Alexandria

---

While in Egypt, we took a day trip out of Cairo to explore Alexandria.

We hit all five of the big sites: the Roman amphitheater (which we really just glanced at), the pillar of Pompey, the catacombs, the library, and the citadel.

The citadel was a pretty ridiculous experience. The museum of the citadel had nothing to do with the fortress and instead was filled with life-sized dioramas of sea life. It was, however, pretty neat to stand in the belly of a whale. I had never before seen a whale skeleton (at least not that I can recollect).

The library was pretty neat. They had a really amazing collection of old and rare manuscripts. The oldest dated to the 10th century AD. They covered a whole variety of topics from math and science to religion and just about everything in between. They also had the smallest Torah scroll I have ever seen in my life, which was pretty neat to see.

The catacombs were a lot of fun. The wall paintings were incredibly well preserved and Sarah and I greatly enjoyed looking at the uses of paint and the possible materials that had been used. The catacombs were very extensive, and like many ancient sites in Egypt, they were discovered by an animal- this time a falling donkey.

The pillar of Pompey is pretty neat to see. It is kind of nice to see Corinthian columns with capitals that are not acanthus leaves. The papyrus leaf capital made for a nice change. There was also a few other really interesting things at the site. There was a sister library to the famous Alexandria library where some texts were held in a nice underground storage area. Also, there was a Nilometer which was used to measure floodwater for the purpose of tax payments to those who had property damaged in floods. Again, Sarah and I had a good time looking at stone sculpture and trying to guess the materials (we got some of them right, at least!)

That evening we had dinner in Alexandria. Our guide took us to a fancy restaurant and we tried to say no, but oh well. We paid way more than we needed to, but we tried some fish, which had been recommended to us by the hostel. The restaurant also had an excellent view of the water and we were able to watch the sunset as we ate.

All in all, our Alexandria excursion was a hit!

---