New Years 2011-2012 | Jason Around the World

Cairo to Washington DC on EgyptAir and United

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Feb 092012

I’m going to make this one mainly a picture post, with a few thoughts thrown in here and there. It’s funny, but I’ve actually reached a point where flying has become a bit more of a “chore” than exciting – except when it’s a really exotic airline or destination. For example, the Daallo Airlines flight (sans seat belts) from Somalia to Djibouti was definitely memorable! However, with the exception of seeing what the deal with EgyptAir Business Class really was…this was nothing special.

If you look anywhere online, EgyptAir gets a REALLY bad rap for having a business class that is essentially economy with a couple extra inches legroom. Sort of like domestic first in the US, except it’s a dry airline, so no booze at all. We’d purposely booked this flight on the 777, since we knew it was their “new” business class. I have to say, the seat and meal (with the exception of being dry) was comparable to any US or European offering. The crew, however, was absent. They threw the food at you, and you never saw them again. Sort of like a US airline on a bad day. 😉

EgyptAir Flight 777
Cairo, Egypt to London, Heathrow
Boeing 777-300ER, Registration SU-GDN, Manufactured 2010
Depart 9:20, Arrive 12:35, Flight time 5:15

Pre-Departure “entertainment:”

Tour of Cairo, Egypt

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Feb 082012

As I mentioned earlier, we’d hired a tour company here to maximize the one full day we had. I’m usually pretty opposed to organized tours, but in this case it sounded like a good idea to fit as much as possible into a one day transit. This turned out to be an excellent choice, especially when we saw how terrible the traffic was in the city. I’d highly recommend the company we used (Memphis Tours, linked in a previous post) to anyone wanting a similar experience.

Pick-up was at the hotel in the morning, and it was just down the road to the Pyramids and the Sphinx. Anyone who wants to visit Egypt, I highly recommend that you do it soon. The tourist hoards are terrified and staying away at the moment (well, maybe not this week due to the riots again) but this is definite time to go. Things are quiet, you have the place to yourself, and you can really enjoy things. On top of that, lots of the touts and salespeople have given up, and it’s possible to really enjoy things and have a completely un-harrassed experience. For all the negative experiences I’ve had people tell me about Cairo – we really enjoyed it! So – the pyramids and the sphinx:

Juba, South Sudan to Cairo, Egypt on EgyptAir

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Feb 032012

Onwards! The “hotel” arranged a transfer to Juba airport, and check-in was pretty primitive – but completely painless. There was a paper list they were checking names off of, bag tags and boarding passes were handwritten (and I still have yet to receive United credit for this segment) but all in all – it worked. We went through what passed for security, but the x-ray machine was off, there was no real check, and we were soon sitting in some very torn-up lounge chairs in the departure room.

Juba Airport is really just two rooms – one for arrivals, and one for departures. It was packed with everyone for the three departing flights, and despite the fact ours had been changed from a 737 to an ERJ, the room was quite empty. The list of names only had like 20 names on it, so Inshallah it would be an empty flight…and it was!

EgyptAir Flight 860
Juba, South Sudan to Cairo, Egypt
Depart 14:45, Arrive 18:00, Flight Time 4:15
ERJ-170, Registration SU-GDH, Manufactured 2009

The flight was absolutely empty, and less than 1/4 of the seats were taken, so everyone who wanted could have their own row. This was by far my longest flight on an ERJ, and it was as good as can be expected. The crew were quite lazy, surly, and did the bare minimum (even serving drinks in previously-used glasses) but all in all, with the number of empty seats, I won’t complain at all. Plus, the meal was at least edible!

Flight arrived on time, bus to the terminal, where the handler from the tour company we’d booked with was waiting. I decided to book a tour for this trip, because we had one full day in the city and wanted to really maximize the amount we could see. Included were round-trip airport transfers, and the handling of the visa on arrival, no need to haggle with drivers….was well worth it. I would highly recommend Memphis Tours to anyone looking for a similar situation.

Drive to the hotel – the Le Meridien Pyramids was pretty quick, under 45 minutes this late, and soon we were being hassled by the front desk clerk who wanted a bit of baksheesh in order to deliver SPG benefits. UG! Welcome to Egypt! Eventually everything worked out, we got some dinner, a very very slightly upgraded room where the AC barely worked, and it was off to bed in order to maximize the next day!

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to Juba, South Sudan

Ethiopia, Flights, hotels, New Years 2011-2012, South Sudan 5 Responses »

Jan 262012

As I mentioned earlier, we were faced with a last-minute dilemma: We needed to get from Addis to Cairo, but the only direct flight left at like 3am…and we both absolutely detest redeyes…especially ones that are 1 hour long. No thanks! We had planned to transit for a day in Yemen, but they weren’t so keen on issuing visas at the time…pulling ours at the last minute. For some reason, a spark went off, and I looked into the possibility of connecting via the newest country: South Sudan. Shockingly, the times were perfect, middle of the day, fares were pretty reasonable…and it all ticketed! The only concern was that visa requirements for South Sudan were very unclear. I figured we could wing it at the gate and get away with it…and that’s what happened!

Ethiopian Flight 490
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to Juba, South Sudan
Depart 11:05, Arrive 13:05, Duration 2 hours
Aircraft: Boeing 737-700, Registration ET-ALM, Manufactured 2004
Seat: 2L

There was a bit of confusion when we got to the airport. Ethiopian’s website now listed this flight at noon, as did a few flight tracking apps, but the check-in agent, the airport monitors, and all other “official” sources still listed it on time at 11:05. Guess what happened 😉 So, we checked in at the international terminal in Addis…only to be sent to the Domestic terminal. Seems that certain flights – with little rhyme or reason – still depart from this terminal. Computers were slow, eventually they checked us in (the walk between terminal is 5 minutes or so max) and immigration was a breeze, and we were in the lounge. Free water and diet coke made us happy while we waited. This whole time – NOBODY knew when the flight would really leave. The lounge was outside security, so we took turns clearing security to check at the gate.

As predicted, the plane had come from Rome, and we ended up boarding around 11:45.

On the taxi, we went past the airplane graveyard/etc in Addis which had a few interesting relics:

Djibouti to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

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Jan 252012

The whole purpose of this trip had been to visit a close friend who was working in the region…since we seem to always be his only visitors on these sorts of trips. Somehow, I’m not sure he believed we’d show up in Djibouti…but after Kuwait he also shouldn’t have been surprised! After a great night of showing us around, we had a relatively early morning ahead of us. But first, a shot from the beginning of the last night in Djibouti:

Two days in Djibouti

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Jan 242012

So…Djibouti immigration. Turns out 99% of our fellow passengers were in transit to the Daallo Airlines flight to Dubai (I suspect on another plane, since I don’t think the IL-18 has that kind of range) so they were shunted off, and maybe 10 of us went into the immigration queue. Where they took our passports, told us to have a seat, and we waited…for 30 minutes or so.

Eventually, we were ushered into a small office, where for a charge of $60 each, we got a collection of stamps, stickers, and glue in the passports that passed for an official “visa” to enter Djibouti. We had heard $55 in advance, but with exchange rate changes were not about to argue over such a small amount. Before the trip, for some reason, I suspected Djibouti Airport would be much much bigger. It’s not. it’s essentially one giant room with a few different areas…this place is tiny!

Got outside, and the Sheraton shuttle was of course not there as we’d asked for. Taxi was cheap, and soon we were off to the Sheraton…where they had absolutely no record of our points reservation, and were completely clueless how to deal with it. Check-in took nearly two hours, when you count the time to figure out what to do, get us to a room, get us a stocked minibar, and have everything sorted. Oh, yes, about the minibar. Due to local “sensibilities” they leave it empty. However, for platinum guests, they are happy to deliver a more-than-adequate FREE minibar:

Hargeisa, Somalia to Djibouti on Daallo Airlines

Djibouti, Flights, New Years 2011-2012, Somalia 2 Responses »

Jan 232012

What, you’ve never heard of Daallo Airlines? Shame on you – one of the finest outfits in the business. I mean, you even have the luxury of calling a 1-800 number in the US to book with them, where you get transfered approximately 114 times to different people, have to fax photocopies of your credit cards to another 14 people, and then email them as well just so they’re sure they can read them. Surprisingly…after all this…you actually do get a confirmation number…and when you check in at the airport things are flawless. Welcome to 1990 I guess? But…it all worked. Then, we got to the airport.

Honestly, the airport in Hargeisa was perfectly fine, and perfectly functional. Check-in was perfect, and we were informed that today we would have the luxury of travel on a relic – an Ilyushin IL-18D – a relic of an aircraft that is a bit of a legend from Soviet days. This plane was such a relic, I’m still trying to get details on its origins! Enough of that, however. Check-in was so good that our bags were tagged with proper electronic baggage tags, we got proper electronic boarding passes….and then off to passport control and security – which were honest, efficient, and only collected the fees posted on the wall. I was beginning to get a bit shocked at how anti-climactic this was!

Daallo Airlines Flight 159
Hargeisa, Somalia to Djibouti City, Djibouti
Depart: 10:00, Arrive 10:45 – later adjusted via e-mail to Depart 14:00, Depart 14:45 – flight time 45 minutes
Aircraft: Ilyushin IL-18D, Registration UP-I1801, Manufactured who knows when!
Seats: TBD, Printed as 18A and 18B

So, into the waiting hall where they were selling newspapers and food. THe usual sodas, crisps, etc, and then it was 14:00…and no plane. We found there were some plastic chairs out on the tarmac, so we went out there to have a sit and wait for our plane. Not much to see, but more interesting than inside!

Day 2 in Hargeisa, Somalia

New Years 2011-2012, Somalia No Responses »

Jan 212012

Woke up, and decided to do what everyone else in the hotel was doing – have breakfast delivered! Can’t go wrong with coffee, eggs, and toast…and we had the hotel set to arranging a tour around the city before our early afternoon flight. Of course, this involved going to hire an armed guard of course, but we negotiated to give him a few wads of the Somaliland Shillings this time, everyone was happy, and we were off to see the city of Hargeisa itself.

The Ambassador Hotel is set just near the airport (presumably so frightened NGO types can flee the country asap should things go bad) and maybe a couple miles out of the downtown proper.

First stop was the Somaliland Independence monument – even if things get better in Mogadishu this part of Somalia has no interest in re-joining the federation.

Hargeisa, Somalia

hotels, New Years 2011-2012, Somalia 1 Response »

Jan 212012

I’ll start with a bit of background. I’m not sure anybody in their right mind goes to Somalia these days. Mogadishu hasn’t had a real government going on 15 years now, and the country is probably the largest breeding ground of terrorists outside of Iraq…or was that Afghanistan Nope, it’s Somalia. Anyways…back in “the day” Somalia was two countries – British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland. They were merged, and an independent Somalia was born…which didn’t last long. About 12 years ago, the western part (former British Somaliland) left Somalia, and has been relatively quiet, peaceful, and stable ever since. Their own government, currency (as you saw in my previous post), border guards, and all. Unfortunately, however, the international community isn’t buying it…and still considers it part of Somalia. For someone trying to visit Somalia, what better way to go!

I’ve already posted about our hotel…but when we got there, they informed us that all rooms had only one bed, and thus we needed, of course…two rooms. Fortunately, we got two across the hall and solved that problem. They were decent, functional, and since it was almost noon….we decided to grab some lunch in the hotel restaurant while the hotel sorted out the day trip we’d requested. So first, lunch! There were two things on the menu in Somaliland we hadn’t had yet…and we were determined to have them! The first was camel (which we had as a steak at dinner…and was pretty awesome!) and the other was goat. Soon our goat stew arrived, and it was actually really tasty and one of the best meals I remember from the trip!

Nairobi, Kenya to Hargeisa, Somalia on East African Safari Express Airlines

Flights, hotels, Kenya, New Years 2011-2012, Somalia 3 Responses »

Jan 202012

As I mentioned earlier, booking tickets to Somalia isn’t easy. The airlines don’t operate frequently, there is next to no information about them online, not to mention anything about how to book. Thanks to a very helpful person I talked to on Flyertalk I learned about an airline called East African Safari Express who supposedly was the most reliable (i.e. the flights actually do go when they say they are going to) option. Took about 5 or 6 e-mails until they responded, but once we’d traded emails I found a date and time that worked and voila…it was booked. Of course, they only take payment in cash, and could you kindly show up in our office in Nairobi to do that?

Since we had barely 36 hours in Nairobi this was going to be tricky, but they agreed we could pay the day before. What they forgot to advise us was that the day before was a holiday in Kenya…and they were closed! Fortunately, immediately upon arrival we’d spotted their office, walked in, dropped several C-Notes with a shady looking guy in a back office…and had carbon copy tickets that were handwritten…things crossed out, changed, etc. Fortunately, all went well!

Arrival and check-in was quite quick and efficient, and there’s not too much to say. They insisted we check our bags, but other than that…it was just like a “normal” flight. Through security, and into a very unfabulous lounge thanks to Priority Pass, and then it was down to the gate….where we saw the first glimpse of our plane!

East African Safari Express flight 1823
Nairobi, Kenya to Hargeisa, Somalia
Departure 8:00, Arrival 10:00, Flight Time: 2 hours
Aircraft: Fokker F-28, Registration 5Y-EEE, Manufactured (approximately) 1985
Seat 12E

Now, I say approximately, because I really can’t find a production list for F28s online. I found this aircraft has been passed around Africa for over 10 years now, after doing previous duty in the US with Allegheny, Piedmont, and eventually US Air!

All the checked baggage was laid out next to the plane, and before boarding you had to point yours out before they would load it. That was reassuring…at least you knew it was on board! That said, the flight itself was quite uneventful. I’d say it was 75% Somali diaspora and maybe 25% foreign aid worker looking types. They even served a “meal” on board…you’d never see THAT in the US!

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