Cairo, Egypt

We flew from Tel Aviv to Cairo via Jordan. The first flight was only 20 minutes - the shortest flight ever. The second flight was slightly longer but still very easy. When we arrived in Egypt, we expected a bit of a fuss about visas and immigration but it was easy and we were out of there within half an hour.

Our hostel is located in downtown Cairo and is on the rooftop of an extremely old building. After checking in, Alex had a nap because he isn’t feeling well and mum and I explored the city a bit. It’s an old looking city but the people are friendly. The roads are chaos and probably quite dangerous.

Day 2:
We were picked up by our driver in the morning and take to the Pyramids of Giza. When we got there, we hired a guide and some camels to take us around the pyramids. Since I had recently ridden a camel in India, I’d wasn’t too keen on the idea but mum and Alex wanted to. As predicted, it was (at best) eventful. The camels were in pretty bad condition, with large open wounds where their straddles had been rubbing. You could see where they had been whipped as they had scars all up their neck. Also, before mum had properly mounted the camel, it began getting up. Mum nearly fell off. Then the same camel got stuck on a metal prong and the saddle completely broke off! Needless to say, I wouldn’t recommend the camel tour!

Apart from that though, the pyramids were fantastic. The pyramids of Giza were built around 5000 BC, making them some of the earlier Egyptian relics. At Giza, there are 6 pyramids, 3 large and 3 smaller structures. We also visited the Sphinx, which was actually much smaller than we had both imagined.

Next we visited Saqqara to see the step pyramid. This was built by the king as a stairway to heaven. We also entered into this pyramid to see the sarcophagus of the king and the hieroglyphic writing which was all over the internal walls.

Day 3:

Since Alex was unwell, mum and I caught the metro to Coptic Egypt. The metro was fine, but getting to the station was a bit of a problem. The roads are crazy. Similar to India but at high speed, making it quite dangerous for foreigners to cross. We found some people to help us cross, but these people were usually trying to sell us something! None the less, they were friendly enough to help us cross through the crazy traffic. Coptic Egypt has Christian ruins from the latest era of ancient Egypt. Coptic Christian’s were the first and only remaining Christian group in Cairo - also known as Egyptian orthodox.

Day 3:
On our final day in Cairo, we visited the Museum of Egypt. This is a huge museum, full to the brim of ancient relics. The highlight was visiting the relics from Tutankhamun’s tomb, which was only discovered in the early 2000s. They were in pristine condition!
Although very interesting, the museum is just so disorganised - almost as if there are simply too many artefacts to store! Many were not labelled. Some rooms had everything from random mummies, to art work and sarcophaguses. A really crazy, interesting place.

To end our time in Cairo, we hopped on a dinner cruise down the Nile. The entertainment on board was full on - we had European dancers, belly dancers and singers. It was lovely to see the city lights and the hundreds of other cruise boats floating down the longest river in the world!Baca lagi