Our Cairo Activities

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I’m laying here in the lap of luxury, sprawled out on a bed of sorts, and supported by pillows. Twenty minutes ago I was in a deep sleep. Ten minutes ago I was having a delicious meal delivered to my very resting place. And… I’m on an airplane? Yes, this giant Boeing 777 from Cairo to London is less than half full. Kevin, Raf, and I each claimed our own middle-aisle of four seats all to ourselves, so we’ve had full length beds this entire 5 hour flight. On the last flight Kevin and I had the poor man’s first class… now we have the poor man’s king’s class (see the new Airbus A380). Oh… and if you’re ever offered lasagna on an airplane, I strongly recommend you have it.

Our plan for Cairo was a little different from the other countries we’ve been to because most of it was pre-planned by a travel agency. Here’s a quick rundown of the events that have transpired over the past few days. First, my big blue gym bag, (that I’ve been carrying around everywhere so that I don’t have to spend $220 to ship it home) was lost in between our TelAviv-Amman-Cairo flight. We considered ourselves lucky to have come that far without having lost a bag. I had to pick up the bag at the airport today… no thanks to Min Travel. We crashed the first night in our wreck of a hotel that luckily had a tremendous view of the pyramids only a mile away. The next day, Min Travel (the abysmal travel agency we planned to take us around to all the sites) took us to Memphis where we saw various Egyptian statues. Then we went to Sakara where we saw the step-pyramids and were able to get a true appreciation for what a desert is. Then, we went to our unanimously agreed upon favorite activity of the trip: horseback riding to the Great Pyramids at Giza. Then, we went back to the hotel, got some delicious Shwarma from a small vendor across the street from our hotel. The next day we went to the Great Pyramids by car and explored the grounds, took pictures, and were able to crawl down into one of the smaller queen-pyramids. After this we toured the Egyptian Museum and then went to a bazaar. That afternoon we played cards on the rooftop of our hotel for a while and then engaged ourselves in one of our patented enlightening debates. This debate continued on our ride to the Nile River late at night. At the Nile we boarded a dinner cruise at 10pm… we were definitely out of our element for the following 2 hours. The next day was a very relaxing day. We slept in, went to our (delicious) free breakfast in the hotel and walked around the streets around our hotel. We chilled on the rooftop for a while playing Hearts and looking at the pyramids. That evening we fulfilled our promise to have three Shwarmas each, in one sitting. Our jolly source of said Shwarma’s took a while to realize that we EACH wanted 3 shwarmas. A shwarma is an absolutely delicious Arabic sandwich we discovered in Jerusalem: sliced kabob meat, vegetables, sauce, and goodness, wrapped in various forms of bread/tortillas/pitas. We finished our three Shwarmas without throwing up… though, let’s just say it’s affected this flight a little. We then relaxed on our street-side table brainstorming solutions to various “problems”. This continued over late-night cards on the roof. We crashed late and got up at 5am this morning to catch our flight. And… because of this bed, have been able to get all caught up on our lost sleep!

We just started our decent into Heathrow Airport so I’ve got to go. As this was just a recount of our activities, my commentary on them will follow sometime later.

London here we come!

- Dan

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