20th July
With no official paper work to be done today it was decided that today the team would visit the battle fields of El Alamein and also clean the interior of all 3 cars for easy custom examinations.
To get out of Alexandria was quiet a mission and for the uninformed it might be worth knowing that the teams drove some 40 km along Alexandria’s beach front before hitting the main feeder road towards Lybia which would also lead to El Alamein.
Again and similar to the property developments along the Red Sea they saw kilometres of property which must have been developed recently as well as thousands of uncompleted holiday villages. The colour of the sea was unbelievable light blue – similar to what one would expect around Indian ocean islands such as Mauritius.
The teams headed straight to the German War memorial which was manned by 2 friendly Egyptians with full knowledge of the historian happenings at the time of the silly World War 2.
Realising that Paul and Willy were from Germany the guide was eager to explain that the British army would have lost the battle would it have not been by the help of the Egyptian Bedouins.
These Bedouins informed the British army of a site close by where they could wait on top of a mountain for the Germans to come through the trap of a valley. This strategic advantage apparently was Rommel’s downfall and the British government apparently offered the Egyptian government independence should they assist in beating the Germans…
The British however never kept the promise and the guide was indeed sorry and in retrospect he thinks it would have been better for Egypt to support the Germans.
With Mark as the true English gentleman and Willy representing Germany the 2 great nations finally shook hands and made peace again surrounded by this great memorial ……
Off to the desert and the contents of all cars came out in order to sort the staff to take with from the staff to discard.
Lipsticks deep freeze still produced some of Woolie’s best Sirloin and quickly a fire was started for a final braai on Africa’s continent.
Out came the black bags and any left overs such as quick soups , beans in tomatoe sauce and the much loved curried veggie tins were put in these black plastic food hampers.
Willy stopped a tractor driver and with his broad Swabian- Arabic dialect convinced the young Arab that today is Christmas for all Muslims meaning that he needs to receive the best of Lipsticks Delicatessen reserve.
Indeed hesitating at first -the young Arab- who by now was called Fritz the tractor driver- became excited and after having received some of Tupperware’s usefull boxes on top of all the gourmet food he produced a big smile and surely will return to this place of excitement on an annual basis……….
The next candidate for another food hamper was a grader driver who passed by. Again he needed to be stopped and be convinced that today is special and that Elao’s contribution to his grocery cabinet might make the next few days as festive as possible… Another full row of Arabic top and bottom teeth rewarded the teams effort to give away rather then throw away…
Back with neatly sorted cars to Alexandria they waited for the arrival of Dave ((Andre’s son ) from Dubai . Dave would hire a 7 seater in Cairo and drive to Dubai so that the team members have some sort of transport after handing over their cars to be shipped out of Alexandria…
Stuck in traffic it took Dave a good 4 hours to arrive and this gave the team members enough time to fight the dangers of dehydrations. The friendly bar keeper took a great interest in all the stories out of Africa and mentioned that he was a keen collector of African foreign notes…
The team members gladly gave him some notes from all countries they went through and the barkeeper’s excitement caused him to shake when filling the whiskey glasses in such a way that the normal double shots became quatros…
David’s arrival was also duly celebrated and he would quickly realise that the team members Eastern Cape dialect must have been influenced during the trip as the more central African Schoschwa dialect was prominent in welcoming him and during the following early morning communications…..