Camels and Donkeys
Let me just say, for the record, riding a camel is really uncomfortable - particularly for a guy! In Aswan, we rode camels for 1hr through the desert to St. Simon's Monastery. This monastery was actually one of the earliest Christian churches. With the Roman persecution, many Christians we're forced to live out in the desert, so they built a monastery out of mud brick. This site isn't very popular however, because some time afterwards, all the Christians were converted into Muslims, and so the place is now a Mosque.
This is Jono on a Camel:
This morning in Luxor, after visiting the Valley of the Kings, it was time for the donkey-ride. Now Donkeys are renowned for being extremely suborn, as we soon found out! They are not grand, they are not graceful. They are just, well, donkeys! And whoever sits on a donkey, looks really really stupid:
It reminds me of when Jesus entered Jerusalem, riding on a Donkey. He must have looked so silly! Certainly, it wasn't the kind of grand entry you'd expect for God's promised King and Saviour.
Overall however, our donkey-ride was awesome. We raced them like horses through the local village, passed all the kids who were harvesting the sugar cane. Afterwards, we stopped by a street vendor to buy some Sweet Potatoes from his cart-drawn wood oven, while our donkeys decided to go for a stroll through the traffic.
Tonight, we return to Cairo. And then tomorrow I'm off to Spain! Stay tuned for more updates.