SA|Photo

Nothing much

2009-12-17T21:07:00.000-08:00

It's been just over a month since I posted last and I guess I haven't had much to blog about. I'm just working and have had a lot of projects from portrait sittings to model portfolio, and of course, the dreaded Christmas themed imagery. I had several glamour images printed of my model friend Wendi Handley in the October issue of FHM magazine (Philippines). That was cool. And supposedly, I have

Time flies

2009-11-12T22:46:00.000-08:00

It's been just over a month since I returned from my trip and I've had so much going on. I was sick for a little while and apparently brought a bug back with me, had neck and back problems from carrying my backpack all over but probably more so from the bus squishing me in Cairo, and I've been busy with shoots. It's been a long month but I'm feeling better. I was in LA last weekend shooting and

This time last week

2009-10-16T14:11:00.000-07:00

Last Friday I was sitting at JFK waiting on my return flight to San Diego, exhausted from my trip and ready to get home. It's amazing how quickly time passes. I look back and think how wonderful but short the trip was and I am having a bit of travel withdraw. I find myself thinking of new locations to run off to now and Tokyo or Hong Kong may be next on my list. I've caught a bug and it wants to

I'm home

2009-10-10T12:07:00.000-07:00

It was a long day of travel yesterday, 27 hours. I made it back last night around 8pm, San Diego time. I talked with my friend Kim, who apartment sat for me, and after I unpacked and took a shower I was out. It's noon now and I'm just getting started with my day. The trip already seems so distant. I was talking with a neighbor who has traveled extensively and he said he felt bad for me because he

Final leg

2009-10-10T12:04:00.000-07:00

October 8th - 4:45pm, somewhere over the MidwestI'm on the last leg of my trip in the air somewhere over the Midwest. I had a ten hour layover at JFK today... got on my flight at 4pm, easy coast time, and have been in the air now for a little over an hour. It's strange that I look back on the last two weeks and it went so quick, and now feels so distant. I had a wonderf time and an adventure that

6:19am, wheels on the ground at JFK

2009-10-10T12:03:00.000-07:00

October 9th - 9:00am, east coast timeWe landed at JFK at 6:19am and the cabin broke into aplause. We didn't have a rough flight or anything, people were just happy to be on the ground in the US. It was a long flight though, elleven and a half hours. After I got off the plane I went through passport control and security, it was good to be back. The last two weeks have been adventurous to say the

Cairo airport

2009-10-08T14:02:00.000-07:00

October 8th - 11pmJust went through security which took about 45 minutes. Seriously, I went through several stations. I'm sitting at the gate now and have about an hour before boarding. I hired a driver from the hotel and Ali was awesome. It was like driving with a madman, and he was so nice to talk with. I think he got me here in record time. It's a good thing too because the airport is packed.

All is good

2009-10-08T02:18:00.000-07:00

October 8th - 3:00amI can't sleep so I thought I would explain why in my last post I think Egypt is trying to kill me. I was kidding but yesterday was a bit tough. It started good and I slept a little late, got up and had breakfast at the hotel,... cheese, bread, olives, and cucumbers. I packed my bag, checked out, and headded for the train station. It was about a 20 to 25 minute walk. I asked

Egypt is trying to kill me

2009-10-07T13:39:00.000-07:00

October 7th - 10:30pmI just checked in to the Lialy hostel downtown in Talaat Harb circle. I got off the train around 6:30pm from Alexandria, took the subway to Sadat square, and then walked to the Juliana hostel in Garden City. I booked with them before checking out last week and paid an EL 100 deposit. I get there tonight and find that they gave my room to someone else. I get the deposit back

On my way to Cairo

2009-10-07T02:08:00.000-07:00

October 7th - 11amI just checked out of the hotel Egypt and I'm walking over to the train station to get a ticket back to Cairo. I hope to catch an afternoon train and miss the rush. I should get into Cairo by 6pm.

Where's Alexandria

2009-10-06T13:38:00.000-07:00

October 6th - 9:30pmI've been walking around Alexandria all day. I just returned to relax, take a shower, then go to sleep. I started off my day by eating at Athenos resturant right around the corner from the hotel. I had a fish, mushroom, curry dish which was so good. Like really good. I've never had a curry dish with fish that tasted so good. And the fish... ahhhI left the resturant in search

The Egypt hotel

2009-10-06T02:49:00.000-07:00

October 6th - 11:30 amI just checked into my new room at the Egypt hotel. As I type this I'm sitting on the corner of the bed looking out of the french doors at the bay and fort Qaitbey. The hotel is just one block over from the place I stayed last night (I paid $24.00 US but that was to much for that place). I'm on the third floor and overlooking the main street, and bay. Everything is booked

Cafe Trianon

2009-10-05T14:54:00.000-07:00

October 5th - 11:40pmI just finished dinner inside cafe Trianon. The margareta pizza was so good. I moved to the sidewalk outside to people watch and breath in exahust fumes and dust from the busy street right in front of me (just kidding, it's not really that bad). After several days in Luxor the breez is wonderful tonight. It's actually a little chilly but then the bay is just a 100 yards

In Alexandria

2009-10-05T13:56:00.000-07:00

October 5th - 10:45 pmI made it to Alexandria after a long 12 hour trip. It was two train rides, from Luxor to Cairo, and Cairo to Alexandrian. The first class compartment was comfortable and I was able to sleep a little. I arrived in Alexandria around 2pm and walked around the train station for a little while to figure out where things are when I come back and get my ticket for Cairo on

On the train to Alexandria

2009-10-05T13:51:00.000-07:00

October 5th - 11:10 amJust boarded the 11:15 train to Alexandria. I arrived at the Cario station about an hour ago, purchased my ticket to Alexandria and spent the rest of the time wondering around the station. I didn't get much sleep again on the train ride up from Luxor. The car wasn't bad at first but in the middle of the night the airconditioning kicked in at it was freezing. I had to get

On a deeper note

2009-10-05T13:47:00.000-07:00

October 5th -12:15amI've been listening to music on my iPod and looking out the window as distant street lights pass. This trip has been a tough one. Not because of the cultural differences, language barrier, or difficulties I've faced but because I've not had my companion to share in those experiances and be part of an amazing journey. It's been a trip mixed with wonder, amazment, excitment,

Moving on to Cairo

2009-10-05T13:44:00.000-07:00

October 4th - 10:22pmI'm on the train for Cairo. The car is much better than the one I came down in. I think the only smelly thing on it this time is me. I'm pretty rank after a day in the desert heat. Ahh, the swiming pool would be so good right now. Luxor has been incredable and I would come back again. I missed so much, just not enough time to do it all. I have to say that even with the

Last day in Luxor

2009-10-04T12:13:00.000-07:00

October 4th - 7:00pmI'm sitting in El Hussien resturant waiting on my chicken dish, after finishing my walk through Karnak. I've had an interesting day. I was up early to get things together because check out was supposed to be at noon. The desk attendant let me stay until 3 which was cool. That gave me time to rest a little more and then head off to the train station to get my ticket for the 10:

Not so much

2009-10-03T11:51:00.000-07:00

October 3rd - 7:50pmI'm sitting in the lobby of the Winter Palace hotel. It's the posh portion of the hotel where rooms go for 3 and 4 hundred a night. They have free wifi here so I've snuck in to send notes and update my blog. It's a beautiful hotel though and over a hundred years of history. Well, today I didn't do so much. I think the travel has caught up to me and I was really tired this

Quick note

2009-10-02T10:42:00.000-07:00

October 2nd - 8:45 pmJust returned from Luxor temple. It's incredable!! I'm exhausted so I'm going to keep this note short and I have a long day tomorrow and so need sleep. I'm happy my hotel is quite and very peaceful. Anyway, my iPod battery is going dead too. I was up all night playing with it and typing. I took so many images this afternoon my eyes hurt. I got to the temple around 2 and

In Luxor but just barely

2009-10-02T10:35:00.000-07:00

October 2nd - 11:38amI arrived in Luxor but just barely. I had finally fallen asleep about 6 this monring. I watched the sun come up through the window of the train. It was so dirty you could hardly see out it though. The train ride was rough. Seated car, smelly, and freezing cold at first. By morning it wasn't as cold but still smelly. As I said, I finally got to sleep about 6. I woke up for a

On the train

2009-10-02T10:33:00.000-07:00

October 1st - 11:15 pmI'm on the train to Luxor. I left downtown Cairo arond 8pm and hopped on the subway to Mubarak station. The train was packed and we litterally were pushed off in a mass group. There was an older couple in front of me and once off the train we started talking, they had there back to me for the short trip. It turned out they were going to the train station to get the same

I'm off to Luxor

2009-10-01T10:40:00.001-07:00

7:45 pmJust a quick note because I may not have Internet for a few days. I'm off to Luxor on the 10:15 pm train. I'll sendore when I het comected again.

In Cairo and heading for Luxor

2009-10-01T10:33:00.000-07:00

October 1st - 2:00 pmJust purchased my train ticket to Luxor. It was EL165, $30 US.4:00pmMy train leaves at 10:15 so I decided to get back on the subway and come back down to Sadat square. I've been walking around now for an hour and wanted to take a break before heading off for food. I'm sitting in Sadat square relaxing in the shade and watching rush hour traffic. Taking the subway to Mubarak

On the balcony

2009-10-01T01:28:00.000-07:00

October 1st - 10:15 amI'm sitting on the balcony again drinking tea and enjoying the breeze. I woke early today to try and figure out my transportation issues. I need to get a train ticket to Luxor this evening and after I finish my laundry I'll get my things packed and head off to the metro station. From there, I'll catch the subway up to the train station and see if I can get a ticket. I've

Giza pyramids

2009-09-30T12:42:00.000-07:00

30th - 2:45 pmArrived at the pyramids. Read the next post below for my introduction to Giza. Okay, with the tough part out of the way I'm walking around the sphyinx and it's incredable. I only wish that I could have gotten right next to it. I moved on from there to khufu pyramid and walked around the site. I took so many pictures. The size is incredable, all three are incredable. It's amazing

Evening breez

2009-09-30T10:19:00.000-07:00

It's 7:20 pm and I've been sitting on my balcony enjoying the evening breez. It was such a hot day in the desert, and frustrating too. Just so many people wanting baksheesh and my driver pissed me off by dumping me right in the center of the camel and horse jockeys. I told Hany specifically that I didn't want a horse or camel at the pyramids. Hany is the owner of the Juliana hotel where I'm

Memphis, Imhotep, and Saqqara

2009-09-30T10:05:00.001-07:00

30th - 9:00amWaited for my driver for half hour, finaly got here (the hotel) and then we both waited on the car, he didn't have one and I guess was dropped off. Too funny. He was friendly enogh, just didn't speake english... very little. And, I know like a handful of Arabic words/phrases so there wasn't much conversation. The drive to Memphis was long, bumpy and scarry at times. Scarry with

Egyptian Museum and other things

2009-09-29T14:43:00.000-07:00

Tuesday 29th - 12:00Before getting to the museum I spent a couple hours walking around downtown. I woke up late and didn't get out of the hotel until 10. All I have to say is, Crrazy! Cars everywhere, people, noise, water dripping on your head from airconditioning, people trying to talk with you and sell you things. And crossing the street... OMG! Talk about sensory overload. Finally, I get to

The airport

2009-09-29T13:56:00.000-07:00

28thSo, we land at 3:45 pm. I get off the plane, go to the arrivals area where I'm asked to fill out another card,... this one is for the Health Ministry. After getting through that I get in line for the passport check but I forget my Visa so I have to get out of line and go over to the bank to get it. $15 US gets you a 30 day visa. I go back to the line and get through that. I'm walking toward

On the plane to Cairo

2009-09-29T13:37:00.000-07:00

28th - 2:30pm - that's 5:30 am California time.We've been in the air for about 9 hours now and there's just over an hour of fligh time left. I've slept most of it and spent the last two hours eating and watching Star Trek, an on flight movie. I was told by the passanger next to me there were a couple hours of really rough flight. I thought it was only like 15 minutes so I guess I slept through

Arrived in Cario

2009-09-28T09:13:00.000-07:00

I'm so tired and my experiance at the airport and drive downtown have left me exahusted. The experiance coming in was amazing though and flying over Greece was so cool. The ordeal at the airport was chalanging and I won't go into that now but I made it to the hostel and I'm relaxing a bit before taking a walk down the street to see the Nile. I wrote some on the plane so when I get back this

2009-09-27T18:45:00.001-07:00

Got to JFK... it was a long day filled with delay. I'm on my flight to Cairo, waiting to take off. I hope to sleep through the flight, I'm so tired.

2009-09-27T11:15:00.001-07:00

The plane is fixed and we're off.

Flying out of San Diego

2009-09-27T07:04:00.000-07:00

Okay, so this mornig I was finishing my work projects, packing, and trying to get some last minute things taken care of. I've been up all night and tired but I have a friend looking after the place while traveling and I wanted to straighten and clean up a bit. The last thing to do is take out the trash. Since I already gave my keys away I only have the spare to my door and not the entry to the

Bags are packed

2009-09-27T02:58:00.000-07:00

It's 3am and I'm trying to finish up some last minute work. I have about 2 hours before the cab comes to take me to the airport. I can't wait to get on the plan because I'm so tired. My total flight time is like 17 hours and I think I'm going to sleep most of it. I may spend the 6 hour layover at JFK sleeping too. Ugh, 24 hours of travel time. It's worth it though and I'm excited to fly into

2009-09-24T05:38:00.000-07:00

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. - Eleanor Roosevelt

Egyptian Pounds are cool

2009-09-22T18:11:00.000-07:00

I went to the bank today and picked up my order of "exotic" currency. It was funny hearing someone call currency exotic I guess (my banker called it that). The pound notes I picked up are the 50s and 100s and the engravings and color on both are very cool. The Sphinx on the 100 is awesome. If you don't know, the 100 is pretty much the equivalent of our $20... my exchange rate today was $1.00

Voice memo from iPod

2009-09-22T17:58:00.000-07:00

I'm trying out the voice recording feature. If this works you should be able to click on the file below and hear my voice.Note:So the text above was sent from the iPod but the voice recording didn't come through. It would have been cool if it worked for the blog. It does work well with email though. I sent a copy to myself and the recording came through as a mpeg attachment. This could come in

The iPod Touch

2009-09-21T22:26:00.001-07:00

It came today. I've been downloading apps and setting up and it's pretty cool. I've set up Skype, created a gmail account to forward and send mail from, added a text chat app that works with my cell phone, and dowloaded a bunch of other cool stuff like google earth, expedia, and some helpful utilities. Sweet!I think I'll be able to keep in touch without international calling cards and most

Almost there

2009-09-20T10:45:00.000-07:00

This morning I booked my hostel in Cairo. It was tough going through all the hostels and deciding where I was going to lay my head. I opted for a quite spot in the Garden City district close to the US and Canadian Embassies. It's inexpensive for a single room at E£135 ($24.00). There are less expensive options but they're also in the heart of downtown. I think I want to sleep well the first

Too funny... well not really

2009-09-19T14:08:00.000-07:00

I woke this morning at 10am to a nock on the door. Thinking it was UPS I eagerly sprung from bed and threw on clothes,... I've been waiting the arrival of my iPod touch. I opened the door to find two people asking for me. It was a client I had set an appointment with for a portfolio consultation, and her friend. She was on time, I had just mixed the day/time with another client. I had actually

I need more sleep

2009-09-19T01:19:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to get everything done this last week and get projects wrapped up for people before heading off. I did my last shoot today in the studio. I don't think I'll set up another before leaving as I still have so much to do and get out before the trip. My plan was to actually stop shooting a week before to get images back to people. I've had a lot of momentum last month and this month

10 days before the trip

2009-09-17T09:14:00.001-07:00

I ordered an iPod touch the other day and I'm anxiously awaiting it's arrival. I decided to get it so I would have a small wi-fi device while traveling which would allow me to access the internet, email, and Skype. I wasn't sure if it would work much in Cairo but there's apparently wi-fi hot spots all over; most of the hostels/hotels I'm looking at staying in have wi-fi. I think the feature I'm

2009-09-14T05:28:00.001-07:00

Trying another form of quick communication. I just set up an email address so that I can post without having to log on...Edit:Very cool, this worked too. Now I just have to remember it.

2009-09-14T05:09:00.001-07:00

>Just set up my cell to send text messages. How cool is that!?

Okay, I'm pretty much set for Egypt

2009-09-14T04:17:00.000-07:00
I just need to order a water purifier before the end of this week. All the guide info I've read said it's a good idea to take one with you,... besides, it will cut down on buying bottled water. Oh, I'm also looking for some light weight pants that are easy to hand wash and quick to dry but other than that I'm set. I'm traveling very light, just my camera bag and a small 55 liter backpack which

2009-09-11T20:44:00.000-07:00
It's been a long week but I've got most of my things ready for the trip,... I'm still in need a few items though. I called the bank to order my Egyptian Pounds today but it looks like I'll have to wait until Monday as I didn't receive a call back. I wanted to travel with EP as my bank wont charge for exchange. I'm not sure what the exchange rate would be in Cairo but this way I'll have it take

22 days and counting to Cairo.

2009-09-04T04:55:00.000-07:00
I'm excited but Wow, I've been thinking this is a major step for me to travel by myself and I'm felling butterflies in the stomach. It's kind of the same feeling I used to get before stepping into a sparing match with Sensei Brooks...I would always ask myself if I was sure I wanted to do it but once I took that step into the ring I was committed, no matter what he threw at me. Of course I ended

2009-09-03T10:45:00.000-07:00
I've had this blogspot for over a year now and have never done anything with it. So, I decided I would use it for family and friends to share my adventures while traveling in Egypt. Yes, that's right, a trip to Egypt. I've always wanted to go and I can hardly believe that's it's coming up so quickly (23 more days from this post). I'm excited and nervous, nervous mainly because I've never been to