Cairo & Giza - Day 1

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Wow - still can't sleep in this hotel! It's crazy loud and was up every hour. Up at 6am for breakfast; paid for our optional excursions to the Spring Tours rep, Mohammed and then bags to the bus. By 8am, we were off to the museum. It took awhile just to get down our street as there was a mad rush of cars trying to get into the gas station which apparently was the norm.

Got to the Egyptian museum for our first stop of the tour. I'm surprised that we dont have a separate local guide and that Sherif is our local guide combined with a TM. He was so knowledgable he blew me out of the water. The highlight of the museum for me was definately seeing the mummy of Ramses! I had seen a mummy before in our museum in Toronto but all of the great Pharoahs that I had ever learned about in Art History class were all here in this one room mummified! It was incredible! For most others their highlight was seeing the gold mask of King Tut which was cool as well. Sherif gave us an amazing hour of guided tour and then we had an hour on our own. Mark & I didnt realize that USD$ was not as widely accepted for payment for everything as we had assumed. We then had to go to an ATM and withdraw Egyptian pounds for the trip.

After the museum, we then had the Spring Tours coach take us out to the Pyramids of Giza! It was an interesting drive to go from downtown city to shanty towns in the ghettos outside of the downtown and then to the agricultural fields on the way out to the desert. So many vast types of land in such close proximity was amazing! When we saw our first glimpse of the pyramids, everyone freaked out on the bus....it was so funny watching everyone trying to take pictures of them from the speeding bus on the freeway while they were still just specks on the horizon. I was impressed; yes but still it was funny😊

We first had a photo op at 1 pyramid where they are actually letting people up on the blocks to take pictures, walk around, etc! Sherif told us that normally people dont have access to do this but since the crowds have not been as busy they were allowing it. We were harassed by the locals like crazy! Mark and some of the other guys were actually having to tell them to leave them alone because it was too much. When we walked back to the bus, they follow you on horse or camel so most of the girls were sticking together as a group. I was lucky to have Mark! My now pretend husband. We then drove over to the sandy desert area behind all 3 pyramids where tons of camels sit waiting for the tourists to come! The boys all bought local scarves to wear to keep sand off your hair and face. Our camel leader asked if Mark & I were on honeymoon so i went along with it and said "yes, of course!" He then gave us special treatment taking tons and tons more pics of us then he took of the others. He gave us special treatment looking for that extra tip of course! The camel ride was amazing! I loved it & we had the best view of the pyramids and the city from there. On the way back, our leader let go of the camel and told me i was going solo and the camel started trotting ahead faster😊 He said we were having races...but not so much. They didnt go too fast.

Next stop was at the Sphinx which I expected to be huge; but it wasn't. It was very amazing to see but not as impressive as the pyramids. The locals there try to help you getting classic tourists shots of you kissing sphinx, etc and while they help the one taking the picture, they snatch your camera, purse, etc or pic pocket and i swore the girl helping Mark almost took off with my camera. It wasnt the nicest place to sit and take it in as we were also followed by a young boy forever, etc. So many poor locals it was sad as they are so desperate. We didn't have lunch until 4pm where we went to a nice garden type place outside of the downtown area where we ate yummy falafel's and smoked shisha (apple & grape). It actually got pretty cold outside so we were all ready to go.

Next, we went to the train station and boarded our train around 8pm. They served us dinner right away but Sherif even warned us not to eat much of it saying it wasnt very good. We then had a bottle of wine we bought the night before for the train. One whole car was filled with Contiki people and we were in a car with the other couples, Sherif and a few other tourists. We went into the other car to see what was going on and all 28 people were inside 1 cabin! I couldn't believe it! People were overhead in the luggage compartments and all! We drank our wine on the party car with the gang and socialized in the hallway until 10pm or so and then went to bed.

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