Cairo

Day 1

We flew up from Aswan in the morning. Unfortunately about an hour’s delay and a bit of trouble tracking down the driver we had booked, but we arrived at the hotel shortly before 2. We wanted to visit the new (and still incomplete) Grand Egyptian Museum that afternoon, so after checking in we immediately caught a taxi to the museum, which is quite close to our hotel. Very interesting to see - we ended up deciding we didn’t really like the building, but the grand court and the grand staircase are impressive.

Of course, there is a marvellous collection of objects (albeit that the Tutankhamen treasures and the solar boats haven’t yet arrived on site). But we thought the overall curation of the museum wasn’t particularly inspiring.

Back to the hotel around 6 and after a change of clothes off to an Italian restaurant within the hotel complex for a change of cuisine!

Day 2

This morning we enjoyed breakfast on the terrace overlooking the Giza Pyramids. The Great Pyramid of Khufu is on the left and that of his son Khafre on the right. It’s about 10 degrees cooler here than in Luxor / Aswan so a bit a freshness in the air about 7.15am, less than 3/4hr after sunrise.

We had organised a tour of Coptic and Islamic Cairo as a change from all the pharaonic history! Our first stop was the citadel, occupying a fantastic site overlooking the city (albeit the view can’t be described as stellar!). It has dramatic walls and fortifications, all reinforced by Saladin in the 12th century after he’d thrown out the Fatimids and reestablished Sunnism in Egypt.

Within the citadel stands the nineteenth century Mohammed Ali Pasha Mosque - no longer used and just a tourist attraction.

Visits to the nearby Al-Riva’s mosque and the Sultan Hasan Madrasa followed. We then had a short trip to the Khan-el-Khalili bazaar, where Diana finally found a Christmas tree decoration to add to our collection!

After that, to the Coptic section of our tour, which included visits to the Hanging Church (first two photos below) and the Church of Saints Sergius and Bacchus, where the holy family is believed by Copts to have sheltered following their escape from King Herod. Both are very ancient buildings, originally consecrated in the third and fourth centuries respectively.

We spent the afternoon relaxing by the pool and dinner was at the Indian restaurant on site.

Day 3

We had booked a tour of Saqqara, Dashur and Memphis, which lie about 3/4hr drive south of our hotel. The famous step pyramid of King Djoser at Saqqara - the first attempt at pyramid building some 4,700 years ago - was our first stop. As has been so common on this trip, we were amazed by its size and age and left wondering how on earth they built it!

We went inside a smaller and less well preserved pyramid close by, the Pyramid of Unas, where you can see some very early funerary inscriptions and into the tomb of Princess Idut, where there are well carved scenes of rural life.

On to Dashur, to see the famous Bent Pyramid of King Sneferu, Khufu’s father. We were able to get inside this one - a slow stooped climb down a 65m shaft (the second photo below shows this section - it’s a sloped boardwalk at about 45 degrees and the passage is about 3ft wide by 3ft tall) and then up a short flight of steps to the burial chamber, and then another set of steps and a crawl through a tight passage to reach the inner surface of the top of the pyramid, where we saw quite a few bats. The final photo below is of me emerging, a bit grubby, having retraced our steps - the atmosphere in side was quite close as you can imagine, hence the rather sweaty face!

At Dashur we also saw the Red Pyramid, another creation of King Sneferu, and shown in the distance below to give an idea of the desert landscape surrounding all the pyramid sites.

Our final stop was at Memphis, the ancient city for which Saqqara was the necropolis. There’s not much there now, but it was good to see what there was. This is Diana with our guide for today, Hozny.

Dinner at the terrace restaurant, looking up at the two pyramids, with that of Khafre nicely floodlit.

Day 4

This was the morning to explore the Giza Pyramids. Our hotel provides a shuttle service to the gate closest to Khufu’s pyramid and we were there shortly after 8, with the site pretty much to ourselves. We didn’t have a guide today, so just did a self-guided walking tour of the site - walking a circuit of some 8km to get up close to each of the pyramids and see the sphinx, but then heading out across the sands to take in the panoramic views from higher ground to the south. We were even able to get a coffee at the 9 Pyramids lounge as a half-way stop!

Back to the hotel shortly after 11am, with the rest of the day to relax and reflect on a fascinating and sunshine-filled trip.