Cairo, Egypt April 7, 2007 Updated April 14th

We left the ship very early to head to The Valley of the Kings. Not too far down the road, we encountered something new for us, a SANDSTORM!! Yikes!! The wind was blowing over 30 MPH and it was really hard to see. Thank goodnees by the time we got to Cairo, it had subsided to the point that we could get out of the bus and see what we came to see but it was WINDY!!! The Great Pyramids are the only remaining monuments depicting the wonders of the ancient world. Originally built as tombs for the early Pharaohs by slaves, the structures have intrigued the greatest minds of the world. They have managed to survive the rise and fall of many dynasties throughout history. Altough, in the Valley of the Kings there are (were) 108 pyramids, some of them now look much like a big pile of rocks. While others reach to the sky with the same magesty they had when they were originally built. Unfortunately, some of the pyramids were vandalized. Can you believe that?? Not only did people stloot them for their gold, jewls, treasures galore...but the Muslims stole the exterior of them!! Some of the pyramids had a full layer of marble over their massive stones. You can see at the very top of the pyramid in this picture that there is still some of the original marble at the very tip top. Now, there are police on camels all over the place with guns. You would not want to get caught stealing a rock these days. The punishment would be cutting off your hand!! There are teams of archeologists working in the Valley of the Kings trying to preserve the pyramids without disturbing them. Those same teams are always digging at other sites hoping to find more tombs. You see, after a period of time, when the Pharaohs began to worry about people looting their tombs they no longer wanted to be buried in side pyramids. They wanted to be put deep into catacombs with crazy puzzlelike routes to their acyual burial places. We were fortunate enough to actually go inside one of the pyramids and into one of the catacombs.
The Sphinx is located just southeast of the great pyramids. It is a man's head on a lion's body. It is a lot smaller in person than I thought it would be!! I have to say I was a little surprised at it's size. I was expecting a massive structure. Not so. It is big but postcards and TV make you think it is much larger. The Sphinx is steeped with legend and superstition. It is believed to have been built as a monument either to the sun god Ra, or Pharaoh Chephren. It faces east, presumably to greet the rising sun and the return of life each day. There were SO many people selling things there it was ridiculous. They didn't just try to sell it to you they would shove it into your hands and say it was a gift and then let you take three steps and then ask for the money for it. It was fine for about the first 20 or so people that did it, but after you couldn't keep count anymore it really took away from the experience of such glorious architechture.

You can see that most of our pictures seem a little fuzzy. It is the sand blowing! We had sand in our hair, ears and teeth!!!Kathleen was happy to relax after our first glimpse of the pyramids. We went to a place called Mena House. The banquet room we ate lunch in was palatial.
The exterior of the hotel where we had lunch. The grounds were fabulous. You'd never guess that about 1,000 yards over to the left there was a huge desert!! Amazing what water will do!!
After the pyramids what would you do?? Go shopping?? Yes. That is what we did. We set out on the streets of Cairo, just the 4 of us looking for what normal people in Cairo do. What we found was a very busy street that our hotel was on. It faced the Nile River. We found out quickly that traffic lights are for decoration only. They do not stop...ever. They get in their cars and only stop if they hit another car or when they get to their destination!! We never could cross the street to go look at the river!!

We did find a "mall" of sorts. They called it an Arcade. It was about 3 stoies of small shops, indoor, and nice. They had a Toys R Us!! We found Muslim Barbie in there!! Here she is! Kathleen found a Muslim shoppe and posed with the gals in the window!! They had mostly black and dark grey robes!

Our walk back to the hotel was fun. We found a contrustion site that used Persian rugs to say "Keep Out"!!! An unusual taxi stand. The taxi drivers laughed at us while we took these pictures but we thought it was really different!!

I hope to be able to post more of our Cairo story on another posting. Fingers crossed!!