The definition of a Globetrotter is someone who travels widely and often. So after I travelled for three weeks from Aswan in Upper Egypt, via Luxor, via Cairo to Alexandria in Lower Egypt  I thought I qualified

Map of Egypt

   – but there was a problem.  My luggage – a real globetrotter knows better – and I didn’t. I had loaded myself down with a large suitcase and two other bags , which did not have  wheels. But there were situations when wheels did not help either, like in a sandy, uneven street.

My friend Sue and I stood helpless in front of my luggage trying to decide who will pull the large suitcase through the dirt, and who will carry the two bags. Fortunately, John her husband came and dragged the suitcase and we each took a bag.

Or when getting on and off a water taxi which brought me from the West Bank of the Nile to Luxor. There was only a narrow, little plank with nothing to hold on to, and once off the boat there was a steep stone staircase to go up. Looking at it I wondered, how we,  my big suitcase and the two other bags would make it over and up.  Fortunately Bawady, the owner and driver of the boat took them and like an experienced dancer,  he stepped onto the narrow wooden plank to shore and up the stairs.

 You must wonder what I had in those bags – well, while packing  I kept on thinking that 3 weeks is a long time and I added more t-shirts, more pants, and more, and more……….. what I did not know is that in every hotel, even the smallest one, you can give your laundry to wash in the morning, and you will find it in your room in the afternoon – clean and very well pressed. Had I known this  I would have reduces my t-shirts to 6 instead of —- no, I don’t want to tell you how many I took!

This, of course, is not only true for Egypt, travelling anywhere – travelling light – you will not be frustrated, bugged down, or paralyzed by too many t-shirts….!

More from Egypt soon                                

Desert in Aswan seen from the Nile

                                     Brigitte