“You’re going to Egypt AGAIN?!”

After unpacking, sorting, sending and posting photos, answering email and Slack messages, watching our daughter get married a few days after we returned*, and doing all the things you do when returning from a trip. I started to fully process everything we did on our extraordinary trip to Egypt in November, 2023.

But realized we had missed one thing.

Bringing both our daughters 😊

Because our trip had been scheduled late-ish, there was only one cabin left on the one cruise line that had a Nile cruise with dates that included my birthday (because what’s the point of going before or after your birthday – you’re then still going to have to have that birthday party – ugh).

So we couldn’t bring our daughters (tbh both had recently just started new jobs when we booked the trip, but still).

So starting in January, after the holidays, I started noodling on places I could show them if we went back – figuring that they’d both WANT to go, and figuring we could pick a time that worked for all….

In April, I asked the girls, “if we planned a return trip to Egypt would you…”

and before I could finish the question they both said “go to Egypt with you, yes!!” so that was great. We discussed dates, length of trip, could Emily’s new husband Dan go…then we had to figure out the logistics, hotels, restaurants, tickets and transportations to sites, etc.

Luckily, we had stayed in touch with our Guide on the trip, Egyptologist and Program Director Fouad Berto, who grew up and went to school in Cairo and knows pretty much everything you’d ever need to know about Egypt. (He also seemed to know literally EVERYONE at every site, not only other tourism professionals or people at restaurants, hotels and sites, even just random people would stop to say hello to him.)

We had a zoom call after I texted him about ideas for a trip, told him the dates we were thinking about, discussed options and he came up with a preliminary plan that we’d tweak over the summer and confirm in the early fall – for a January 2025 return trip to Egypt.

But this time would Be. Even. Better.

There are so, so many fabulous places to go, sites to visit, people to meet, food to eat, things to do, when you’re in Egypt, you’d have to move there in order to explore it all.

Of course, not just the pyramids and the Sphinx, or bustling ancient Cairo.

There are deserts with the most incredible fossils and oases, lakes, dunes (that you can drive a custom jeep up or sandboard down).

There are spectacular stargazing areas in these deserts and by other sites (like Dendera Temple) where you can spend a night under Egypt’s dark, starry skies (with an astronomy professional and a telescope if you want).

You can head to the absolutely breathtaking Red Sea, stay at any one of a number of gorgeous resorts right on the water and take a boat out to snorkel in the waters by protected coral reefs.

There are many-thousands-of-year-old temples in cities and towns like Luxor, Aswan, Qena, Esna, Edfu to marvel at and walk through.

You can visit the city of Alexandria with its ancient library and historic trade routes.

And you can visit archaeological sites like those in Abydos if you’re hard core.

But we can dig (get it?) into all that later.

*Fun fact: our older daughter Emily and then-future Best Son-in-Law Ever, got engaged in January 2022, decided right before we left for Egypt that they wanted a simple, civil ceremony, not a big wedding, so decided to have a friend officiate the ceremony and hold a casual wedding in their favorite pub where they had their first date and got engaged, Murphy’s Townhouse Café in Stamford, CT, six days after we returned from our trip to Egypt.