“The northern Sinai Peninsula is a war zone and tensions are very high,” a colonel in the Egyptian Army told The Idiot when he discussed resuming his walk around the Mediterranean Sea at Rafah on the Egyptian side of Gaza. “Don’t risk it — not that we’d give you the necessary permission to be there — while we’re fighting Daesh (ISIS) and have numerous other security concerns in Sinai.”
That advice, which was echoed by numerous other sources in Cairo and elsewhere, prompted The Idiot to choose to MedTrek from Port Fouad on the Asian side of the Suez Canal through Port Said towards Alexandria which, founded by Alexander the Great in 332 BC, was Egypt’s capital for over 1,000 years.
An Egyptian woman has tea and checks her phone on a Port Said beach at sunrise.
A group of fisherman pull in their huge net on a Mediterranean beach west of Port Said, Egypt.
Fishermen in the lagoons near Damietta, Egypt.
MedTrekking along the Nile in Ras el-Bar, Egypt.
There are more cats than people at the lighthouse in Ras el-Bar, Egypt.
The Idiot still managed to be pleasantly detained for 14 hours near the Damietta port (think CNN, lots of tea, shrimp lunch, walks on the beach with a friendly first lieutenant and a free ride to HQ and back in Port Said while they checked him out) by the Egyptian military who very efficiently patrol and control the sea coast.
Buying fruit before heading west of Ras el-Bar, Egypt, towards the Damietta port.
Everything seemed clean and clear just before The Idiot was detained for fourteen hours by the Egyptian army between Ras el-Bar and the Damietta port. He mistakenly walked into an unmarked (in English) and unfenced military base.
That experience taught him to check very carefully to determine if the sandy beaches and coastline are public (which is the case in urban areas like Ras el-Bar, Gamasa, Baltim and Al Bourros) or off limits (which The Idiot presumes is the case elsewhere when fishermen make a sign of being handcuffed with their wrists or there’s a visible military presence).
One of many military outposts on the Mediterranean Sea in Egypt.
A MedTrekkable beach in Gamasa, Egypt.
A MedTrekkable field in the Nile Delta in Gamasa, Egypt.
Public beach art in Baltim, Egypt.
Entering the Al Borlos fishing port where the sea wall has been reinforced with dolosse to prevent erosion and thwart a rising sea.
Although he probably erred on the side of caution and avoided some sections of the seaside to walk on the treacherous International Coastal Road, The Idiot hasn’t been detained again and his experiences with authorities (there are frequent checkpoints and encounters with the military, border patrol and police) and other Egyptians have been friendly. “Welcome to Egypt” is the most-heard English expression and everyone responds when The Idiot says “Assalaamu aleikum” dozens of times each day.
Egypt is in the throes of an inflationary economic crisis (the IMF approved a $12 billion loan this month), which makes it one of the least expensive and filthiest (there’s garbage everywhere) places to visit on the Mediterranean.
There are apartments and rooms with views like this for only $7.50 a night during the “winter” season on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast.
Garbage (and in this case garbage and goats) is an eyesore almost everywhere in Egypt.
But there are signs that the elected military-run government is moving in the right direction and has the support of the populace. The Suez Canal has been expanded to take more traffic (if more traffic there is), The Idiot passed two new power stations being built on the Mediterranean and Delta University was thriving with enthusiastic students when The Idiot made a brief visit to promote his blog and The Idiot and the Odyssey books. The only other foreigners he met on the coast were three young British scientists inspecting cargo at the Damietta port. And rest assured that the traffic is still crazy everywhere.
On to Rosetta/Rashid and Alexandria
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