Egypt, continued

This is our family in front of the second pyramid. Note the size of the stones. From a distance I thought the blocks were small, but realize now they are about as big as Marin. It's like when I was a little girl and we would be driving in the country and see fields of corn. I never believed that the stalks were taller than me, but my dad always said that they were. Well, one day while driving my dad stopped (big deal for my dad, he didn't like to stop for ANYTHING!). He let me get out and stand next to a corn stalk. Wow, they were really tall. That's how I felt about the pyramid stones.
If you look closely at Brett you will notice he has a cloth on his head with a band around it. He actually looks like an Egyptian (ok, maybe not). Anyway Brett got "accosted" by the people selling these things. He even looked to our security guide for assistance. He just laughed. Needless to say, Brett bought 2 of them and was given another one from a friend. The kids loved them so much that he bought more! Never thought it would be such a big hit!
The family in front of the pyramids.
Sophie and Olivia in front of a pyramid.
Looking up at pyramid two.
Camel rides. This was a great trip! These animals are HUGE! Brett, Sophie and Max got up without a problem. I got on my camel and then the guide was placing Marin up when the camel started to stand. He quickly let go of Marin to grab hold of the camel. the bad thing was, Marin was not completely up on the camel when he let go of her. Thankfully, we were able to scooch her on correctly, but it took us a few minutes until we were comfortable. I don't know how they rode these animals for long journeys.

Egypt, continued

Marin in front of the pyramids.
Family on the camels. You may be wondering where Olivia is. Well, she wanted no parts of the camels! We decided to leave her with one of our tour guides, Nesrin. Trust me, she was very happy to stay with Nesrin instead of riding on a camel.
Max in front of pyramids.
Sophie, the strongest of all of our children :), able to lift a pyramid in a single hand!
The camels were about 8 feet high. Their feet were about as big as Brett's two hands put together. We had to lean back to ride, and really lean back when the camel got down for us to dismount.

Egypt, continued

We left bright and early on Friday morning. We had to be outside of the gate by 7:30 am. There were 31 of us, 11 were children, 10 and under. This is Marin and Max looking very energetic. All of us were thrilled and amazed that in just a few hours we would be in Egypt!
Our first morning, Sat., was spent at teh Cairo museum. The museum holds the King Tut mask and other items found in his tomb. It also has a boat that was found by the side of one of the pyramids. It was buried there so that the King would have the ability to travel in the afterlife.
This was a sculpture outside the museum. We thought it was funny having the five of us sitting in front of this "5-guy-statue".
This is me, standing like a king in front of another sculpture.
This is the family getting onto the Turkish plane at the Adana airport. From here we flew to Istanbul, then got onto Egypt Air which took us to Cairo.

Experiences in Egypt

Dear family and friends, We had a wonderful opportunity MLK weekend to travel as a family to Cairo, Egypt. We went with a group from the chapel on base. It was only for 4 days, two of which were for travel. We will be posting pictures from this trip for a while. It was an unforgetable experience. We hope you enjoy the pictures. This was a picture in the Cairo airport. I was trying to get the "Welcome to Cairo, Egypt" sign in the back but it didn't work too well. The kids were great on the plane. We began our trip on Friday at 7:30am. Flew from Adana to Istanbul, then to Cairo. Three continets in one day! We arrived in Cairo about 4, got to our hotel and we were greeted with warm towels and a fancy drink for all. Dinner and then a nighttime tour around Cairo, the city that never sleeps!
This is a statue of Ramses II. It is thought that he was the pharoah during the time of the Exodus. If this is true, I told the kids that the statues we were seeing of Ramses could have been built by the Isrealites! We learned that a kings beard is straight if he is still alive, and long and curled at the end if they are dead. Look at the statue of Ramses II. Was this statue done when he was alive or dead?
This was us in front of the pyramids of Giza. The pyramid on the far left was the first one, built approximately 2589BC for King Khufu. It was 481feet tall but is now only 450 ft. tall. The second pyramid (behind Brett's head) was built by Khufu's son, King Khafre. It is shorter than his fathers but is on higher ground, so it looks bigger. It was also covered with limestone at one point. This was built approximately 2530BC. The third one was built by Khafre's son, Menkaure. It is the smallest of the three and was built about 2500BC.
This is a picture Brett took of the second pyramid while Max, Marin and I were taking a trip inside of it! Max's favorite part of the trip was the fact that he didn't have to bend down while walking through the tunnel. It was about a 50 ft tunnel going down, then 50-75 feet going up. We ended up at a large open room with a casket inside. It was stuffy and hot. If you look closely you can see the tip of the pyramid is still covered in limestone.
This is another great picture - we travel hundreds of miles and spend hundreds of dollars so that my sweet Livvy Leigh can play in the sand! I thought it was perfect with the pyramid in the back. All of the kids were great on the trip. We had one meltdown on the way home. Other than that, all went well. If you look closely at this pyramid you will see a little pyramid on the right side. I think there are two more behind that one. These were built for the queens. The Sphinx is actually off to the left, out of the picture. We'll post that later.

Fun at the Howie's

This is Karin, one of the few pictures of her since she is always the one with the camera in hand. We were at a park in Adana. There are more park pictures when you scroll down.
We had a fun time in school one day building with sugar cubes. This is Sophie with her "Aliens from Outer Space" sugar cube creation.
This is Max with his "Khufu Pyramid".
This is Brett and Olivia at the Christmas program at the chapel.
This is Marin's creation. She made a clock tower.

Park Fun

Sophie and Olivia
These were favorites for the kids. They were swings with tires on them. There were 6 of them in a circle. It was a lot of fun for the kids. Max
Olivia
Sophie

More Howie fun

Max and Olivia in the tub.
Max at the park.
Max and Marin at the park.
Olivia told me one morning that she wanted oatmeal for breakfast. I was fine with that but told her I would get it when I got downstairs. Well, I guess I took too long because this is what greated me when I finally arrived in the kitchen.

Kizkalesi

Kizkalesi is a beach resort area that is about 1 1/2 to 2 hours from Adana. It is very popular with folks here.
We traveled a road about 8 km and then went onto a dirt road for about 2 km. We were looking for Roman reliefs. When we arrived a man came out of nowhere and said he would show us the reliefs (atleast that's what we thought he said - the language barrier can prove difficult at times). He led us between two rocks and this was the sight we laid our eyes on. The grass was so soft and fresh. You don't see a lot of really green grass around here. (And if you know my dad, you know where I got the appreciation of nice grass!)
He then led us down a path that looked like it went nowhere. After descending about 50 ft and not really being sure where we were going, we attempted to communicate to him that we were done, that it was no longer safe for our children. He wanted to take us further but we kindly refused and turned back up the hill.
Although we did not get to see the reliefs, we did get to behold the beauty of the mountains and the gorge. It was a remarkable sight. Maybe we will return some day for a picnic, and hopefully learn a little bit moer turkish before going back.

More Kizkalesi

There are two castles in Kizkalesi. Actually, the word "kalesi" is Castle in Turkish. We call this the "kiss castle". We actually got a chance to walk around this castle and really understand the layout of it. There was an area where the boats came in through a large archway, inside the walls of the castle. We walked about halfway around the walls, throwing rocks and sand into the water, just enjoying the beauty. We stopped and had a picnic lunch overlooking both castles. These were just fun pictures we took. Sophie has definitely built up her muscles since she has been here in Turkey!
"No, Daddy, don't let her go!"
This is the castle out in the sea (obviously). We will try to get there when the weather warms up a bit.