If you're counting at home, I've been in E
gypt 9 days and have yet to lay eyes on a pyramid. Day 10 brought about time to change that. We talked our favorite tour guide into hooking us up with a friend in Cairo, and our trip sounded like so much fun that he took the train up to join us. So now we have the six of us and two tour guides on a whirlwind mission through Cairo. We started down in
Memphis with the open air museum there, which has a lot of cool old stuff some more ruined than others, and a giant
colossus of Ramses II that won't stand up anymore. The drive to Memphis takes you over a lot of little bumpy rides past the most disgusting looking
Nile canals. At some places the canals are filled with floating floating garbage at one end of a section and at the other end there would be people fishing. I'll order the lamb thanks. From the museum at Memphis, we next rolled to
Sakkara where you find the oldest pyramid, the step pyramid built by
Djoser (
Zoser). We had seen dogs at a lot of the sites, and got the impression t
hat there might be puppies around someplace, but finally found one at the step pyramid. I think if W thought we could have gotten him in our carry on, we'd have a new puppy at our house. You start by walking through the temple complex through some stone columns, and suddenly find yourself craning your neck at this giant structure. There is still much to be unearthed there, but the structure itself is really quite impressive. There's a small museum there too, with cool artifacts from the early dynasties
there would be pictures, but you know how this story goes. After hanging around the step pyramid for a while, we
were back on the bus, for a quick trip to the carpet factory. How they make the carpets was cool, what they charge and how they pressure you to buy, not cool. After carpet shopping it was time for a little lunch. We ended up in a pretty touristy spot that I really regret not getting the name of
because the view of the pyramids from there was incredible. We sat at a window table that looked right over the
Giza plain. The Egyptian food served there was quite good, despite the fact that it was on a buffet. We gorged ourselves on all the deliciousness and enjoyed a
sakkara beer with a whole new perspective on it. After lunch the guy in charge took us up a few flights of stairs to an outdoor deck where we actually got some of the best pictures from the trip. After our picture time, it was time to go get up close and personal with the pyramids. You have the option to pay extra to go inside the great
pyramid of C
heops (Khufu) but no one really wanted to follow the big crowd into a hot, dark cave and pay extra for it. You can go down in one of the smaller pyramids without extra charge, and essentially get the same experience. We had also been warned by many people not to take the camel ride at the pyr
amids, so we were glad to have already fit the camel ride in. There's no doubt about it, the pyramids are big, and impressive. Tourists don't get to climb up the sides of the pyramids anymore, and there was a little guy blowing a whistle and yelling at select groups of people climbing and letting others go with no real rhyme or reason to
his methods. After getting close to the great pyramid and going down into a small one we got on the bus to go over to the panorama where you can take pictures of the big three in one shot. After snapping there for a while it was time to go pay a visit to the sphinx. You can't terribly close to it, but the fact that you're there at all is plenty of consolation. You're also there with a lot of other people. I never realized how short a distance it is from Cairo to major
Europe
an hubs. 5 hours from London or 3 hours from Frankfurt makes a sunny destination like Cairo easily in reach of a lot of tourists. So you don't get a lot of pictures without other people in them, but for us here in the states it's a big deal to go that far, so you just learn to deal with the crowds. While you're there, you have to take the touristy pics of pointing at the pyramids, and kissing the sphinx, and assume that people have done these things as long as theyve had cameras to do it with. The best realization is that some of the monuments you're standing in front of have been there since before 2000 BCE, or more than 4000 years ago. That's an insanely long time. We were a tired wind and sand beaten bunch w
hen we got back to the hotel, and after a little rest and a round of showers for all, briefly checked out the casino, and it seemed nice, but there were far more casino employees than gamblers.We grabbed a bite to eat at Roy's Country Kitchen in the hotel, which has unfortunate Egyptian waiters forced to wear overalls and flannel shirts, oddly paired with dress shoes. Then it was sleepy time, with another full day ahead of us for the next day.
If you're counting at home, I've been in Egypt 9 days and have yet to lay eyes on a pyramid. Day 10 brought about time to change that. We talked our favorite tour guide into hooking us up with a friend in Cairo, and our trip sounded like so much fun that he took the train up to join us. So now we have the six of us and two tour guides on a whirlwind mission through Cairo. We started down in Memphis with the open air museum there, which has a lot of cool old stuff some more ruined than others, and a giant colossus of Ramses II that won't stand up anymore. The drive to Memphis takes you over a lot of little bumpy rides past the most disgusting looking Nile canals. At some places the canals are filled with floating floating garbage at one end of a section and at the other end there would be people fishing. I'll order the lamb thanks. From the museum at Memphis, we next rolled to Sakkara where you find the oldest pyramid, the step pyramid built by Djoser (Zoser). We had seen dogs at a lot of the sites, and got the impression t
hat there might be puppies around someplace, but finally found one at the step pyramid. I think if W thought we could have gotten him in our carry on, we'd have a new puppy at our house. You start by walking through the temple complex through some stone columns, and suddenly find yourself craning your neck at this giant structure. There is still much to be unearthed there, but the structure itself is really quite impressive. There's a small museum there too, with cool artifacts from the early dynasties there would be pictures, but you know how this story goes. After hanging around the step pyramid for a while, we 
were back on the bus, for a quick trip to the carpet factory. How they make the carpets was cool, what they charge and how they pressure you to buy, not cool. After carpet shopping it was time for a little lunch. We ended up in a pretty touristy spot that I really regret not getting the name of because the view of the pyramids from there was incredible. We sat at a window table that looked right over the Giza plain. The Egyptian food served there was quite good, despite the fact that it was on a buffet. We gorged ourselves on all the deliciousness and enjoyed a sakkara beer with a whole new perspective on it. After lunch the guy in charge took us up a few flights of stairs to an outdoor deck where we actually got some of the best pictures from the trip. After our picture time, it was time to go get up close and personal with the pyramids. You have the option to pay extra to go inside the great pyramid of Cheops (Khufu) but no one really wanted to follow the big crowd into a hot, dark cave and pay extra for it. You can go down in one of the smaller pyramids without extra charge, and essentially get the same experience. We had also been warned by many people not to take the camel ride at the pyr
amids, so we were glad to have already fit the camel ride in. There's no doubt about it, the pyramids are big, and impressive. Tourists don't get to climb up the sides of the pyramids anymore, and there was a little guy blowing a whistle and yelling at select groups of people climbing and letting others go with no real rhyme or reason to
his methods. After getting close to the great pyramid and going down into a small one we got on the bus to go over to the panorama where you can take pictures of the big three in one shot. After snapping there for a while it was time to go pay a visit to the sphinx. You can't terribly close to it, but the fact that you're there at all is plenty of consolation. You're also there with a lot of other people. I never realized how short a distance it is from Cairo to major Europe
an hubs. 5 hours from London or 3 hours from Frankfurt makes a sunny destination like Cairo easily in reach of a lot of tourists. So you don't get a lot of pictures without other people in them, but for us here in the states it's a big deal to go that far, so you just learn to deal with the crowds. While you're there, you have to take the touristy pics of pointing at the pyramids, and kissing the sphinx, and assume that people have done these things as long as theyve had cameras to do it with. The best realization is that some of the monuments you're standing in front of have been there since before 2000 BCE, or more than 4000 years ago. That's an insanely long time. We were a tired wind and sand beaten bunch w
hen we got back to the hotel, and after a little rest and a round of showers for all, briefly checked out the casino, and it seemed nice, but there were far more casino employees than gamblers.We grabbed a bite to eat at Roy's Country Kitchen in the hotel, which has unfortunate Egyptian waiters forced to wear overalls and flannel shirts, oddly paired with dress shoes. Then it was sleepy time, with another full day ahead of us for the next day.
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