Egypt

After an early wake up call, we were on the bus at 3am heading to Ankara International airport, for the next destination in our journey - Cairo, Egypt!
The flight was a little under 2.5 hours & we arrived to a beautiful morning. First impressions - Wow! - Istanbul was exotic but Cairo is ancient! There are 20 million people living in Cairo & it is a thriving, throng of humanity & culture. Only one word accurately describes the traffic in this city - crazy! You indicate with your horn & there are no real line markings on the road, so it is every man for himself! Roads that might comfortably hold 3 lanes of traffic in Australia, hold at least 5 here!
As our hotel was not ready until midday, our buses carefully navigated the traffic to the famed Egyptian Museum of Antiquities - wow, wow, wow! This museum is so full of antiques & ancient artifacts that it cannot hold them all! A new museum is currently under construction, directly opposite this important treasure, & is scheduled to open in 2018 - we will have to come back for another visit then. The current museum is breathtaking, although cramped with pieces in boxes stacked haphazardly everywhere. With new artifacts being found on a daily basis, this facility is bursting at the seams & our guide (a local Coptic Christian & Archaeologist), informed us that there are multiple warehouses around the city, stacked high with pieces that have never before been seen! 🤤
The history held within the museum's walls dates back to at least 2500 years BC! Tutankhamun's artifacts are all stored & displayed here. It was absolutely mind blowing! There is a definite sense that being surrounded by these ancient artifacts is just 'normal' for the local Egyptians.
We stopped for lunch at a boat docked on the Nile River, before heading to our hotel (Barceló Hotel) for an easy afternoon. The Nile River is surprisingly filthy (that's the last time I'll be purchasing Nile Perch) & boy does it flow; like really fast!
At 6pm we were on the bus again & heading to our boat cruise dinner on the Nile where we were entertained by a Belly Dancer & a Twirling Dervish, the latter of which was absolutely mesmerising. How he spun for at least 10 minutes without getting dizzy was beyond me 😁.
We were asleep within 5 minutes of our head touching the pillow, just after 10pm.Read more