Woke up this morning to find the 3 day quarantine has turned into 30 days. Two confirmed cases someone returning from the US and her mother. And now no alcohol sales! What?
We went out this morning when the grocery stores were open and had a great “private” walk on the beach. Just a few people out and about. Today things seem more lively around us; we hear music coming from the houses near us, people out in their yards and bbqs going. We did see a few golf carts out this morning but nothing like the usual.
There may be a flight back to the US, will keep you posted on what happens next.
Pelicans taking a break from all of this craziness!This little morning glory type flower seems to appear right out of the grass.There are several species of lizards here. This is the only one I chose to pose for a photo.And by the way we do have plenty of toilet paper. Miriam and Jose are taking great care of us.
It’s officially quarantine but I like using lockdown, it seems more descriptive as the entire island seems to be shut down. This usually bustling vacation destination has golf carts, walkers, bicycles and motorbikes with a few taxis and construction vehicles mixed in all crowding the streets. Yesterday and today those streets are quite! Only a few patrol officers are out.
Families are staying in their homes and if they do come outside they stay on their porches or balconies. Without the noise of the hustle and bustle I can hear the chatter of among families including parents working with their kids on school work and children and adults singing,
In our yard we have many birds that sing and are busy finding food and building nests. We have a Common Black Hawk which is building a nest of sticks and pine needles. It will break small twiggy branches from the tree to add to it’s nest. Before I realized what it was doing I just thought it was a very clumsy bird! There only seems to be one hawk right now so it will be interesting to see when another shows up.
By the birds mating behavior it definitely seems like spring even though it’s subtropical here and the weather doesn’t vary much other that between a wet and dry season.
No one in sight when this would normally be a busy street. Yes, I walked out to the main street. Our neighborhood grocery store.The Black Hawk. I wish I had a zoom lens!
Well it finally made its way here. The first person tested positive for coronavirus here on Ambergris Caye. While the authorities are investigating and finding out who that person had contact with we are on 72 hour lockdown. Our busy little side street that we have view of, is super quiet today. People are following the directive.
Today marks our one week stay here on the island. This first week we’ve both been fighting off a cold and cough. We have been self isolating and in my concern for Kirk’s cough I called the doctor. We ended up having the health ministry coming to our door to examine us. Our symptoms were not consistent with the virus but we were tested because of our travel.
Even though we and the doctor were sure we didn’t have it we were relieved to know that we weren’t ground zero in Belize!
Our place, and I do mean our No one else is here the only others left on Saturday. Our new kitchen and Kirk doing what he does best!
The flooded Nile River on the day we left. Our longest leg, 14 1/2 hours. Brazil’s rivers from the plane. Crisis in Panama! Some lost their roll. Mexican iguana. Chris, only the green ones are good to eat.Sen Pedro here we come, wasn’t sure we would make it until this flight. Beautiful Belizean sunrise.
For Kirk’s work, we were to be in India after Cairo. Three days before our flight we learned India closed their border. Kirk’s work acquaintance from India was completely surprised and shocked that this happened so quickly.
We rearranged our flights to the Maldives. We have always wanted to go there. These are amazingly beautiful tropical islands that are disappearing due to rising sea levels. Per my research several types of including hammerhead sharks can be seen while snorkeling and diving!
As things on the news escalated we knew we didn’t want to be stranded in the Maldives (what we understand is it’s expensive and you can only drink alcohol in your resort with a big cost, which would be fine but not for long term!) so Kirk begin planning our exit from there. It took him most of the day to find something that wasn’t through Europe yet got us out of the Middle East. Australia was the best option for our next destination.
The day of our flight we learned the Maldives were to close their border at midnight which would be before we arrived. Our connection was to be through Dubai so we thought we could at least get to Dubai and then figure out where to go from there.
When we checked in with the airport agent he was confused saying our tickets were still to India, yes we had received the confirmation that our tickets were changed to the Maldives but we hadn’t paid the difference, when rearranging our flights the phone agent was to call us back to collect the fee. They never called but we received a confirmation email so we thought we were all set. We explained our trails to the agent and showed him the email that the Maldives were closing at midnight. The agent said that it hadn’t been announced so he didn’t know about the closing but He also didn’t seem too surprised.
At that point the agent was finding humor in our situation and told Kirk to go with another agent, he held my passport and our luggage and asked me to stand nearby. Kirk was taken out of the secure area and worked with that agent to find a flight beyond Dubai. Dubai wasn’t having anything to do with people staying there, we had to have a destination beyond Dubai and it wasn’t going to be in the Maldives!
The agent asked Kirk where he wanted to go, Kirk said anywhere in Central or South America without going through Europe. This was at the time things were escalating in the US. The agent said name a city so Kirk started to rattle off the cities, flights were either full or cancelled. Finally they landed on a flight to São Paulo the agent booked it and we were good to go with Dubai as a layover. Kirk said the agent was laughing the entire time.
We saw both of these agents later as we were boarding the plane and they just laughed finding our journey humorous. That was at the beginning of all this chaos, I wonder what they’re thinking now. We are grateful for their assistance.
A Caipirinha made with Brazilian cachaça. A much enjoyed cocktail after 19 hours of time in the air.
We made it to São Paulo, Brazil. Back in the western hemisphere with plenty of hand sanitizer and toilet paper! It’s hard to get back from the Middle East without going through Europe, Kirk did it!
We are healthy and still enjoying the adventure.
We are on the move today trying to go north. I will share more about our experience when time allows.
With the help of our hotel peeps we were finally able to rig our power supply to the unique adapters in Brazil! An adapter for the adapter.
I really enjoy dried dates and I know there are several different kinds. In Cairo we were served fresh dates, something new for us. The texture was similar to a plum, the skin was paper like and could be eaten or slipped off with little effort, the flavor was somewhere between a plum and a dried date. Delicious!
We are in Cairo for Kirk’s work, he is buying Egyptian limestone. With a big international purchase it’s important to check out the source and companies that the stone is being purchased from. This means spending long days in stone shops and queries and bouncing between. It also means getting to see areas not as tourists but as those that live and work here.
A lot of these pictures are taken through the windshield and from the backseat. There is no infrastructure in the stone yard so the roads are extremely rough, it hard to get good pictures. Everything is covered with dust, I mean like an inch of dust. I’ve been wondering what it be like to be there after the rain that’s been happening the last few days.
Food stands in the Stone Yard. Almost everyplace has several dogs, and I believe these dogs probably take care of themselves. They called them Bulldogs as they protect the place at night. This one seems to be well taken care of. These trucks are waiting to enter the stone yard, they are on the same rough roads as all the other vehicles. They rule the road but it’s slow going! A stone supply shop and “restaurant”. Yuk-tuk, these are weaving in and out of the big trucks and other vehicles. The query next to the stone yard. These are all over this city. Traffic coming at us. somebody is going the way! Layers of dust everywhere. I saw a food truck that was operating but the entire truck was encased in dust.
Heavy and continuous rain started early Thursday early morning here in Cairo. The government shutdown schools and shops, what a contrast this created to the day before! Very few people out and traffic was almost non-existent but still could hear honking from the few drivers left. There is no where for water to drain here so the streets were flooded, cars where still able to get through but it was slow going. According to locals it has never rained this much and this long before.
We did get a ride to a “drinkie” which is what liquor stores are called here and it was open! I guess everyone knows at times there’s nothing left to do but drink! At the drinkie we found a locally made vodka that is very high rated and tasty. We could buy the bottle for just a bit more than one drink cost at our hotel.
The rain had slowed so we decided to walk back to our hotel. Almost everything’s was shut down except for the small grocery markets. We had to dodge flooded area and with the slow traffic we were even brave enough to maneuver on foot, through a traffic circle which would normally be life threatening. Of course the rain started again and we got pretty soaked, that’s one way of getting our laundry done!
On Friday we took an excursion to the Giza pyramids, we have been using Viator to book these excursions. This company is great with super good prices and very informative guides. The tours are often private so the time schedule and tour spots are somewhat flexible. Because of the rain which was still coming down but not near as hard there was almost no one touring the areas we went to. Hense our private tour!
Driving around the floodwaters, our car is sideways in the street trying to get over to the shallow side. A view of the Giza pyramids from a distance the king’s pyramid is to the left, his son’s in the middle, and the queen’s on the right. The king’s pyramid is the biggest and tallest but from a far he made his son’s appear larger. This is the pyramid of the king’s son, here you can see the top still has the polished limestone covering which made the pyramids reflect the sun and moon light to appear white.These are two of the oldest pyramids in Egypt. The one in the background is the oldest. It’s built in a different style which was tombs built upon tombs. The pyramids range from small to giant sized blocks of stone to sand mounds on top of the tombs. In front of the oldest pyramid in Egypt. Notice no tourists anywhere!This location replicates in stone, the wood that was used prior to building pyramids with stone. These columns represent the reeds that were tied together to create the columns prior to the use of stone. Each tomb tells the story of the person that was buried there. One side of the column represents the person when they were alive (out of shape body, harsh facial features, etc) the other side represents what they will come back to the after life as. We were able to see the tune of a medical doctor and the hieroglyphics depicted circumcision and childbirth. Our guide said these were very rare depictions., the only that he is aware of. Descending under a pyramid. We were literally the only people in the pyramid, of course there was no electricity so we used our cell phones for light. Bonus we didn’t get electrocuted!
We’ve gone from an ultra modern, clean and shiny city to Cairo, Egypt which is on the Nile River and surrounded by desert. The days start out clear and by the end of the day the air is filled with sand.
The Nile in early morning, beautiful and at it’s best. Late afternoon when a Sahara desert sand storm had rolled in.
There are parts of Cairo that are very old and other parts that are very new. Because of the sand and dust in the air everything looks dirty no matter how old it is, even the new construction looks like it’s been around for a long long time.
There are a few places that have trees and greenery, most areas are barren with only sand or so much buildup There is trash almost everywhere even in places were it is picked up constantly, the wind blowing trash in. There are street dogs that rummage through the trash, eating scraps but also freeing it up to blow around.
People park just about anywhere and the drivers here can maneuver through the tightest spaces.
As in Dubai there are wide highways and the same here but there are no lane markings so a street that is meant for four lanes might have seven cars side-by-side and motorcycles weaving through all of the cars, trucks and buses. Then on top of that there are vendors that walk in between the “lanes” of traffic selling food or other items.
It’s very common to find several dogs together either eating or sleeping.This guy is selling fake funny glasses with a big nose, everybody needs that while they’re driving down the highway in Cairo!This is true our windshield and our driver is not slowing down!
Traffic is is insane and entertaining! I’m pretty sure there is not a vehicle on the streets that if not dented! There are no lane markings and no stop lights, at least that drivers pay attention to and 19 million people live here! The buses are small vans that are just packed with people. In the busy time of day (which seems to be all day long and into the night) going 10 miles can take up to two hours at least. Oh and everybody driving is honking!
Travels Unraveled 