More on Cairo Excursion

On Thursday, 4/16, we drove the 3 hrs to get into Cairo to the Egyptian Museum and Giza to see the Great Pyramids and Sphinx. Of course there is no sense to going to see the pyramids without a camel ride to complete the experience.

On the drive to Cairo we saw strange dome shaped buildings with timber sticking out and little holes or openings every so many feet. These structures are called pigeon towers. Many homes have these structures to raise pigeons which they feed until plump like a small chicken. Then they are stuffed and served only in the homes. Our tour guide said they are served for special occasions and stuffed just was we would a chicken. I tried to take a picture of the unusual structures from a moving bus so the photo doesn’t do them justice.

After navigating traffic in Cairo we headed to Giza. There we saw the Pyramids of Cheops completed around 2500 B.C. They are one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient world and the only one of ancient landmarks to survive today. This was truly an amazing engineering feat. Most of the blocks weigh between two and three tons! Originally each pyramid had a layer of fine limestone, but most of that has been taken away to adorn newer buildings in Cairo. You can see some of this limestone on the middle pyramid at the very top. There is a small statue (about 2-3 inches) of Cheops in the museum which is the only known figure of the man that built the great pyramids. What is a trip to the pyramids without a ride on the camels! Not as easy as it looks! It is quite a bumpy ride and when they kneel to let you off, it feels as if you are going to fly right over their heads!

Down the hill is the sphinx, which was thought to protect the tomb of the pharaoh Chephren. When we were there nearly 20 years ago, we could walk right to the base and touch the structure. It is no longer possible to get anywhere near the structure and security is very strong at all the sites now. The same was true for the museum. Now there are two security metal detectors to get into the museum now and not allowed to even carry a camera thru the door. It was fabulous to see all of the treasurers from King Tut’s tomb. It leaves one in awe that over 2000 years ago they had these beautiful solid gold masks, jewelry, and caskets with intricate figures all hand carved. What an advanced civilization to create all these beautiful objects. The only negative to the trip was that there was never enough time to spend in any area. We only had 50 minutes to see the museum and it is a place that you could easily spend hours or half a day exploring.

I was glad that I made the trip and the weather there was much cooler than Luxor. It was a good day and brought back many memories of our trip there nearly 20 years ago.