Turkey, Egypt, and Cypress

[MadVlad]

... and had a blast!! Egypt was awesome, I really wasn't prepared for a few thiongs though. All the great monuments (or the one's I saw) were literally right next to modern development, which I had not expected. I also was not prepared for the onslaught of "vendors" as soon as you set foot around anything. They will hand you "free" items, put shiek-looking head coverings on your head, and say "Welcome to the Pyramids, we love Amercians, Hi-Ho Silver!!" Of course, 5 minutes later, they're trying to get you to pay ridiculous amounts of money for the "free" merchandise, and trying to con you into walking into more deserted areas for whatever reason. the ride to the Pyramids from Alexandria was alos fun, a lot of Bedouin communities, but way too much trash and unk on the streets and rivers for my liking.

Cypress, was, well, a disappointment. Our tour guide basically insulted American's and the Turks the whole time, I didn't find the people as openly receptive to our tourism dollars (basically treating us as a necessary evil as opposed to something welcome), and we didn't get a real good vibe from the island.

Turkey was the best. Our Cruise ship sailed into Marmaris (we wanted to go to Istanbul in the worst way, my wife is Turkish, but that didn't work out). The people were all extremely pleasant, going way out of their way to make us comfortable, share their tea with us, and make our stay pleasurable whether we bought something or not. I must say, the Turks do have a way with selling. We bought a lot of items, all at what I percieve as good prices, and even the places we didn't buy at were really great to us. We saw a few older ruins, Dalyan and Caunos, which were mind blowing.

On a score of 1 to 10....

Turkey 9+

Egypt 7

Cypress 4

[mcheiss]

... and had a blast!! Egypt was awesome, I really wasn't prepared for a few thiongs though. All the great monuments (or the one's I saw) were literally right next to modern development, which I had not expected. I also was not prepared for the onslaught of "vendors" as soon as you set foot around anything. They will hand you "free" items, put shiek-looking head coverings on your head, and say "Welcome to the Pyramids, we love Amercians, Hi-Ho Silver!!" Of course, 5 minutes later, they're trying to get you to pay ridiculous amounts of money for the "free" merchandise, and trying to con you into walking into more deserted areas for whatever reason. the ride to the Pyramids from Alexandria was alos fun, a lot of Bedouin communities, but way too much trash and unk on the streets and rivers for my liking.

Cypress, was, well, a disappointment. Our tour guide basically insulted American's and the Turks the whole time, I didn't find the people as openly receptive to our tourism dollars (basically treating us as a necessary evil as opposed to something welcome), and we didn't get a real good vibe from the island.

Turkey was the best. Our Cruise ship sailed into Marmaris (we wanted to go to Istanbul in the worst way, my wife is Turkish, but that didn't work out). The people were all extremely pleasant, going way out of their way to make us comfortable, share their tea with us, and make our stay pleasurable whether we bought something or not. I must say, the Turks do have a way with selling. We bought a lot of items, all at what I percieve as good prices, and even the places we didn't buy at were really great to us. We saw a few older ruins, Dalyan and Caunos, which were mind blowing.

On a score of 1 to 10....

Turkey 9+

Egypt 7

Cypress 4

So you didn't get to see Istanbul?

That's a bummer, the city has so many high-rises under construction.

[Mith242]

It's too bad you didn't enjoy your stay in Cypress. I've never been but I know someone who has family go there on a semi regular basis and I have heard good things from them.

[MadVlad]

Yeah, we missed Istanbul. My wife wanted to go in the worst way. What will eventually happen is we'll get a vacation where we'll spend a whole week in Istanbul....