Cairo – Be Back Whenever

4/2023 Egypt – Cairo and the Nile

From Amman we flew as a group to Cairo where UniWorld again met us, handled the passport control, led us thru customs, and on to the bus. The tour started the next day with a total of 36 people on the UniWorld cruise. After a day of visiting the Muhammed Ali Mosque and the Old Egyptian Museum (The NEW one is still under construction and several years late.), we flew to Luxor to start the cruise.

Doesn’t he look like he’s sitting on a toilet? He’s in the Egyptian Museum.

All public toilets in Egypt had an attendant handing out toilet paper in return for some change. However, the airport paid their toilet attendants so this sign was in those toilets. Our translation was “Don’t pay to pee.”

Our description of a Nile cruise is that it’s just like a bus tour – sail to a location, get off the boat, see a temple or two, get back on the boat, and sail to the next location – without having to pack and unpack every day. All the temples except Abu Simbel are very close to the Nile but driving between them is less comfortable than sailing between them.

The cruise was uneventful except for one good Norm story. Norm hit his head getting on the little boat for the bird watching trip AND he lost his wallet someplace that same day. No one found it on the bird watching boat so Norm cancelled his credit cards. A day later or so, one of the cabin boys on the cruise boat found Norm’s wallet in Cabin 1; Norm and wife had switched cabins and the wallet fell somewhere in the old cabin.

Now for the pictures with just a little explanation.

Scenes from the bus

Outside of the Cairo airport Arrivals area

Abu Simbel

Ramses shows up all over Egypt

He’s at the Temple of Luxor. BTW … we gave up trying to keep all the dynasties and kings and pharoahs straight. I need a cheat sheet for that.

All the styles of columns were Susan’s favorites.

Inside Hathor Temple. Trajan and the Romans were involved with this one.

No trip to Egypt is complete without visiting the Valley of the Kings where King Tut was buried. We’d already visited his mummified body and the gems buried with him when we saw the OLD Egyptian Museum. Valley of the Kings just has the empty burial site along with a few dozen other tombs. One admission lets you choose 3 tombs to visit (Don’t lose your ticket!) but you need a separate ticket for Tut.

Valley of the Kings is very desolate and dry.

We finally headed back to Cairo via plane. In Egypt, as in India, men and women use separate security lines in the airport. All of the airports also had one security line at the entrance to the terminal for passengers and luggage. After passing this test, we could head to check-in, get our boarding passes, drop our bags, and head to the second security. The gates were not very good at using a microphone to board the bus to the plane. It was a “watch the gate and go when every one else does” kind of boarding.

We finally got to see the pyramids and the Sphinx. We had no idea that the Sphinx is pretty small and is right down the hill from the pyramids.

The pryamids are right outside of Cairo with a KFC and McDonald’s close by.

One side has orchards and a Marriott hotel at the entrance.

In front of the Great Pyramid and the Sphinx

Pyramids! They’re actually on a small hill so the big crowds are on the other side down the hill.

Riding a camel was a popular activity. We passed and just took pictures.

Sakara beer, an Egyptian beer that was pretty good, especially on a hot afternoon.

Every temple had a vendor area. They were quite persistent at trying to sell and would negotiate in dollars, euros, or Egyptian pounds. This guy didn’t have a stall but walked from group to group selling.

The Colorado foursome flew home via Frankfurt, spent the night in Frankfurt to avoid a 2 AM departure in Cairo. Mark and Susan headed to DC and Cumberland for the last stop on the trip – see Susan’s Mom.