Port Said, Ismailiya, and Suez

Trip Start Apr 01, 2008

Trip End Ongoing

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Where I stayed

Port Said Mereland Hotel and Arafat Hotel

(Port Said hotels)

Flag of Egypt Port Said, Egypt
Saturday, April 19, 2008

Port Said was the refuge from Cairo we were looking for. The air was cleaner, the food was awesome, and the rates were more than reasonable. This was probably because we were the only tourists in Port Said. I guess after the war fifty years ago, tourism was wiped out in Port Said, but it still had all the wonderful things we were looking for. Our hotel room at the Mereland was more like an apartment with two bedrooms, 5 beds, a full size refrigerator, a living room, and a private bath. The sign above the hotel has fallen into disrepair and everyone had a good chuckle that we were staying at the Por Sa d Mereland Hotel. We ate Korean food and drank at the only bar in town called the Cecil for Ian's 26th birthday. The next day we attempted to go to the Military Museum, but it closed two hours early. We could see blown up Israeli planes and tanks left over from the war and the school next door had murals on the walls of the Egyptian army triumphing over Israel. Instead we had a fish feast that cost each of us about 10 dollars. Our waiter took us to the back of the restaurant and asked us to point to the fish we would like and they picked up that particular fish and threw it on the grill

Dinner in Suez

. Fresh fish in Egypt always seems to come whole no matter where you eat. Our fish meal came with seven types of salad including two types of potato salad, a Greek salad, humus, babaghanouj, tahini, molokhiyya, etc... The fish we picked was Grouper and we got calamari as well. It was the best fish I have ever had and the meals of fish we had were consistently good for our entire trip. We took the bus from Port Said through Ismailiya, where we stopped for two hours, and then on to Suez. We had a gorgeous room in Suez that was on the roof of a hotel. This is the first time we had screens on the windows and it was so refreshing to be able to open the windows at night without fear of being eaten alive by mosquitoes. We had a great view of the city and of the ships that seemed to be gliding through the desert. Our intention was to spend the night in Suez and then take the direct bus from there to Dahab, but we ended up on a bus that took more than 10 hours. Even traveling along the coast and stopping at every check (which we did) should have only taken 7 hours, but our bus driver didn't want to travel more than 40km an hour, so we were stuck. At least it was sort of air-conditioned. Once we reached Dahab, we realized why it was worth the trip.