Cairo

Watching the news for the first time in a long time and seen that British tourists have been kidnapped in Lamu! Harri, Jon, Sami and Alex were only there about a week ago, so scary times! Apparently this couple were the only ones there on the luxury resort... so all those Tana Guesthouses are the places to be then! Anyway...

We spent our last evening at Faze 3, where we had a lovely meal. For the first time in 7 weeks I had gravy! =D Sausage and mash, om nom nom. :) We watced the sun set and sat on the terrace overlooking the lake. The others all had wine but I had a splitting headache, probably from the sun, so just made the most of being able to have Mirinda Fruity, which we can't get at home. :( We all spent too much on food though, and had to scrape together loose change to pay Godfrey for the room. Jo, knowing us too well by now, had taken out an extra 20,000 because "she knew this would happen", ha ha. Good job as well, since I was 9,000 short. We hadn't expected to spend quite so much on chocolate that afternoon to bring back, oops! Cheers Mama Jo. ;) Got our last boda ride back in the dark to pack and shower, and headed to bed at about ten to eleven, with the alarm set for quarter to two! I will not miss that alarm ring tone, argh!

Godfrey took us to the airport, leaving at 2am since we were only about 15 mins away. Our flight was at half four, so we had a bit of time to get some water etc. Although security in Entebbe airport is after duty free, so they took our water off us. Well, the water out of our hands. I had a bottle of water and flammable deet in my bag, and Jo had water and chocolate milk. And there we were expecting security to be tighter on 9/11/11... Did get a bit nervous when we went to board and there was a briefcase left near us. Sami was like, "I don't wanna worry anyone, but there's a bag there! There's a bag been left!" We told security and got a move on. Sure it was fine, but it got us a bit nervous.

Slept for quite a while once we'd had breakfast on our way to Cairo. When we arrived in Cairo, we were suddenly a bit wary of time and not sure about making our way out of the airport. We were looking for somewhere to ask advice on whether we ought to leave the airport, but an egyptair man showed us to a desk that did different trips out of the airport. We paid 240 Eqyptian pounds, so about £25, for our transfer, entrance to the pyramids, a guide, and a meal voucher, but I'll get onto the meal voucher later grrrrr...

We were all in kind of disbelief that we were actually on our way to the pyramids! It was amazing seeing them and the sphynx, and a great way to spend an 8 hour transfer! We arrived at half eught in the morning and asked about doing the trip with egyptair, and within 45 minutes we were being shown out of the airport, on our way. :) We climbed down inside one of the smaller pyramids (because it was included in our ticket price), and we stopped off at a perfume place and somewhere they make papyrus on the way back. Everything seemed to be running so smoothly that Sami kept saying it was too good to be true... and there's always a dramatic story. It almost was a bit too good to be true, as we thought we were spending a night in Cairo right up until our flight time, gaaaah!

We should have bought a visa for £15, but because we went out with egyptair we didn't buy a visa but instead left our passports with them and left the airport avoiding passport control. I was a bit nervous about parting with my passport, and with every right, so it turns out! We arrived back at the airport by 2pm, and we didn't board until 4pm, to fly at 5. We went up to customer services and they sent off for someone to get our passports. Two hours later, our gate was open and we still didn't have our passports! Burger King was the only food available on our side so we sat up there with the live 9/11 memorial on in the background, just what we wanted of course. But the Burger King guys did give us discount when we had to count out our pennies, and I paid in English pounds. We eventually got our passports back at ten past four, and got to our gate three minutes before it closed! We did leave a bit late, but still! Quite stressful.

Lots of screaming kids on the flight back, but I watched Bridesmaids and laughed out loud so much ha ha. For some reason, it was still an egyptair flight but it had been changed so we were flying on bmi, which was much nicer. Didn't sleep at all though, and somehow stayed awake all the way home, where we arrived at about quarter past one in the morning, 25.5 hours after having got up to go to the airport, eurgh. Went to bed about half two, after Mum kept rewinding and pausing to show us where they were at the proms in Hyde Park on Saturday night. How was I up at half eight this morning?! Definitely on 'Team Time'.

It is lovely to be home, my bed is so comfy, I've had cereal with real milk this morning, a hot shower last night, I'm watching the news, have had turkey ham, and basically loving the home comforts. But it's strange to be away from the people you've spent every day with for the past 7 weeks, and I definitely am going to miss the team! But Sami, Kate and I are practically neighbours next year. :) And Jo's gonna visit Leeds on her way down from Glasgow to Cambridge in a week or so. =) Looking forward to seeing everyone in Leeds. I've had such an amazing time, and the group's really made it what it's been, so thank guys, I've had the time of my life. :)