It was Christmas Break in 2023. The snow had fallen in Spokane, Washington and Noel and I were discussing future travel – including “bucket list” destinations.
We had recently both read Tranquility by Tuesday – 9 Ways to Calm the Chaos and Make Time for What Matters by Laura Vanderkam and were working through some of the exercises she recommends. (Side note – the book is excellent and worth a read).
One of the exercises the author suggests is writing down 100 different things that you want to do. These could be something pretty simple – like go to a local brewery – but could also include “once-in-a-lifetime” trips.
We each logged nearly 100 different things we wanted to do as individuals – and Noel put them together on a spreadsheet. Interestingly – this is not as easy as it sounds. The first 20 activities were easy – the next 20 a bit harder – and by the time I got to 60 or so I had exhausted my list.
We had many destinations and activities in common – but also each had some unique ones.
One of the trips we had discussed – and was on both of our lists – was to go see the pyramids in Egypt.
It is easy to always put off some of these trips and activities until the “timing is better”. After some discussion we decided to go ahead and book some of our trips while we were healthy and not keep “putting it off” until some future date.
The next day Noel called Viking Cruise Lines and booked a Nile River Cruise for October of 2026 – nearly 3 years away.
What can I say? It was a fast three years.
Our trip started from our “home” airport in Pasco, Washington late in the afternoon on Saturday – which meant we arrived in Cairo, Egypt around 3:00 a.m. on Monday – with the time in between spent on three different flights and airport lounges.
Our first flight from Pasco to Seattle was a few minutes late – but we had a couple of hour layover in Seattle so no real stress on the timing.
While walking to our gate in Seattle I was a bit hungry – so we grabbed a couple of hamburgers from McDonalds and I tried out a cookie from a new place in SeaTac Airport. We boarded our roughly 10 hour flight from Seattle to Paris – which was on-time and actually arrived in Paris a bit early.
After a nearly 6 hour layover in Paris – we hopped on our Air France flight to Cairo arriving at 1:15 a.m. on Monday morning.
Noel had a proposal to get done – and I had some books to read – so the flights actually went by quickly. I read We Solve Murders by Richard Osman and Artifact – Saturn’s Legacy Book 1 by Joshua James – both were fun reads. I cannot say I slept well but I have learned how to grab a few hours of sleep sitting up in an airplane seat with an eye mask, neck pillow, and ear buds to cut out the noise.
Upon arriving in Cairo, we made our way to our hotel. Noel got on the internet and submitted the proposal she wrote while we were on the plane – and then we grabbed about 6 hours of blissful sleep on a real bed.
Our adventures in Cairo start tomorrow and we are looking forward to exploring the city on our own before our planned outings with our fellow cruise passengers – while adjusting to 10-hour time difference and just a bit of jet lag!
Stay tuned for more from our Viking Cruise along the Nile River – I plan on trying to post most days – with pictures – on our latest travel adventure.
So grab your favorite beverage, get a comfortable reading spot, and enjoy our daily postings from Egypt.
Until next time ….
