Day 8: Expat Tour starts!

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We started our first full day in Cairo with a trip out to Shakkra, the site of some of the very first pyramids. Being on the roads in Cairo is an experience in itself! There are literally no road rules, except for anything goes if you can stick your vehicle into a gap. Pedestians walking across highways, cars driving down the wrong side of the road, honestly, I don't know how people get a licence let alone get around in place!

On arrival at Shakkra, our guide, Michael, gave us the first of many warnings about the local hastlers, seedy looking Egyptain men that try to sell you crap as soon as we walked off our bus. Even as Michael was trying to tell a story, there was a muppet in the background trying to flog off his postcards or pyramid books. Anyway, we wondered through this ancient temple and out onto this sand field where the king had to once prance around with an ox tail to prove his superiority to his people...well, that's what I got of the story anyway. The first pyramid we saw was unfortunately mostly covered in scaffolding however gave us a bit of a taste of things to come. We had some spare time so we wondered over to get a better view of the Saraha desert. We were taken unawares by a group of Egyptains who started putting scarves on our heads and guiding donkeys over to us. We thought they were just going to take our photo, we'd hand over a pound (Egyptain pound that is, like 10c) and we'd be done. However they proceeded to put me on the donkey, then Rach and another girl in our group Lucy. Before we knew it, we were having a mini-guided tour on donkey-back. It was really quite hilarious, all the while I knew that this was probably going to cost us. Looking back, we did get some cracking photos. At the time, I was more concerned with watching what they put Rach's camera! Donkey trip over and after handing over 50 Egyptains (GBP£5...after bartering them done from 250 Egyptains which they still weren't happy with!) we headed back to the bus.

We briefly stopped at another pyramid called Titi Pyramid and were given the opportunity to walk down into it and into Kagemni Tomb. This is a place not for the clostrophibics as it was very small. Inside were Egyptain symbols carved out on the walls and ceilings, which apparently were meant to guide the mummified king after he entered the afterlife. Was very cool to walk into this king's burial chamber and peer into his sarcofigas (however no mummy was found).

The next bus trip took us to the Pyramids of Giza, the most famous of them all. Before that though, we had to encounter the Cairo traffic again. Seriously, the place is filthy. We drove along this canal for ages and the whole thing was used as a dumping ground for anything. And there were guys trying to catch fish in it! Even if any fish was lucky to survive that disease ridden water, who would want to eat that!

We arrived at the Pyramids and my gosh, they are MASSIVE. There are 3 huge pyramids that make up this site, the Great Pyramid which is the tomb of one of the kings and then 2 other ones for his son and grandson. Our guide told us that there are other 3 million individual stones that were used to construct the Great Pyramid, weighing between 2 and 20 tonnes each! The Great Pyramid only took 23 years to fully construct...which apparently equated to something like 1 block every 20 seconds! The other awesome aspect of all the pyramids is that the 4 corners all point in the direction of the compass, and with modern equipment they have discovered the Great Pyramid's north corner exactly points to True North (not magnetic north!). How the Egyptains new precisely where this was is an absolute miracle. The other miracle is how they were built (which noone really knows). The blocks apparently had to be transported about 900km south by barge up the Nile and then, at the time of the year when the nile floods, brought as close as they could be to the pyramid site. Then somehow pushed along by some pulley and ramp system and fixed into place above the earth. Modern constructural engineers have no idea how such a feat could be achieved in only 23 years of construction, and how its still standing after 3000 years!

We were given the opportunity to wander around the Great Pyramid, each side being 200m in length. It was an awesome site and I don't think the photos give the granduar of the thing justice. We were hastled once again by locals, attempting to see our tickets and snatch them off us, or go on a camel ride or take our photo. Its really quite frustrating that they don't get the message by a simple 'no thank-you' and you have to resort to quite angry confrontations to get them to bugger off.

We were next taken up past the second pyramid which has a sort of different colour peak. All the pyramids apparently once all looked like this all over, with shiny white granite covering all surfaces. However natural deterioration has taken its toll and this pyramid only has his hat left. We stopped at one of the most famous lookouts overlooking the 3 pyramids with Cairo in the background, it was a pretty special place and got some great photos 'walking like an Egyptain', trying to put the 'top' back on the Great Pyramid and everything else tourists do! The next part was awesome, our camel rides! We jumped on board our labouring beasts and started lopeing our way towards the pyramids. It was so much fun! The camels were pretty dosile creatures, however you still had to hang on quite tight and their rocking could send you crashing back down to the sand! We again got some awesome photos on camel back and slowly made our way back to our waiting bus.

One last stop before lunch...the Sphinx. While the pyramids were unbelievably massive, the Sphinx is relatively small. He sits only a stones throw away from the pyramids however historians don't really know why he's there at all! The head of the Sphinx carving is in the shape of a king with the body of a lion. There are different theories why he no longer has a nose too however I won't bore you with those. Again, we did the typical tourist thing and pretending to kiss & pat the Sphinx and got some pretty cool shots with the pyramids in the background.

So it'd been a pretty hectic day up until now and it was time for some lunch. We stopped off at a buffet and were glad to get out of the sun and dust and fill our bellies. The buffet was ok, however Rach couldn't eat too much of it. Our next stop after lunch was a local family run perfumery. We entered this house/shop and were treated to a demonstration of various Egyptain purfumes and aroma therapy things. It was pretty cool and the guy taking the demonstration was really nice. He would tell us about a particular single flower scent and then dabble a bit on everyones hands to smell. It was pretty amazing as he would then proceed to give us a smell of other purfumes which apparently are the natural base of many designer label perfumes. He would dabble a bit on our hands and tell us, this is the base to Chanel...Hugo Boss...etc...and they smelt really good! He tried to flog us some purfumes at the end and I was slightly tempted as 100ml bottle was only going to cost 200 Egyptains however thought better of it given I don't have much room in my pack as it is!

This brought an end of the formal tour activities for the day. We bussed it back to the hotel to refresh, took a quick dip in the pool and got ourselves ready for the evening trip...our overnight train to Aswan. We made it to the train station with plenty of time to spare after battling the Cairo traffic once again. It's lucky we were booked on a sleeper train as a couple of other trains that arrived before ours looked disgusting and the seats ridiculously upright for a 13 hour train trip! A couple of guys in our tour group decided against the £40 upgrade to sleeper cabin and so will be stuck in cattle class all night! Our train arrived and we hustled on board, not knowing what to expect in our sleeper cabin. Turns out its actually quite cosy, and as I'm writing this blog we are tottering along the tracks, Rach fast asleep on the bottom bunk. Its not overally quiet (hopefully ear plugs will help that) and with the assistance of a sleeping pill, hopefully a good night's rest after our busy day. Next blog from Aswan...

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Photos

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Sakkara Pyramid

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THE great pyramid!