Arriving in Athens, Greece

After the debarcle of the flights and the most annoying taxi drivers in the world, I finally caught a free shuttle service to the airport from the hotel, which in fact took longer for them to ride than it took me to walk the same distance, however at almost midnight I did not feel safe walking with a rucksack through remote unlit side streets.

Cairo airport has a maximum three hour waiting period, where if you arrive before then they will not even let you past the first line of security, so to kill the last few minutes I went downstairs and had a pizza and fries, all the while trying to avoid being myself ate alive by mosquitos.

I was a little miffed that despite buying a meal in the restaurant in order to use their wifi I had to pay extra and was more than a bit glad that I am leaving as I fear I am fast on my way to racially dumping Egyptians in the same 'generally best to avoid' category as I have done with Indians.

However proving that not all Egyptians are to be avoided at all costs, in the airport lounge a friendly female local who was happened to be on the same flight came up to me and started chatting to me, and by the time we were due to fly we were almost chummy, and her talking was the only thing keeping me awake at that point.

As soon as all the air stewardesses had passed and straps themselves in I immediately unbuckled myself and thanks to the luxury of being on an almost deserted overnight flight I was able to stretch out and was probably snoring before we even reached the standard cruising altitude.

For about the hundreth time I wondered why the air stewardessses felt the need to disturb me in order to tell me, not ask, to lift up the window blind and I dearly hope there is a red hot poker in hell waiting eagerly for the posterior who thought that one up.

One of the many benefits of being a European citizen was that while all the other passengers were forced to queue up in the very slow moving lines through immigration I was able to start my own line of one in the EU section and literally waltzed through with barely an upward glance. True this way you dont get to have your passport stamped this way, but there is more to life than stamps and not being stuck in a line for ages is a worthwhile trade off.

Having completely spent my time in Egypt without being rained on I had began to feel that my weather jinx has been broken, but with Athens almost underwater I soon realised that in fact it was just the exception that proved the rule.

My friendly Egyptian traveller was still with me on the way to the city centre and we shared a bus as far as it went when we were forced to part company as her hotel was in one direction and mine was the other. Had I any of my business cards left I would probably have given her one so that we could keep in touch, but alas my supply was now all spent and I was far too tired to think so I just said farewell and then opened the door to her taxi.

A few minutes later I caught my own and was a little surprised when thirty seconds later he opened the door and accepted a second life, and all I could think of what that at least he was an old man and thus less likely to be a mugger.

Although it was barely 8am my day was still going downhill as when I did arrive at my hotel they had cancelled my reservation after I had failed to show up two days ago and were not full. I briefly argued that I had contacted them by email twice, but I was still too exhausted to mount any real enthusiasm and so I just asked if he could help me find another hotel. "There are many hotels" with much theatrics and gruffness to his voice and I could tell that he hated his job and was only waiting for his next glass of wine and a chance to relax.

I declined the suggestion that I could stick around til after eleven ( almost three hours ! ) to see if they received any cancellations, already knowing that the further away from him and his hotel the happer I would be, and also I felt on the verge of deciding to get a taxi to the nearest 4 or even 5 star hotel if for no better reason than they would cut through the crap and let me have a bed post haste.

As luck would have it there were plenty of hotels nearby and on the second attempt I found a slightly grubby one in a rather shady location but it was dry and cheap and that was all I cared about at the moment. The rickety old lift was so narrow that with my backpack on I could not even turn around and so had to reverse out into the hallway when we reached my floor.

I passed a concom vending machine in the hallway and when I reached my room I found a spirit level lying on my bed. With no view at all from my main window I went to the bathroom window to see if the view was any better in there and could see only an alleyway where two leather clad hookers ( one a transvestite I bet, even from this distance he was a dead giveaway ) were loitering for a passing trick to come their way.

After coughing my lungs up for the umpteenth time in 48 hours I tried to wash myself up in the basin only for the faucet to drench me and my legs, so far from my most auspiciuos start.

Dumping my clothes on the ajoining single bed, I layed down and passed out in moments, not waking up til 5pm, having just slept through the best part of the day and thankfully the rain had stopped.

I considered if it was worth trying to book a trip to Delphi tomorrow or even a nighttime trip, but with my cold and cough still lingering and the rain I felt it probably best just to instead grab a meal and see what the weather does tomorrow morning before visiting much more of Athens.

Even before I managed to get outside the hotel I noticed that the two hookers I saw from earlier had now been joined by a few friends and the whole group were pretty much filling up the whole doorway outside the hotel, which was met by total oblivion by the hotel receptionist so I am guessing that they are either in cahoots or just its not worth the hassle making a scene.

My card refused to let me take out more than 50 EU$ and I remembered that the exchange rate from Bahrain dollars to EU dollars was better than for pounds, so I am guessing that the GB£ might now be worth less than a EUS which is disasterous news for Brits, especially those abroad.

I managed to find a bite to eat in a little restaurant around the corner form the hotel, but with no map in the dark I didnt want to venture far and within the hour I was back in my room, tring to get some sleep.