Well, we have just returned to Doha from a trip of a lifetime! We were joined by Liz and James, which made it really fun to have someone to share the adventure with. We packed a lot into just under two weeks, however, we managed to see most of the major sights in both Egypt and Jordan. The tour guides were amazing, especially Walid in Egypt. He was a mine of information and we learned so much history and archeology from him. Above are of course the pyramids, just on the ouskirts of Cairo. The drivers in Cairo are even worse than Doha and frequently drive 3 or 4 abreast where most people would have just two lanes of traffic! I was glad we were driven by some great bus drivers. We stayed at the Marriot and the food was really great. We saw all kinds of temples and the Valley of the Kings, you name it - we saw it.

An extra side trip we decided to take was to go to Abu Simbal. I am so glad we did, it was amazing and so well preserved. We cruised on the Nile for four days, getting off for various sights. I had never been on a cruise before and I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. After an early morning start to sightseeing, we really enjoyed our afternoons lying on deck and watching Egypt unfold before our eyes as we floated down the Nile. We were able to see the local people going about their pastoral lives and the sites role by like a giant screen. It was so relaxing sipping our beer watching the world go by and sitting in the sun.

From Egypt we flew to Jordan with several others from our Egypt tour. Again, we packed in a huge amount in three days, of course the highlight was Petra. Walking through the siq, you know what you are about to see, but your first look at the Treasury is as magical as everyone says it is going to be. After lunch, we continued on with a few other brave souls and went up to the Monastery, which is like another version of the Treasury but 700 steps further on and up. However, when you get to the top, there is an amazing view of the Rift valley and of course it is downhill on the way back!

Our flight out on the last day was not until the afternoon and originally we thought we might try to change it to an earlier time. However, we had wanted to see the Dead Sea, which was not included on out tour. The tour director quickly organized a couple of minivans to pick up 12 of us and in about and hour we were there, lathering ourselves up with mud and then floating in the very salty water. It was so buoyant that try as you might, you just could not turn over and it was really funny to see us all bobbing around.

We had such a wonderful trip and took literally thousands of pictures between the four of us. Enough to bore most of our friends for years to come! As the plane touched down in Doha, we both had the feeling that we were coming home. What a great way to end our adventure to the Middle East. We now have a couple of days to finish packing up and to say our goodbyes then back to the snow and ice and to our real home, although I have a feeling that now we have had a taste of adventure, we will have a hard time settling into a rut again before looking for more!

This weekend we drove up to the north west of Qatar and went to Al Zubara. It had been a large settlement area at one time housing about 5 or 6,000 inhabitants. They fished and harvested pearls, until a siege in 1878 bought things to an end. At the moment archaeological excavations are taking place. However, we also found that it is right next to a wonderful beach with lots of wierd creatures to find on the beach. Derek saw a ray and there were lots of sea birds. It was very shallow and would be a wonderful place for young children to play and explore the little tide pools with their small fish.

We walked out along this man made breakwater of local rocks full of tiny shells. I presume it had been here for a long time. All around it were little rock pools full of crabs and small fish, amongst other strange purple wormy like creatures were hadn't seen before. There were also some brown mushroom looking creatures as well.



It is hard to show just how vast this area is, but this gives a little bit of an idea. This is where they are going to build the Friendship bridge to Bahrain. On the map it said 2013. It seems so shallow here, you could almost walk across!

Here is a picture of what is still remaining of the settlement. This is just a small portion of it, there is a surrounding wall with some turrets and the area is suposedly about 54 hectares. We had a great time, paddling in the water and then poking around the settlement. It was an interesting day and unfortunately it is likely to be our last adventure in Qatar. I still have a few more pictures of the leaving party that his coworkers gave him and I went and took more souq pictures of things I always see, but hadn't captured before, so will add some more tomorrow.

This weekend we went back to my favourite beach, Al Ghariya which is in the north east of Qatar. There is a beach resort nearby, but we like the public beach just beyond it and drive through the abandoned village and set up our umbrella on the beach to claim our spot. The temperature was absolutely perfect at about 35 degrees and the water was even refreshing. We stayed in the water for ages and actually had to finally get out because we were starting to get chilly! who would ever have thought it! Derek doesn't normally like beaches and swimming, but with the saltiness of the water, he was able to float and the temperature of course, was lovely. He saw a sea turtle , and every now and again a yellow torpedo like fish leapt out of the water and then skimmed across it like a skipping stone. I dont think we could have dreamed up a more perfect afternoon.

As the afternoon wore on, more Qataris came down to the beach. A couple of groups of ladies in black were at either end of the beach with their children and their nannies, the men had gone out in their fishing boats. They only paddled and I wonder if after Derek had left, they might have gone in the water. Some go in fully dressed and then hand their robe to the maid who then returns it to her when she wants to come out. Others just swim fully dressed. In this instance they just waded up to their knees. As the sun sets, you often see groups of men in their Toyota Land Cruisers stop in the middle of the desert, or in this case on a hill, to watch the sunset. One of the prayer times is at sunset, although I have never actually seen them pray, just look at the sun going down. Qataris come to life at night and often when I have not been able to sleep, I look from our window at the Corniche and it is always packed with cars and with people walking and greeting each other, until at least 2 as that is the latest I have been awake, but it would not surprise me if it goes on all night.

Last night we went out to our favourite restaurant in Souq Waqif. We now know the route through the little alleyways, sometimes taking a detour depending on our mood. This shop is one of our landmarks. It sells some of the largest pots I have ever seen! Outside the store are the really big pots, that you could cook a whole camel in!

As it was our last meal at Cinque Sensi, we decided to be gluttons and go for their set meal for 150 QAR each. What we hadn't realized was that the three choices of anti pasto and three choices of pasta were in fact not choices, they bought all three of each of them! and they weren't small portions either! By the time we got to the main course, we were very full - especially since they always have the most wonderful warm rolls that we cannot resist. However, we had asked if they would change the desert to include my favourite nougat semifredo with almond sauce, and it was amazing how we still had enough room to squeeze every last morsel of that in! The meal ended with a thimbleful of espresso which just set off the sweetness perfectly and was not enough to keep us awake at night. It is a good thing I still have one more session with Mohammed, the personal trainer at the gym in our building. He is very strict about my workouts and I have to go every day or he wants to know why I haven't signed in that day! Without that, I would be in big trouble with all these last meals at our favourite places - we have so many of them!

I am a bit behind again with the blog, but as our time in Qatar comes to an end, we are starting to return to some of our favourite places, or trying to pack in some of those we haven't seen yet. Last weekend we returned to Al Khor island "purple island". To get to the island, you have to wade through two cut-throughs, which, depending on the tide can either be up to your knees or around your ankles. This time we timed it so it would be round our ankles and we managed to successfully negotiate the crossings without seeing the myriad of black crabs about 2" across, which I was very thankful for. They had, however, returned for our homeward trip! The island is known for the purple or in fact red dye that used to be extracted from shells here. A very laborious and expensive business which is why only royalty or very special people used to wear the colour purple. We were searching for the piles of shells left behind from the proces, but were unsuccessful. It would have been nice to have gone with the natural history group here, but, alas, no time. The geology of the island is very strange, with a band of holy rock like the picture shows.

There are mangroves starting and this was a neat picture of showing how the new shoots radiate from the central tree.

The water is very shallow around here and you can see people wading through the water with nets catching their supper. They had strung a net across the whole area and must have been able to catch a lot of fish.

Another picture of the strange geology of the area. We had a great afternoon walking around exploring, and got back to the car just as the sun was setting. Another good time of exploration.

The other night we went for a walk and took a few pictures of the nearby hotels. West Bay, the area where we live, has a number of big hotels as well as various embassies nearby. We took a few photos of the nearby hotels, which all seem to try to outdo each other with their outdoor decorations and lights.

This is the Four Seasons, which we see from our window every night.

This one looks like it has one of the arabic hats on top

This is the Sheraton near us - it is in the shape of a pyramid from the outside and very elaborate on the inside!

This was the picture I forgot to put in my last blog. After we had been driving over the sand dunes for about 20 minutes or so - one of the cars got a flat tire and it had to be changed. I am not sure how they knew it was flat, since you have to let a lot of air out of the tires anyway to drive on the sand. Quite funny to watch though - as our group was full of mostly male engineers, together with the Qatari drivers - all of whom are car mad. Anyway you could smell the testosterone in the air as helpful comments were made in English, French and Arabic throughout the exercise! Surprisingly quickly we were on our way again.

At sunrise, the next morning, we got up to take some photos. Our neighbours the previous night were a group of Qataris who had been camping back on the sand dunes a bit of a way down the water from us. They sounded like they were having fun, talking and laughing around a campfire - you could have been camping anywhere in Canada! Anyway, the next morning, the tide was out and our neighbours had driven right to the edge of the water and were busy fishing. They kindly gave us a fish! although the cook at our camp didn't think too much of the type of fish! it somehow never got cooked! One of the easiest ways to get around is to drive right by the water as it is firm sand. On our walk, we were passed by several cars! A little bit unnerving!

It was well worth getting up early for this view.

Back to the camp for coffee and tea, kindly served by the "tea boy" who had been quite the dancer the night before! I still have a hard time getting used to being able to have couches and comfy chairs and tables which are left outside. The roof is not for the risk of rain, but for shade! So we got our plates of delicious breakfast of scrambled eggs with spices, some kind of sweet noodle with fool (mashed up beans) on top, juices, muffins etc. and bought them back to our comfy chairs to sit on. Then back into the cars again for a more direct route back to our awaiting cars. Sad to think that this will likely be our last trip to the sand dunes.

Thursday afternoon, we went with a group of people from the company for my second and Derek's third trip to the desert. While they were letting the air out of the tires of the ubiquitous Land Cruisers that we were driven in - oh I forgot to put that picture in, I will put it in the next one. Anyway, several people rode on camels to while away the time.

This time we stayed overnight and this was our accommodation. We just had a sleeping bag to put on top of the cushions, with carpets to walk on - quite cosy! We just slept on top of the sleeping bags and had a light sheet on top as it was still pretty warm and humid. The tent is only closed on three sides, with the third, long side, open. We were fed a typical bedouin meal, which was basically meat, rice and pulses of different kinds. All with lots of tasty spices.

This was another option of a place to sleep. But I just wanted to show how much carpets are used here. This beautiful carpet was just laid on the sand and was in fact covered in sand from people walking on it. They did ask us to remove our footwear before entering the tents, but you have sand all over you and of course it gets everywhere.

After dinner, we were entertained by our drivers, one got out his electric organ or whatever it is called and played obviously well known Arabic songs. They were all singing and clapping along to them. Before long, everyone was up dancing, our drivers included. They were very hospitable and friendly. Derek played a lengthy game of volleyball as well, so we were definitely ready for bed around midnight and too tired to care if there were snakes or scorpions - which there weren't. To be continued.