CAIRO AND THE PYRAMIDS

We were picked up at 6:15am outside our Hotel and taken to Paphos airport where we caught the 8:00 am Egypt Air flight to Cairo. The flight took off about 10 minutes early and it took about an hour. We had a snack on the plane, a small roll and a croissant with apricot jam, and rice pudding Yes! rice pudding for breakfast.

The first impression of Cairo was the sheer size of it, from the plane we could see it built up as far as the eye could see and all the buildings seemed to be a dusty dirty yellow. We were shepherded to our coach, there were 2 coaches in our party we were in coach No 2. We had an Egyptian Lady for our tour guide she was great, I don't think she stopped talking all day.

Cairo Airport Terminal

Cairo was covered in a smoogy sort of haze in the morning, this did lift a little as the sun got higher in the sky.

We were taken right accross Cairo from the north to the south crossing the river Nile and entering into Giza. This journey was a real eye opener, there is no lane discipline in Cairo when your driving in a one way street you have to make your own lane and the use of the horn is obligatory. There were heards of goats along the sides of the main roads, donkey carts full of Melons etc. The streets were filthy with litter there was squalor everywhere you looked. We saw families living under trees, we even saw a dead horse  which was being eaten by a dog. This was by an irrigation canal which was full of litter. There were very few birds to see Just a few Cattle Egrets some of these were filthy dirty.

Cattle Egret out of the coach window

There were a few House Sparrows, Swallows, Swifts & Feral Pigeons that about sums up all the birds I saw in Egypt. I did see one Duck? later flying over the Nile. I found out later that the Swallows I had been seeing in Egypt were a Sub Species (Savignii) They had dark red bellies.

Back to the trip to Giza, poverty was aparant everywhere, we were told that there were 20 million people living in Cairo. They had 2 shifts in the schools mornings and afternoons.

Egypt is an Islamic country this was evident everywhere. We went through the old Islamic part of the city the poverty could be seen everywhere. Families had built tombs to bury their dead, they keep them on the bottom floor, and they lived above them on the next floor these tombs went on as far as the eye could see. There were part built houses and high rise flats everywhere you looked. There were also Mosques and Mineretts everywhere.

 Mohamed Ali Mosque Cairo

Islamic Tombs Cairo

On arrival in Giza we started to see the Pyramids they are awesome. The coach pulled up at first between the 2 biggest ones, it was possible to go down inside the second one but we decided against it. There were peddlers everywhere trying to flog us stuff. There were police on camels, security was everywhere, we even had our own armed security guard on our coach.

Evidence I was there.

We then went on to the Sphinx for a photo stop. To see the Pyramids and the Sphinx was unbelievable.

The Sphinx with the Pyramids in the background.

We were then taken to a jewelry centre where you could get a gold pendant with your name in hieroglyphics called a Cartoush. I asked the price it was 1730 Egyptian Lira about £173 pounds, I said forget it. I bumped into the manager on the way out, he said "you like our Jewelry" I said " I like, no money" pulling my pockets out.

We then went next door to the Papyrus Museum. We were shown how the ancient Egyptians made paper out of the stems of the Papyrus plants. The stems are triangular in shape, they cut the outer green skin from each face and use this for basket weaving (Remember Moses was found floating in a papyrus basket). The Pulp inside the stems is then cut into strips, soaked stretched and pressed together to make the paper. They had paintings of old Egyptian scenes which were not overly expensive, we didn't buy one though as we were thinking of how we were going to get it home.

We were now taken for lunch to the 5 star Giza Meridian Hotel. The doorman was resplendent in his Tommy Cooper Fez. There was everything you could wish for to eat, we didn't over indulge though. I did have an Egyptian Beer (Stella) it was OK. Following lunch we were taken to the Cairo National Museum in central Cairo. The trip was very much the same as the trip to Giza in the morning, poverty everywhere another dead horse, in the canal this time. Central Cairo was a little better, there seems to be a big gulf between the rich and poor and nothing in the middle.

Volkswagon Taxis in Cairo complete with air conditioning (side doors open) 

At the museum it was bedlam trying to get in but we eventually made it. We had a couple of hours here, our tour guide took us round the Tutan-Kha-Mun exhibition, the death mask is unbelievable. We sore loads of things here but the things that stick in mind that were found in his tomb were a throne chair covered with gold leaf which folded up like a film directors chair and also a fold up bed. Remember this was from 1300 BC incredible!

We had paid another 20 euros each to see the mummies of the Rameses Pharoes and their families, I don't know what I expected but they were all laid out in temperature controlled glass cases. You could see every detail what stuck in mind was the teeth of some of them being pure white.

We then done a bit of shopping in the Museum shops, Cameras were not allowed in the museum so we bought a post card of the Tutan-Kha-mun death mask and also a little replica ornament.

Tutan-Kha-Mun Death Mask, Solid Gold, Cairo Egyptian Museum

We rejoined the coach at 5:30 pm and we were taken a ride down beside the river Nile where we caught a big river boat. We were given dinner while we had an hour long cruise on the Nile. We were entertained by an organist & singer followed by a Belly Dancer and a Swirling Dervish who was un believable. I managed to get up top and take a few photos over the Nile, I even managed to get a sunset.

Sunset over the Nile

We were then taken back to the airport for our flight back to Cyprus, we stopped on the way back to collect our passports from the police, they had been taken off us in the morning when we arrived. When we got them back they had been stamped, this stamp was actually the exit visa which we had to show before they would let us board the plane.

The flight was scheduled to take off at 9:15 pm but again it was 10 minutes early taking off. We had food on our return journey. I was quite impressed with Egypt Airlines on both flights in under an hour they had been round with papers, drinks, food, Tea or coffee and top up tea and coffee, I've been on some 4 hour flights and not had that kind of service.

We arrived back at Paphos Airport about 10:10 pm caught the coach and were back in our hotel room at 10:50.

WHAT AN INCREDIBLE DAY