A Wednesday Surprise!

Well, that's right, our usual Wednesday jaunt to the Etap was full of surprises today.

This morning, I'd read somewhere that 500 of the town's cleaners had, more or less, taken the Governor hostage in his own office! As we made our way through the rubbish strewn Youseff Hassan Street, it was patently obvious that the 'Amoun' men (street sweepers) weren't working. What a mess! We should have been issued with wellies or something. Never mind, we eventually managed to get as far as the Savoy Bazaar, and were aware of several men in what looked like NEW uniforms.Could this be a concession made to them? New uniforms instead of better wages?

When we came out of the other end of the Bazaar, we realised that they weren't Amoun men at all, they were ambulance men! Here's what brought us to that conclusion!
                                                                                                                                                             

That's right, this is Luxor's ambulance fleet, well 25 of them, anyway!











There were several which were out of shot, some actually in the Luxor Supreme Council car park, and a couple across the road in the lay-by.








I asked one of the drivers if he spoke any Inglesie, but he just indicated that he knew a little. Eventually, we came to the understanding that there was a small problem, and that problem was a lack of floos (money). They were still all standing there when we finally came away, so I hope that no-one needed their services while they were lobbying the Governor!

The 25% reduction in drinks prices at the Etap, was coupled with TWO sachets of Nescafe for Freda today. I couldn't complain, as I got a large teapot full of tea instead of the usual small one. They must have been having a good day! Not many minutes after we had taken our usual seats, a Misr Travel coach pulled in, more or less completely blocking our view if the road. As I pointed out yesterday, it's the Egyptian fortnight, and the El Luxor was consequently busy with Egyptian tourists. This coach had arrived to pick some of them up, he'd obviously been booked for a five o'clock return, but was still there at twenty past. If it had been me; the rest would have been walking home, I can assure you! After two false starts, he finally got away. My heart went out to him, I can vividly recall many a day trip return which I just wanted to be over before it started! I only hope he didn't have too far to go.

Not many new guests arrived at the Etap, but we did see about 6 or so Travco coaches sailing along the Corniche, so the Thomson flights were pretty busy. That has to be good news, even if they are mostly just joining Nile cruises.

Then we saw this:

I'm sure that I mentioned, the other week, that I'd seen two open-toppers, well, I finally managed to snap one, even if it was nearly gone by the time I managed to get the old trusty out!

So there you are. That's what passes for an eventful afternoon in Luxor, well it does for some of us! But, in actual fact that wasn't all. With the ongoing strike of the lock-keepers at Esna; we have been warned that there may well be a water cut, so we now have all of our buckets and dishes etc. filled with water and standing about in the bathroom. Those poor folk who have to survive on the West Bank had no water for most of the day on Monday, one forum contributor from over there wrote that things were starting to stink! Poor souls.

I wonder what tomorrow might bring?