Egypt - Day 2

After sleeping in late on Thursday morning, we awoke from our travel-induced haze and headed downstairs for breakfast. This was the first time seeing the hotel during the daylight, and it was quite a spectacular sight! All of our rooms overlooked the Nile River and had great views of the city. We were a little surprised to see the entire city shrouded in dense smog and the river littered with trash, but one must remember that Cairo is a city of nearly 22 million people! We had an incredible breakfast buffet at the hotel and then headed off for a day of sight-seeing.

Our guide picked us up promptly at noon and we headed off to our first stop, The Citadel. The three of us with a guide and driver fit very comfortably in a 15-passenger touring van. Our guide introduced himself as Muhammad, and explained that 99% of men in Egypt are named Muhammad or some variation. He turned out to be an incredible source of knowledge, who guided us around Cairo for two days straight reciting the entire history of the country without ever once consulting notes or a book. It turns out that he had been guiding tours for over 10 years.

Having lived in Italy for sever months, we thought that we had seen just about every crazy thing that can happen while driving. Cairo took this to a whole new level. It is truly hard to describe the chaos, but I am just shocked that we came through the experience unscathed. All sense of order is lost, and the Egyptians communicate entirely by honking. Someone described it like driving with your eyes closed, using your horn as a sonar to detect everything around you. People would honk to say hi, honk to pass, honk when getting passed, honk when they’re happy, and honk when they’re mad. It was absolutely incredible. Here's a good video to show you what I mean.

We eventually arrived at the Citadel, which is perched high on a hill overlooking Cairo. The main sights are the Mosque of Muhammad Ali (Built in 1848) and the Qalawun Mosque (Built in 1335). The walls surrounding the Citadel were built from the facing stones of the Great Pyramids (have to give it to them for recycling!). As we entered the site, Muhammad gave us an extensive lesson on the history of Egypt and all the various regimes that inhabited the land over the last 5000 years. It was absolutely incredible, though I must admit I lost track of most of what he said!

We spent time at the Citadel touring the outside and inside of the Mosque of Muhammad Ali. It was interesting to learn that the design and architecture was actually Turkish in origin, because Muhammad Ali was from the area now known as Turkey. An interesting feature of the mosque was the clock tower installed in the courtyard. It was a gift from the King of France back in the 1800’s after the King of Egypt gifted an Obelisk to France. That is the obelisk now on display on the Concorde in Paris. It turns out that the clock only worked for 2 weeks! Our last stop at the Citadel was a vista overlooking the city and supposedly the pyramids in the distance. Unfortunately, the combination of fog and smog limited the view. As our guide said, it was a “fogoramic view”.

From the Citadel, we braved the streets again and headed to Coptic Cairo. We visited the Hanging Church and Ben Ezra Synagogue and also wandered the streets a bit. Including the Citadel, we visited churches from three major religions in as many hours! The buildings were impressive both inside and out, but we were getting a little hungry and tired by that point.

Our next stop was the Egyptian Museum. On our way, we stopped at a take-away restaurant and picked up some wonderful chicken wraps and sodas to consume during the ride. After the initial shock of driving though Cairo wore off, we were able to sit back and enjoy the spectacle. My favorite was the BWM with a Stairmaster tied to its roof weaving through traffic and, yes, honking its horn.

We arrived at the Egyptian Museum and spent some time walking around the garden area which contained several statues and the sarcophagus of the Frenchman who founded the museum. After visiting the Vatican and Louvre, I was surprised that there were any Egyptian artifacts left to display. While we wandered the museum, Muhammad continued the history lesson on Egypt, this time reaching back to the earliest civilizations and kings. The highlight of the museum is the collection from King Tutankhamun’s tomb. Out of 162 known tombs in Egypt, King Tut’s was the only one to be found intact. There were many statues and pieces of jewelry, and the centerpiece was the solid gold mask that he was buried in. The incredible thing was that he was really just a minor king, who died when he was 17. I can only image what the grander kings may have stashed in their tombs!

From the museum, our driver dropped us off at a personal stop: Harley-Davidson of Cairo. We had planned for weeks to stop here and buy t-shirts for various folks back home and we were not disappointed by the selection! We took a taxi back to the hotel, which was an interesting experience in that our driver had to stop and ask a group of teenage boys for directions to the hotel. Either it really was a new hotel or we didn’t really get in a legitimate taxi. Either way, we made it back safely for a bargain rate ($6 US).

Back at the hotel, we enjoyed a buffet dinner with a wonderful chocolate dessert. After dinner, I went to the rooftop pool deck of the hotel and talked with Christina on Skype (the pool deck had free WiFi that worked decently with my iPhone). By 10:00 I was exhausted from the days adventures and had little trouble falling asleep.