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Published: August 7th 2007
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This one is a long time coming....We left Egypt almost a month ago and are now settling down in London for a bit of a long haul.
Egypt was a country full of beauty, mystery, heat, annoyances, and stunning scenery. Once again, we are so going back there.
We started in Cairo and arrived at about 9:30pm and the heat hit us as soon as we stepped off the plane. The flight was delayed by about 2 hours so we were wondering if our taxi driver from the hostel we had booked would still be there. When we walked out of the customs area, there were about 50 or so people all with signs and shouting, thinking we would never find our guy liz turned and looked at me as if to say, oh no this is going to be hard, luckily she was standing right in front of our guy although she didn’t see the sign until I pointed it out. The taxi driver was great fun on the way to the Hostel, keeping us entertained with his jokes and songs.
When we got to the hostel we were greeted with hot tea (go fathom, when it
was still stinking hot) but it was a welcome relief to the dryness of the air.
The next morning we were up and raring to go, our hostel had a guide that we could hire for the day who would take us around a few of the sites, and it was worth it as it was all done at our own pace.
Pyramids -
We got taken down a back alley to where all the camels owners are and were told that for a 2 hour ride to and around the pyramids was going to cost us LE120 but we managed to get it down to LE90 each (we later found out that that was still a rip off cause other people in our hostel had paid only LE60 each).
Our guide was trying to make our camels gallop along which, if any of you have been on one it is not the most comfortable ride. We got taken in the back ways (the pyramids are surrounded by a massive metal fence, and there was a convenient “hole” that we went though) and consequently got chased by the Tourist Police a few times in there cause
our guide had not paid for our entrance tickets and they were talking to him trying to kick us out. They kept telling us to come back from the pyramids but our guide kept telling us to carry on, so we did. They police in the end let us carry on around the place (I think our guide may have slipped him a few pounds for that one).
We got off the camels to have photos and to go up to Khefre's pyramid, (the middle one in the photos) and it is truly massive, me at 6ft 4’ felt like a small cricket when standing next to them, I didn’t even come up to the top of the first stone. We were looked up at them and wondered how the people carried those massive blocks (about a tonne each apparently) all the way to the top and how it is still standing.. We choose not to go inside as it would have cost us another LE30, people had told us you had to crouch for over 100m (not so great for Josh as he is bigger than most and may have had to roll down instead 😊 ) and
I'm not the greatest with small spaces.
We then went to Sakarra (thinking for some daft reason they had said Sahara) but were too knackered from the heat and the pain of riding the camels to care or want to see it. We later found out that it is the oldest pyramid (7000 years old) and is unique cause its a step pyramid. But never mind, we will be going back there again, so it will be a stop that I will be doing. Along the way we had to stop off at a Mosque as our driver had to have afternoon prayers? And we both fell asleep while waiting.
Went back to the hostel to get some energy levels back up, and there we met a Canadian girl who had just arrived and decided to go to the Egyptian Museum with her which was just across the road from us. The security was tight, with at least 20 or 30 armed guards outside the museum.
Inside it was amazing, the number of artefacts and statutes in there was amazing, on the lower levels they had divided the museum into like a timeline of Egypt with areas
devoted to when different cultures ruled over Egypt. We paid a bit more to get into the Mummies room which showed how to preserve the bodies and actually had the mummified bodies of 9 Kings and Queens. They were fascinating to look at. Here are bodies from thousands of years ago and we are still able to look at them. Some still had hair, teeth, nails and some even had their faces in tact!!
To tell they were Kings or Queens in the afterlife, the people that preserved the bodies would put the hands across the body in a certain way. You could tell each different generation because each one had their own way of putting the hands across, be it palms up, down, left hand on top etc. There was one body in there that had the hands at the side of the body. The little blurb said that the body was found in the tomb of King ....but they suspected it was stolen and replaced with the body we saw!! Naughty little grave robbers...
We also saw Tutankhamens exhibit which was massive. His body is still in his tomb so we did not get to see
that in the mummy museum. There was his famous head gear (an exact replica of his face structure so that he is recognised in the afterlife) which weighted 11kgs. We also saw all his chariots, throne, his solid casket and 2 tomb casings and then the 4 gold boxes they were put in after that (all others were gold covered), jewellery and whatever else was in there and lucky enough not to be stolen.
That night we decided to go to the Khuela Kheflu (not spelt right) which is a market place in Old Islamic Cairo. The shops are down little dark, dodgy looking alleyways and are only about 2mx2m. They all sold the same stuff which made for great bargaining power. We got Josh to try a belly dancing outfit (photo evidence as well) and I had a scarf wrapped around my head properly. They really welcomed us and gave us tea as we entered the shops and just generally wanted us to hang out with them. Josh was with Krysten (the Canadian girl) and I and all the men were asking him if he had two wives and then were telling him he was a lucky man
and that he was Cansanova. It was a lot of fun but the badgering from the men asking if they could marry us did start to wear a bit thin, though I did get offered a few thousand camels, a couple of elephants and some goats so that was interesting 😊
We had a relaxing day the next day, with just exploring the Nile and surrounding areas. We decided that while in Cairo we should seeing as we could, have Dinner on the Nile, certainly a weird experience as i have learnt a lot about it during my school years and to be actually here and touching it and having dinner on a boat over looking it was a surreal experience. Also funny as the waiter managed to spill the drinks all over us, as he tripped on his way to the table 😊
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