Adios Amigos

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It’s that time of year again! Time to pack up my sleeping bag, tent, solar charger and trail clothes into my beloved back pack and head to kinder climates. While this years winter has not been hard so far, I’m still itching for T-shirt weather.

On January 18th Gord and I will fly to Cancun. The plan is to travel through Mexico and into Guatemala. With no set trail or itinerary, we will go in whatever direction we feel inclined, on foot and by bus, steering clear of the dangerous areas.

I love Mexico! I love the food, the people, the scenery, the history, the weather, the language and the culture. I haven’t spent a ton of time there – mostly traveling back and forth en route to Belize when I briefly lived there – so it will be great to get to know the country better. And I’ve never been to Guatemala so that will be another new and interesting place to explore. I’m looking forward (read super intimidated) to practice my oh so meagre Spanish skills. But it’s good for the old grey matter. And I really want to come home with better speaking fluency so I will push past the fear of ridicule and humiliation. I just wish they didn’t speak so crazy damn fast!

I’m going to miss my little granddaughter, Cadia so much! At almost a year and a half she continues to amaze and delight me in every way and the thought of not seeing her for two months literally makes me tear up. But I’ll try to utilize technology to get me through. Wow – those are words I’d never thought I’d say!

As always, I’ll blog all the adventurers. Next post from Mexico! Or should I say – Siguiente mensaje de Mexico! (Imagine that I’m speaking with a really awesome Spanish accent.)

The Bluebs are ready!

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Just a little update on the 2022 season! I am open on Sunday July 31st from 9am -1pm for the first ‘open to the public’ pick-your-own blueberry day! I will also have pre-picked berries for sale along with blueberry pastries and our famous blueberry coffee.

The plants took another hit from Mother Nature when the buds above the snow line were damaged just enough from the -30 winter days (that happily took care of the caterpillar problem for us) to stop them blooming. So it’s another year with limited berries but hope springs eternal that next year will be a full harvest.

The good news is there are still lots of berries on the bushes! I am super excited to be harvesting the Toros and Nelson’s (two new cultivars I planted a few years ago) for the first time and they are awesome! Sweet and big!

So if you would like to enjoy some fresh-off-the-bush berries, come on out – I’d love to see you!

Ride to Conquer Cancer

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Once again, I am participating in the Ride to Conquer Cancer to support the Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation. Below is a photo of the details of a fundraiser that I am having if you would like to attend. If you cannot attend but would like to help me reach my $2500.00 fundraising goal the link is below. Thank you in advance!!

https://supportthepmcf.ca/Ride22/ArleneKeith

I was hoping to be better prepared for the two day 200+ bike ride from Toronto to Niagara Falls but since getting home from Egypt I have been immersed in digging trenches to replace my irrigation system here at Balderson Blueberries. I honestly couldn’t have done the mammoth job without the help of my three kids so a giant thank you to them (Sabrina said it was like prison work 😂 – she’s not wrong). But as of yesterday, the system is up and running and it is such a relief as we plunge into summer.

Now it’s on to pruning my plants and bracing myself to do battle with the dreaded caterpillars. But I’ll get a few rides in before June 11/12th. At least to get bum-ready. Because if I don’t – well, I just will. 😬. Once again, sincere thanks!! I’ll let you know how it goes.

Alexandria

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Ever since I saw the movie Agora I have wanted to go to Alexandria. The movie is about a 4th century woman named Hapatia who was a mathematician, astronomer, philosopher and teacher. Her father was the curator of the library of Alexandria, whose mission was “collecting all the knowledge of the world”. It is a movie about ideas and the ongoing controversy between science and superstition but what I really loved about it was that it centers on this wonderful, brilliant woman who, in 391 A.D. when women were not generally treated as equals, taught scholars. I fell in love with the notion of Alexandria and the library as the place where Hapatia was admired and celebrated by learned men during turbulent times. How heartbreaking it must have been to live and breath the preservation of knowledge and then to witness its total destruction. An estimated 40,000 – 400,000 scrolls of priceless information were lost forever when the library was burned.

Even though the current library is new (2002), it has a connection to the past. I am thrilled to be here in the largest public reading space in the world where 250,000,000 books and scrolls are housed (though sadly not on display). I feel like I should be studying something profound or saying something philosophical but I just sit here…writing my post…in the bibliotheca of Alexandria!

The outside of the library is covered in scripts and letters from almost all the languages of the world.
Looking down on the main hall
If you ever find yourself in Alexandria, love seafood and want to experience the ultimate local restaurant, go to Hoda Gondl. It’s open street food and our dinner included fish broth, calamari, ginormous shrimp, seafood gumbo, and two kinds of whole fish. Bread, rice, tahini, and salad on the side. It was all totally fresh and amazing and less than $15.
TraysThere were large trays of every kind of fresh seafood you can imagine. You just told them what you wanted. And they gave you samples!
The view from our hostel window
The Mediterranean
The castle built in the 1400’s was made partly with with the stone from the original lighthouse of Alexandria (which was in that spot) and one of the ancient wonders of the world.
The mosque in the castle
The light stone gave the castle an airy feeling.
Just before leaving the black desert. I know – its out of place. I was going to include it in the last post but thought I had too many pictures. 😂. We are heading back to Cairo to spend our last few days before heading home.

What a Ride!

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Buses, boats, trains, hiking, history, hostels, cities, covid, weather, people, food! And at night, dreams! Of which my most recent is me trying to maneuver a car through a non-existent gap in a Cairo traffic jam (a normal day for residents of this sprawling 25+ million metropolis). I’m frantically yelling into the din that I need to get back to my blueberry field. I wake up in a cold sweat!

We mainly travelled around Cairo by metro

We have spent our last few days roaming through ancient churches, resting, and walking around the Souk (the Cairo Islamic market) where the crowd was crushing. It brought back a high school memory of going to a Queen concert at the Civic Center before they had reserved seating.

Carrying fresh bread for sale on his head

We also went to the Zabbaleen City (the literal translation is Garbage City), a Coptic community who’s entire thriving economy is based on collecting and recycling Cairo’s garbage. Coptics represent the majority of Christian’s in Egypt and the religion dates back to 42 A.D.. As we walked we could see women and children through doorways sitting in large, dark spaces surrounded by, and sorting vast seas of spread out garbage.

Overlooking a street in Zabbaleen City
St. Simon Monastery (also known as the Cave Church) is the largest church in the Middle East and is located in a cave in Mokattam Mountain in Zabbaleen City, in southeastern Cairo.
The walls were full of biblical carvings
Looking across ‘The City of the Dead’ at Cairo.

This trip has been a great adventure! There was less hiking than hoped for and more time spent in cities (which is challenging for me) but overall, it was a feast for all the senses, not the least of which was taste. I have eaten my way through Egypt and Jordan both, and now my work here is done.

Last supper in Egypt. Shawarma meat, fried veggies, olives and sauce are wrapped in large thin fresh bread and fried again.

We leave for the airport in a few hours and we are eager. The only thing better than travelling is coming back home. I am excited to see family and friends and if my night dreams are anything to go by, I’m also ready to get back to my blueberry field. And Gord is also ready to start planting seeds on his farm.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you for reading and for your comments and emails. It has been a real pleasure sharing this extraordinary adventure with you. See you on the flip side!

Salaam.

The White and Black Desert

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Getting to the black and white desert by public transport definitely weeded out the uncommitted. Expensive excursions were easy enough to come by but intel to get to the Bahariya Oasis, the desert village from where the National Park could be accessed, was vague and ambiguous. When we arrived to the Turgoman Square bus station in Cairo, the place where we read that the bus left from, we were told that only Egyptians were allowed to buy tickets. Four bus stations, two taxi rides, two stints on the metro, consults with three branches of the Tourist police for permission, and much walking later we found ourselves in front of a small rundown mini bus, amidst a cluster of rundown mini busses. After the driver confirmed with the Safari camp that we had a reservation, he agreed to sell us a ticket to the Oasis for 150 Egyptian pounds ($12). As per usual, Egyptian mini buses leave when they are full and our rickety little van was no different. Two hours later it reached its 14 person capacity and we were off.

Each of the five hours that passed took us deeper into nothing but the endless rolling sand of the western tip of the Sahara. It was dark when we reached Mohamed’s safari camp and the end of the line for public transport. From there we joined an existing safari in an off road Land Rover and began a two day desert odyssey into a unique landscape of sculpted beauty.

The long road leading into the white and black deserts.
Black basalt and volcanic ash gives an otherworldly look to the black desert.
We climbed a hill called crystal mountain which was made entirely of quartz crystal. A cool feeling to be standing on thousands of pounds of crystal! Talk about realigning your cosmic energy!
The hill was much steeper and longer than it appears and I was sand-boarding down as fast as a greased toboggan on a snow hill. I almost made it to the bottom before wiping out. Climbing back up through the deep sand was crazy tough!!! Long time since I’ve been that winded!
Sunset on route to the white desert
We drove into the white desert at dusk and slept under the stars and a full moon. The speck of orange in the far left of the picture is our campfire.
Our sleeping quarters
Our driver having his evening tea. When he was flying across the sand dunes at breakneck speed I thought he was just having fun but it may have been so he didn’t get stuck in the soft sand. He didn’t speak a word of English so I still don’t know which it was.
The white desert was made from chalk formations. Many millennia of being battered by the wind created the extraordinary landscape

We have finished our time in the desert. I love deserts but being with a group also reconfirmed to me how much I am not a ‘tour group’ person. But it was the only way to feasibly see what we saw and I’m glad and grateful we had the opportunity.

Backpedaling a little bit – the day we left Aswan (before heading to the black and white deserts) we woke up super early and took the bus to the next town with a few young travellers we met to see the camel market.

We had previously been told the price of a good camel was the same as a pick up truck. At the market we were told it was about $6000. I guess it depend on the truck…and the camel.
Buying tea in one of the tea tents

There was a festive air in the market with lots of money and livestock changing hands but no central auction. It was full of men, old and young, but not one woman. Except myself, and a couple of the Europeans that we were with. One was a young German girl with blond hair and yoga pants and I think many camels would have been traded for her. She attracted so much attention it became overwhelming and we had to leave. We said goodbye to our young friends and headed back to Aswan to chill before the night train back to Cairo.

Drinking hibiscus tea, Turkish coffee and eating cookies in what, ten minutes earlier, was a crowded, bustling, street market in Aswan. Word spread that the inspector was coming and before our very eyes the entire market rolled up their goods and disappeared into crevices and crannies. It was astounding to see!

Abu Simbel

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With some extra time back in Egypt we decided to see a few sites that were too far flung to visit before leaving for Jordan. The Abu Simbel temple was first on the list. To get there we crossed the Sinai again, back up to Cairo, back down to Aswan and another four hours further south almost to the Sudan border. It was a long haul but worth it!

Dedicated to Ramesses II, this temple greets you with four 20-metre tall seated colossal statues of the great king carved into the rock
Positioned around him are various members of his very large family
The first room inside the temple is a great hall with another eight colossal statues.
Exquisite carvings of scenes of Ramses II’s victorious military campaigns covered the walls
Adjacent is the temple dedicated to Queen Nefertiti, Rameses II’s favourite wife. She is portrayed almost as tall as her husband which is a rare honour and an indication of his regard and love for her
A number of side rooms are decorated with scenes of rituals of the king, queen, and various gods.
Being in this place and seeing these things is surreal! It’s still hard to wrap my head around the fact that these are not reproductions – that they are the real deal. The actual 3000+ year old Egyptian carvings in temples of the pharaohs.
We were able to pitch our tent right outside the temple grounds on lake Nasser for a few nights (which was very cool) but it was too windy to cook any food. So it was back to cliff bars and bread for a few days. Back in Aswan we enjoyed more street food of chicken and lamb shish-kabob with tomato zucchini soup and salad. I am getting very spoiled on this trip.

Our next destination is deep into the Western desert at the Bahariya Oasis. From there we hope to do some hiking in the black and the white deserts. We won’t overdo it as my Achilles have finally settled down and I don’t want to anger them again. Especially so close to when we are heading home.

The Karak Castle and holding down the Fort.

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The Karak desert castle is a famous ‘crusader castle’ but the occupation of the Franks (the crusaders) was only 46 years (1142 – 1188 AD); a short time in the castles long history. Inscriptions found inside the fortress, combined with historical sources indicate that it was originally built by Mesha, king of the Moabites as a temple to the Moabite God, Chemosh during the Iron Age in 850 BC. It has been conquered, occupied and added on to many times since, by many civilizations. The huge multi-layered castle is a maze of corridors and rooms and if only rocks could talk, the stories it could tell! I leaned into the stone walls trying to absorb the history and let my imagination run loose. It was fun at the time but might have contributed to the horrific nightmares of violent death and destruction that I had for the next four nights. Just a wild guess!

The granary
One of the grand halls where meals where visiting dignitaries were entertained and meals were held
A corridor with officers rooms leading off

We have done some great hiking, met wonderful people, ate delicious food, seen incredible sights but we are ready for warmer nights. And both my Achilles’ continue to be stubbornly uncooperative. So we returned south to Aqaba to cool our heels for a few days on the coast of the Red Sea before taking the ferry back to Egypt.

A Street food treat of BBQ chicken and onion, seasoned rice, thin bread and yogurt with cucumber

The evening we planned to leave Jordan, the wind turned ferocious and the ferry was cancelled. We sheltered ourselves and all our belongings back inside our own castle walls to wait out the siege. The waves were roaring like a thousand foot soldiers on a rampage and the attacking wind sounded like it was ripping our little orange dome apart by the seams. But we successfully held down the Fort and our small, strong keep survived the onslaught intact. The morning dawned bright and blue, we raised the drawbridge (and by that I mean the tent fly), packed up and set out again to catch the ferry. (I may have seen too many castles!)

The Dead Sea

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At 423 meters below sea level, the Dead Sea is the lowest land based place on earth.
Salt crusted rocks lining the shoreline .
The buoyancy while ‘swimming’ is super fun. You just float. And there is no need to worry about anything nibbling your toes. The 35% salinity does not support marine life
We camped on the shores each night as we walked the 50 kilometre length.
Along the way there were natural hot springs which I had been looking forward to. They did not disappoint and we settled in for a couple of nights. But I had to get up super early in the morning before anyone arrived to wear my bathing suit. Otherwise, I went in fully dressed as there were many men soaking but no women. Given the place, a bathing suit would not have been appropriate.
Gord is not generally a fan of full immersion but the warm waterfalls were agreeable, even for him.
I was literally craving tomatoes one day and rounded a corner to see this! Needless to say we feasted, but felt bad for the poor farmer who lost his tomatoes. The previous day there was a wind storm with winds so strong it was hard to walk against. The blowing sand felt like needles on our face and we figure it blew racks of tomatoes right off the truck.
Even the road scenery was breathtaking and it was a treat to walk along the sea. But the pavement has wreaked further havoc with my troublesome Achilles’ tendons and so we will be taking the bus for the next section.

As Salt and Madaba

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The city of As Salt was recently designated a world heritage site. It is a place where people of all backgrounds and faiths have lived peaceably together for hundreds of years and is a model of social and religious harmony.
Golden coloured houses made out of limestone are clustered on the slopes of three mountains
The city is rich with exceptionally kind, tolerant people and crazy steep hills.
The city of As Salt
During our wanderings we stopped for street food. The seasoned kernel corn in a cup was more delicious than it had any right to be!
Just before arriving to El Salt we were invited to share a picnic of grilled pita sandwiches with seasoned ground lamb inside and then sprinkled with lemon juice. A side of yogurt, cucumber and garlic salad, and fermented pickles completed the tasty dinner.
The city of Mataba
Towards the end of the 19th century many Christian families who settled in Madaba used the blocks of the ruined ancient structures already there to build their houses. As a result, floor mosaics were unearthed and can still be found in some family homes today.
Madaba, known for its exquisite mosaics is often referred to as The Mosaic capital of the Levantine.
Stunning mosaics were found in churches and mansions alike, dating to the reign of the Byzantines from 332 – 635 AD. This tree of life was found in the crypt of Saint Elianus
Several historic periods can be found from Roman to Byzantine to Islamic Umayyad. Each period built on what was previously there, giving a glimpse of the continuous occupation of Madaba.
A mosaic of the holy land on the floor of the Byzantine church of St. George is only one of Madaba’s shining stars. I couldn’t fit the whole map in the picture.