We left the boat very late after a late arrival and a 6 hour custom clearance
We drove from Alexandria through Giza and past the pyramids, disappointingly after dark. sam was keen to see them again but we did get a silhouette from the side of the road while we had an essential break, just a 100m or so away
We had dealt well with the Alexandria traffic passing where we stayed a few years ago and past the lighthouse site and the new library, and I think we are better at driving than the Egyptians
Taxi rides in town are interesting but these guys had never come across 45 motivated rally drivers before.
We got through a few big jams going into Giza and then we exited to the west on an empty freeway for a couple of hours drive to the Red Sea
I can’t remember the name where we stayed last night but it was on the water and one of the tourist hotels
Today we had a few great competitions coming up in the desert and mountains, with the first running through very steep valleys
Sam was on the money on the first stage but then we came round into a narrow pass and most of the rally was bogged, even the 4wd Porsche
So we u turned and headed for the third stage (after learning our lesson and loosing so many spots in Greece) calculating that the enormous penalties the leaders would get would bounce us back up to the middle of the field. We got 19th on the competitive section , only to find that the rules had changed and our opportunity to recover removed
We nailed the start time by seconds and finished within allotted time, took off for another hotel on the water only to find the organizers had cancelled the second stage. it remains strange how the organizers don’t really care about the bottom of the filed if they get stuck, but if the leaders are in strife the rules change in their favour
Any way we are here and quiet disappointed with missing the first and second stage as what we had seen of them they were fatalistic driving and fantastic scenery
