2Taylors

On the way to Amboseli we decided we would change our plans again and head to Egypt when we returned to Nairobi, so I called a travel agent whilst we were driving and got things started. Once we got back to Nairobi we dropped in at the travel agent and a few days later we arrived in Cairo.

Our first day in Cairo we visited the Great Pyramids. They are amazing! They are soooo big and it is mind blowing to think the ancient Egyptians managed to build them thousands of years ago. There are 3 large pyramids in Giza and these are the ones that everyone recognises. The famous Sphinx is also located here, again it is the one everyone knows. They are located literally on the edge of Giza town – the town just stops and the pyramids are right there. It was pretty hot and humid, especially compared to Nairobi, but not unbearable. It is also low season, and Ramadan, so there were very few tourists and lots of shops and vendors were closed which means less people to hassle you and no crowds, which was fine by us. One night we went to the Sound and Light Show at the pyramids. It was OK but nothing to write home about, I’m just glad that it did not cost a lot of money.

From the pyramids we visited the Egyptian Museum, which is located in Cairo right next to Tahrir Square, the location of all the demonstrations that have been happening. We saw no sign of unrest. Yes there are still a few tents in the square and some peaceful protesters, but certainly nothing that had us concerned in anyway. Our guide told us that when the riots were happening in January it was very scary and that her family and herself did not leave their apartment for 21 days straight. It will be interesting see what the result of the trial and the election in September will bring.

The Egyptian Museum is huge with so much stuff inside it. Without a guide I think it would be difficult to understand the things that are there as the signage is very limited and it would take you days to see all of it. It could though do with a bit of dusting and maintenance so it looks quite tired and run down, which is a shame as it is full of amazing artefacts. All the treasures that were found in Tutankhamen’s tomb are here and they are truly amazing and absolutely priceless. To think this was a boy king who ruled for a very short time, yet his tomb was filled with all this gold and precious stones, just imagine what would have been in the tombs of the pharaohs that ruled for years and years! We also saw the mummys of various kings, again pretty amazing to think they are thousands of years old yet you can still see their hair and fingernails.

The old town was next on our list where we wandered through the old streets and visited a number of churches including the Hanging Church (a Coptic orthodox church), St George Church (Greek Orthodox) and Ben Ezra Synagogue. All the churches are old, but the Hanging Church is believed to have been built around 690AD with additions and renovations along the way. It is a pretty spectacular church and worth a visit. We also visited the Al Azhar Mosque in Cairo which is huge and can apparently accommodate 20,000 people for prayer. Again having a guide with us made it much more interesting. We took a quick wander through the bazaar, but not being shoppers we didn’t spend too long there as it was full mainly of tourist stuff.

We visited the Citadel by ourselves one afternoon. An air conditioned taxi was easy enough to find, and although I think we paid a bit too much, it was still very cheap. Unfortunately most of the sights within the Citadel were closed – but of course they failed to mention that when we bought our tickets. The only things open were the military museum and the Mohammed Ali Mosque, which was extremely dirty both inside and out and not particularly attractive. We were glad we did not organise an actual tour here as it would have cost 4 times as much as would really not have been worth it. For the amount we paid it was OK and filled in the afternoon, it was just annoying that nothing was open and no one thought it relevant to let you know.

We boarded the MS Emilio in Aswan for our 3 night cruise down the Nile to Luxor. The ship was pretty nice and a lot better than some of the other ships we saw. We decided to upgrade to a suite which allowed us to sit on the lounge in our air conditioned room, but with the full length glass window open as we travelled down the Nile rather than having to sit on the roof deck where it was very hot and windy. The ship was full of French people with only about 8 English speakers on board, but it wasn’t an issue and we had a pleasant 3 days on board.

Our guide for Aswan was also our guide in Kom Ombo and Edfu and was extremely knowledgeable and helpful. The temples are a lot more meaningful and interesting if you have a guide to explain everything to you and are well worth the money.

In Aswan we took a trip on a felucca to view the Aga Khan Mausoleum and the botanical gardens, and then took a motor boat to visit a Nubian village. The Nubian’s have very colourful homes and are pretty friendly. We took a walk through the village and had a look at one of their homes which was a pleasant way to fill in the afternoon.

The next day we visited the High Dam which was built to esnure a constant water supply and created Lake Nassar in the process – the biggest man made lake in the world. It is huge, but does not look so big as most of it is under the water. You need to see the diagrams of it to understand its size.

Philae Temple was next on our list. It is located on a small island near Aswan and was also moved as a result of the flooding caused by the construction of the High Dam. There are a number of structures with various pharaohs adding their own bits through the centuries, all of which are thousands of years old. It was an impressive temple with plenty of statues, columns, engraved scenes and hieroglyphics. It is amazing to think so many of these ancient sites have survived thousands of years. A lot of the temples though have been defaced by the early Christians who erased faces and sometimes whole bodies of the various gods depicted.

Our first stop in Luxor was the Valley of the Kings, a desert valley where the pharaohs were buried from the 16th to the 11th century BC. So far they have found 63 tombs with the tomb of Tutankhamen being the only one that was found completely intact, including all its treasures (which we saw in the Egyptian Museum). The most recent tombs were found in 2006 and 2008, so there are probably more still to be found. We went inside 3 of the tombs (unfortunately you are not allowed to take photos). It is amazing that the colours of the engravings have survived thousands of years and are still quite bright. They certainly went to a lot of effort to create and decorate their tombs.

Next was the temple of Hatshepsut, a woman who ruled Egypt but dressed and behaved as a man. The temple has been reconstructed using the remains that were found and it is quite different to any of the other temples as it is built into the rock face and consists of 3 levels. Each level has a row of columns across the front of it. Most of the statues though are missing or damaged and the decorations are either gone or quite feint.

We stopped briefly at the Colossi of Memnon, 2 large statues that were once part of a temple.

Next was Karnak Temple Complex. This temple is HUGE and has been added to by about 30 pharaohs over the years. It is made up of various temples, pylons, and other buildings as well as a sacred lake.

That night we caught the sleeper train from Luxor to Cairo. It was OK, but definitely not as good as the ones in China. The food was terrible, both dinner and breakfast, thankfully we had bought some snacks to take with us just in case. Neither of us got much sleep as the train is quite rough and then we were woken about 4am for breakfast, an hour before arriving in Cairo – we could have slept another half an hour as it did not take us an hour to be ready!