[jamesp]

When the 2 towers came down my parents were on a Nile cruise. The tv `broke` newspapers became `unavailable` and armed guards appeared on board overnight. I was booked to go to the red sea in the december, when the demand for payment arrived the end of sep, most of us kissed the deposit goodbye. With the guy in charge in USA, I was expecting the red sea to be boiled off from the flash, the egyptians didnt worry me. I took advantage of the cheap airfare and went to san francisco instead £279 return! Spent an entire week there feeling very unsympathetic, had too many friends too close to IRA bombs funded by the yanks. Terrorism was something that happened somewhere else to someone else, thirty years, inflation adjusted. I have since been to new york(some git decided to scrap concorde, that blew the yellow box fund!) and seen the hole where the towers used to be. How so little damage was done to the surrounding area is incredible, and lets face it, in the UK we would still be looking at the rubble while the clean up crew were in commitee stage(think nat west building).

Egypt is fairly safe, after the Luxor shootings the tourism industry stopped, the egyptian gov rounded up something like a hundred of the usual suspects and hung them. They cant afford to lose the business again, and are pretty serious about keeping it. Look at Hurgurdha airport, from the (visible) terminal side the security is sensible and tight even by UK standards(lots of Id checks and baggage checks(with working equipment) to get in, checks repeated to get from terminal to lounge). Saudi is a different matter, I have an Uncle who has worked there through both gulf wars( and about 20years before that!)He has now decided its time to come home!

I went to egypt in may, on a livaboard, and would not hesitate to go again.

As for feeling worried about personal safety, I`ve been to the USA, most of Europe, Mexico, Thailand, Hong Kong and Australia. I travel alone, walk around cities on my own, will get lost and walk into the wrong areas without knowing and walk back out again with out a problem. The only place I have been aware of a situation was in San Francisco, when two guys were lining me up for a mugging, on market street near the tram terminal at four in the afternoon. I made sure they new I had seen them, and made an agressive move in their direction ( I am 6`tall and 17stone(think second row)) they changed their minds.