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Published: November 5th 2009
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View from Hotel Window
I couldn't see these pyramids at night, but in the light or morning, there they were. Greetings from Giza!
Wow! What a full day we had!!!
After a wonderful breakfast buffet, Rich, Kim and I headed out with our driver, Muhammad, our guide who picked us up at the airport, Nuan, and our guide for the day, Suhair. Nuan said goodby at the Cairo Museum and left us in the good hands of Suhair.
The drive into Cairo didn't take as long as the drive to the hotel last night. The traffic was not as heavy, but still crazy! Reminded me of driving in Naples, Italy where when there are three lanes of traffic, there are five lanes of cars. Want to make a left hand turn? Find yourself in the far right lane? No problem. Just do it. Either you will be hit or not. Pedestrians run/walk/dodge cars on the streets and the highways. Cars and trucks share the road with bikes and tractors and horse-driven carts. Residential buildings look unfinished, but mainly because they have steel poking up out of the non-roof, designed that way so that another floor(s) can be added. Over-population and over-pollution are two big problems in Cairo. Running out of room to house people, the government decided it
Cairo Traffic
On our way to the museum in Cairo was easier to build up! You can see agricultural parcels of land checkerboard in sections of the "suburbs." There are laws against building on the agricultural land.
The Museum was awesome. Of course we didn't have nearly enough time to see 1/10 of the amazing artifacts that are housed there. We did see examples of the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom, the New Kingdom and the treasures found in King Tut's tomb. In a couple of days we will have an opportunity to see the actual tomb. The whole experience in the museum was overwhelming. We could have spent many more hours just wandering around. Suhair guided us through the museum and was very knowledge about her history.
But no time, we are on a schedule. Back into the van and on our way to see how paper is made from papyrus. Of course, we had a shopping opportunity (always a shopping opportunity), and the sales people are pretty persausive. I told Lee we will probably now have an Egyptian Room in the house!!! And we've only been here 24 hours.
Right next door to the papyrus store was a "bazaar." Not the kind of bazaar I
Papyrus
Demonstration of how papyrus paper is made. was thinking of ... narrow streets filled with smells of exotic spices and fabulous textiles (well, at least Egyptian Cotton Sheets). Not. A big room with jewelry and other items. I did get some charms for a bracelet. That's one of my splurges when I travel ... a charm bracelet from every country!
It's now 2:00 p.m,. and off we go to lunch, which we discover is a nice restaurant right by our hotel. Suhair orders local food, and we eat. It was good. I took pictures of the food for Lee!!!
Nourished, we head for the Pyramids. Rich, Kim and I vacilate about whether or not to go inside the Great Pyramid and/or ride a camel. We did both. The walk to the chamber in the Great Pyramid was downhill and uphill, walking crouched over, stale air and two-way pedestrial traffic on a one-way walk. But we were glad we made the decision to go. Standing in that chamber built thousands of years ago, with tons of limestone over our heads, many different emotions ran through me.
Back in the van and up to the camels. Our guide suggested we take a ride from that spot
to the Sphinx, about 20-30 minutes, past the pyramids. Hemmed and hawed. Then, the "I-Could-Of-Had-A-V8-Moment" occured ... how many times do you get the chance to ride a camel past pyramids??? So Suhair graciously arranged for this experience, and we were off! We had a great guide, a funny Bedouin-looking man who spoke Enlgish and liked to say "okey dokey." No one fell off. We took lots of pics of each other on our camels. There were other people doing the same thing -- some on camels, some on horses and some in horse/mule drawn carts. We did pass a dead horse on the way to the Sphinx, partially eaten by carrions or other meat eaters. The smell was nasty; our camel driver wasn't phased. It brought home the 'phrase" beast of burden. When it's usefulness is over, there is no "pet cemetary" here. Interesting.
Rich forgot all the rules Suhair had given us about not haggling with the vendors and not overtipping ... he got himself into a mess with a couple of vendors .. they are very aggressive. I did my usual ... walked off. That's not for me.
We did have a few mintues to
Pita and Dips
Lots of yummy food to dip our pita bread in. get a close look at the Sphinx, but it was closing time and tourists were being run off by guards.
One more stop ... a surprise for me. Suhair took us to an aromatherapy shop outside the Sphinx. I was in heaven. So many wonderful oils. I tend to forget I now have to get these things home. But I HAD to have sandalwood from Egypt!!
We were done! In many ways. We went back to the hotel, said thanks and goodby to Suhair, said see ya to our driver and up to the room, 10 minute rest and down to the hotel for dinner. It was yummy, and we sat next to a nice retired couple from the UK who had just come from a cruise on the Nile. We had a tasty dinner (tex mex if you can believe it) and good conversation. Then back to the room and time for bed.
Up early in the morning, and back to the airport for our flight to Aswan.
Goodnight!!
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Chucki
non-member comment
LOL...
You guyz look soooo cute on dat camel. Your pics are so so awesome. You so lucky! You are just an adventurous woman traveling the world...its what you wanted and you got it. YOU GO GIRL! luv ya....chucki