celebration of 100 years Heliopolis, it was open to the public for one month. The land beside it is turned into a garden and at night the Palace is beautifully lit. We visited it in the month that it was open to the public last year. All built in concrete, it does have its charm and forms a special landmark.

We soon will post some pics of the villa (and neighbourhood) we are so lucky to live in while we are in Egypt. It was built in 1927 in Baron Empain "style" and we are near the old centre of Heliopolis, called Korba.

Dune driving with Hein and Noel

Last weekend we went to the desert around Fayoum, to camp at out most favourite campsite at an oasis in a beautiful dune field. Hein en Noel are visiting us from the US and indicated that they liked our desert camping proposal. So this was a good opportunity for Ramses (our Landrover) to show them a bit of Egyptian desert. Paul, Petra, Fenna and David joined us in their Prado.

Sunset in the dune near our campsite (left to right Jurriaan, Corine, Hein & Noel)

On the second day weather turned out to be very hot (46C!) and windy, so it is like having 10 hairdryers at maximum power around you when you walk outside. Luckily we did not get stuck in the sand so severily that a lot of digging was involved, so most of the time we could stay in the shade of our car. On the way we saw a WWII petrol can, and when we lifted it from the sand we saw our first wild scorpion in Egypt.

Wild Scorpion

We will post more pictures soon. Paul and Petra have put a nice collection of pictures on their website already.

Felucca

On Hein and Noel's second day in Cairo we organised to sail on the Nile at sunset with a group of friends. Traffic was remarkably quiet, so we arrived early at the jetty in Ma'aadi. No matter how busy, noisy or polluted it is in Cairo, as soon as you sail on the Nile the atmosphere becomes tranquil and relaxing...

Hein, Noel and our sailor

Moonbeach

Already our third weekend at moonbeach this season. We met several of our moonbeach friends: Mike, Adina, Thor, John. The previous weekend we had no wind. This weekend we had too much wind for us beginner windsurfers. But the experienced surfers were very happy. So instead we snorkeled, read books, celebrated Mike's birthday and took spectacular photo's of the advanced windsurfers.

Action shot of Mike