A travel log
Old friends, a growing collection of stamps, and never just a carry-on. This is the record of where we went, who came and what happened. Scroll the log and the map follows.
Trip 01 · 25 September – 5 October 2026
Jenny Bennett spent months organising Conor’s 60th birthday: three nights in Istanbul, two in the caves of Cappadocia, two under the pyramids and three on the Nile. Twenty-two people did Turkey, seventeen did Egypt and thirteen did the lot.
Twenty-two travellers, plus Ian Hyland for the birthday dinner.
Wed 23 – Thu 24 Sep · Istanbul
The first wave landed a day or two ahead of the programme. Kathi and Ivette crossed to the Asian side for a day and found Istanbul’s cats; Kathi warned that someone would have to check Ivette’s bags before the flight home. Conor and Jenny warmed up with a night at the Ritz-Carlton.
2 photos
Fri 25 Sep · afternoon · Çırağan Palace
Home for three nights was a former Ottoman palace on the Bosphorus. Check-in was at two, the lobby call was 6:30, and a Pakistani wedding was under way at the hotel all weekend.
8 photos
Fri 25 Sep · 7 pm · On the Bosphorus
A private motor yacht, a Turkish dinner on board and the bridge lit red overhead. Jenny called it a great start. Nabeel opened the shared photo album that night and spent the rest of the trip reminding everyone to use it.
16 photos
Fri 25 Sep · late · Çırağan Palace
Richard and Jennifer were the last to land. They sat in traffic while the boat was out and caught up with everyone on the terrace, beside the wedding.
5 photos
Sat 26 Sep · morning · Topkapı Palace
The big walking day began in the sultans’ palace: the courtyards, the tiled rooms of the Harem and the Imperial Hall.
22 photos
Sat 26 Sep · midday · Hagia Sophia
Scarves on, shoulders covered and up to the gallery. Lunch followed in the Old City.
8 photos
Sat 26 Sep · 3 pm · Blue Mosque
The afternoon call was the Blue Mosque, then a full-group photo in Sultanahmet Square outside.
7 photos
Sat 26 Sep · 4 pm · Grand Bazaar
Richard dropped a pin and set a deadline: meet back here at five. Alice hoped everyone had bought a rug, a new pair of shoes, a scarf, a gold and diamond bracelet and a handbag. The dinner bus was pushed back twice.
4 photos
Sat 26 Sep · evening · Galatasaray Island
The birthday itself: an all-white dinner at a private club on a small island in the Bosphorus. Ian Hyland joined for the night and reported the men struggling with the YMCA. Jody danced. Several people slept until noon the next day, which Jenny took as the sign of a great night.
16 photos
Sun 27 Sep · morning · Dolmabahçe Palace
A reduced turnout after the night before. Those who made it agreed that one of its halls was the most impressive room any of them had ever been in. Chris’s review: “BEST PALACE EVER”.
17 photos
Sun 27 Sep · 2 pm · Above the Bosphorus
The bus went back to the hotel for the late risers, and everyone met for a long lunch at BIZ with the Bosphorus laid out below.
6 photos
Sun 27 Sep · late afternoon · Zeyrek Çinili Hamam
The afternoon included a catwalk show, with several of the group recruited as models. It finished at the Zeyrek Çinili Hamam, a restored Ottoman bathhouse, with men and women in separate sections.
7 photos
The same twenty-two, now living in caves.
Mon 28 Sep · Avanos
The 11:00 flight to Kayseri, rain on arrival and a late lunch beside the Kızılırmak river.
10 photos
Mon 28 Sep · 5 pm · Underground city
Narrow tunnels, a rolling stone door and a ventilation shaft straight up to daylight. Back on the bus, Richard had begun fact-checking the guide in real time and posting the results under “For the record”.
6 photos
Mon 28 Sep · 6 pm · Avanos
A demonstration at the wheel, then a turn for volunteers.
4 photos
Mon 28 Sep · after dark · Göreme
The rock-cut churches and their frescoes, floodlit. The day ended at Millstone Cave Suites, which Kathi called the most incredible thing she had ever seen.
13 photos
Tue 29 Sep · morning · Uçhisar
The sunrise balloon flight was cancelled because of wind. The consolation was breakfast over the valley and a carpet demonstration that ran long. “The rug place has us captivated,” John reported, while the bus waited.
6 photos
Tue 29 Sep · midday · Paşabağ
Everyone regrouped among the fairy chimneys, climbed into whatever would hold them and took the band photo.
18 photos
Tue 29 Sep · afternoon · Ürgüp
Lunch was cooked and served in a family home. The free afternoon went on shops, cafés and a tasting of Cappadocian wine.
7 photos
Tue 29 Sep · 6 pm · Saruhan Caravanserai
The Sema ceremony in a 13th-century caravanserai. Sumaira, who had seen it on an earlier trip, called it her favourite part of Turkey and set the dress code.
6 photos
Tue 29 Sep · night · Ortahisar
Dinner, then one more round back at the hotel. It was the final night for the Turkey-only crew, and bags had to be outside the door at 5 am.
4 photos
Seventeen travellers: thirteen who carried on from Turkey, plus Shaun and Yasmin Braun and Mona Kabbani and Omar Ghosheh.
Wed 30 Sep · Cairo
A 5:30 am bus and a morning of airport lounges. The Kayseri flight ended with what Alice called a fabulous double landing. At Istanbul the group split: Kathi and Ivette, Chris and John, Gavin, Alice and Jonnie, and Heather and Martin flew home, and thirteen carried on, each with a duty-free bottle for Egypt. Richard, from seat 37B, to Jenny in first class: “You can’t miss me all that much.”
4 photos
Wed 30 Sep · evening · Marriott Mena House
Shaun and Yasmin, joining for Egypt, had checked in before dawn, and Mona and Omar joined here too. Those already in town explored old Cairo. The rest landed in the late afternoon, got their visas at the airport after a week of losing to the e-visa website, and had dinner with the Great Pyramid lit up behind them.
8 photos
Thu 1 Oct · early · Marriott Mena House
Richard’s brother, who lived in Cairo for years, had vouched for Mena House. Breakfast made the case.
4 photos
Thu 1 Oct · morning · Grand Egyptian Museum
A private guided visit: Ramses II in the atrium, Khufu’s boat and the Tutankhamun galleries, mask included.
26 photos
Thu 1 Oct · 2 pm · Panorama point
A stop at a papyrus workshop, then the panorama point, where the pyramids line up and every possible combination of people was photographed in front of them.
11 photos
Thu 1 Oct · 3 pm · Giza plateau
Lunch on the plateau, on cushions, with the view doing most of the work. Then down to the foot of the Great Pyramid.
11 photos
Thu 1 Oct · 4 pm · The Great Sphinx
Jenny had applied to the government for a special permit, and it was approved in June. It bought an hour inside the enclosure, standing between the paws of the Great Sphinx.
19 photos
Thu 1 Oct · 5 pm · Great Pyramid of Khufu
Once the site had closed to the public, the group had Khufu’s pyramid to itself: up the Grand Gallery to the King’s Chamber and, for those willing to crawl, down to the Subterranean Chamber.
12 photos
Thu 1 Oct · sunset · Great Pyramid of Khufu
Out into the last of the light, on a plateau with nobody else on it. Conor said even the History Channel had never shown the pyramids without a soul in sight. Dinner was at the hotel at eight, with a 4 am bus to follow.
11 photos
Aswan to Luxor, sailing north with the current.
Fri 2 Oct · morning · Aswan
A 4 am start and three different flights south, after a check-in desk handed Kevin and Alison boarding passes for the wrong plane. Everyone was aboard the Sonesta St. George I by lunch.
4 photos
Fri 2 Oct · afternoon · Philae
A look at the High Dam, then a motorboat across to the island temple of Isis.
12 photos
Fri 2 Oct · evening · Aswan
Sunset from the sundeck, the captain’s welcome cocktail, a Nubian show, and a late night up top with the lights of Aswan across the water.
12 photos
Sat 3 Oct · 9 am · Kom Ombo
The double temple of Sobek, the crocodile god, and Haroeris, with a museum of mummified crocodiles next door. It gave the Egypt group its name, the Perfect Sobek Bunch, courtesy of Mona.
12 photos
Sat 3 Oct · midday · On the Nile
Four hours of riverbank: palms, cattle, fishermen and a train keeping pace. Massages were booked and the pool was used.
8 photos
Sat 3 Oct · 3 pm · Temple of Horus, Edfu
Carriages from the quay to the Temple of Horus, one of the best preserved in Egypt, bats included.
17 photos
Sat 3 Oct · evening · Sailing to Esna
Dress code: galabias. A group photo at sunset, dinner on the sundeck and the ship sailing on to Esna.
12 photos
Sun 4 Oct · 8 am · Colossi of Memnon
The night ended with a water leak that flooded two cabins. The morning began on Luxor’s West Bank, where hot-air balloons drifted over the Colossi. Those were the balloons we didn’t get in Cappadocia.
5 photos
Sun 4 Oct · 9 am · Deir el-Bahari
The terraced temple under the cliffs at Deir el-Bahari.
7 photos
Sun 4 Oct · 11 am · Valley of the Kings
Into the tombs: painted corridors, astronomical ceilings in blue and gold, and a burial chamber or two.
10 photos
Sun 4 Oct · 4 pm · Karnak
Jenny had moved the East Bank touring forward a day so that nobody with an early flight would miss it. Karnak came first: the ram-headed sphinxes and the Great Hypostyle Hall.
10 photos
Sun 4 Oct · dusk · Luxor Temple
Ramses at the gate, the colonnade and the Avenue of Sphinxes as the light went.
8 photos
Sun 4 Oct · evening · Luxor
Richard skipped the afternoon and took the sunset from the top deck. On his brother’s advice the beer was Sakara and not Stella. Mona and Omar had already left for Cairo, and a tanoura dancer saw everyone else off.
4 photos
Six of the seventeen, on the way home.
Mon 5 Oct · Mayfair, London
Conor and Jenny went on to the Red Sea, and the Irish contingent flew home. The Townhills, the Brauns, and Sumaira and Nabeel stopped a night in London, where the after-after-party convened in Mayfair. Nabeel’s verdict: “This group never quits.”
6 photos
Who was aboard
Leg by leg, for the one trip logged so far.
| Traveller | Turkey | Egypt | London |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shaun Braun | no | yes | yes |
| Yasmin Braun | no | yes | yes |
| Kevin Sayar | yes | yes | no |
| Alison Sayar | yes | yes | no |
| Nabeel Mian | yes | yes | yes |
| Sumaira Nabeel | yes | yes | yes |
| Ula Ghosheh | yes | yes | no |
| Mohammad Issa | yes | yes | no |
| Conor Bennett | yes | yes | no |
| Jennifer Bennett | yes | yes | no |
| Chris Cummins | yes | no | no |
| John Cummins | yes | no | no |
| Kathi Donnelly | yes | no | no |
| Ivette Loredo | yes | no | no |
| Richard Townhill | yes | yes | yes |
| Jennifer Townhill | yes | yes | yes |
| Along for this one | |||
| Ger Bennett Conor’s sister | yes | yes | no |
| Gavin Bennett Conor’s brother | yes | no | no |
| Deirdre Walshe Jenny’s sister | yes | yes | no |
| Jody Walshe | yes | yes | no |
| Alice O’Connell | yes | no | no |
| Jonnie O’Connell | yes | no | no |
| Heather Ridgeway | yes | no | no |
| Martin Ridgeway | yes | no | no |
| Ian Hyland birthday dinner only | one night | no | no |
| Mona Kabbani | no | yes | no |
| Omar Ghosheh Ula’s family | no | yes | no |