Day 7 - Cairo [Day 3] - Pyramids!

Friday, November 26, 2010

Dahshur

Today I visited all the major pyramid fields in the Cairo area. Pyramid = tomb = statement "I lived". That is my synopsis after seeing and reading about these gigantic out-of-this-world structures. A pharoah's tomb began construction the day he took office, so to speak. 

Roadside sugar cane

This was another early day, and we start at 7:30 AM on Friday, which is good for us, as, due to the weekend, no traffic on the streets. I realize what it takes for no tooting car horns and a million cars on Cairo's streets. Weekend early morning. Sayed, our driver for the day, shows up with tigger in his back seat, and a car that's seen better days and reeks of tobacco smoke, but he's game to show us around for the day. So away we go.

Ramses statue - Memphis

On the drive down to Memphis, the ancient capital of the first pharoah who united upper and lower Egypt nearly 4,000 years ago, that he's been driving for Pension Roma guests for nearly 25 years. He proceeds to show us some sights along the way that we'll be passing, and shows us our first glimpse of the Giza pyramids, where we will end our day, off in the haze. Awesome! 

Alabaster sphinx - Memphis

Half an hour later, we arrive at Memphis. The city was built of clay and mud, and has long since returned to the Nile, but archeologists continue to dig and find. The site itself is nothing to sneeze at, but has a supine gigantic statue of Ramses [one of them] under a roof, and some other statuary in the open-air museum. A WC break later, we are on our way back out and on to Dahshur to visit the Red and Bent pyramids.

Bent pyramid

The Bent pyramid is one of the oldest, and many believe this helped lay the groundwork for the great pyramids at Giza. "Bent" because the angle changes about 2/3 of the way up the pyramid. Our guidebook tells us that this was because of a nearby collapse of another pyramid being raised at the same angle, with the Architect then questioning his design and making changes. Huh.... a few thousand years later and some things remain the same.... 

So we picked up our very own police escort at the site, and gave him a ride to his camp on our way to the Bent pyramid. This one is not open to tourists to go down in, but you can walk around it. As we did, we were joined by an Egyptian guard who asks the standard question: "where you from". I wander a little further afield for other shots of the pyramids, leaving Andrea to deal with our escort for a while. A few minutes later, I see that his camel is going down, and she's going to take him up for a ride... you go girl! I don't remember either our Camel Cop's name nor our ride, but I also take my first ride on the ship of the desert. It's different, but it's fun. CC also takes us around to where you can try to "lift" the pyramid. Fun, and I get into it too.

Red pyramid

Red pyramid

After our little trip, Sayed drops us off at one corner and we start walking around. After our circumnavigation of the pyramid, we are off to go inside. The steps up are a little steep, and my lack of shape is showing as I'm a little out of breath as we start to descend to the mouth of the pyramid. The stale and musty air, with the small quarters, has a wave of claustrophobia overcoming me, and I call down to Andrea to go ahead, and that I would join her if I could. I take a few minutes to get my breath, and to get aquainted with the size of the passage as well as the stale and ammonia-like smell, while sitting only a few steps inside. Finally the claustrophobia edges away, and away I go, something like 60 meters downhill bent over. Once again, I'm thankful that I'm vertically challenged. I saw a 6-foot plus man bent over nearly double climbing back up and it did not look like fun. 

The ceiling of the tomb

The steps - Red pyramid

By the time I get down to the ground, I'm coated in sweat both with the heat, and feeling a little nauseous to boot with the ammonia smell. There is no decoration down in the burial chamber of the queen, and yay, stairs up to the king's chamber. The way the tomb is constructed is really interesting, with the mass of the pyramid above us - okay, not helping claustrophobia feeling! - and the way it is supported on the chamber walls. Really interesting from a construction and physics perspective. Again, no decoration, and these tombs are nothing like what we saw in Valley of the Kings. While these pyramids were visual to everyone else, the tombs in Valley of the Kings were full of decorative arts that would be visible only to the soul of the pharoah, as he made his daily journey through the night. I found the differences fascinating, as at the time the Valley of Kings' tombs were being built, the pyramids were already ancient! 

Step pyramid

So, seeing inside of pyramid... check! Next, we are off to the pyramid fields of Saqqara. A quick stop at the really nice Imhotep museum, and we are driven to Teti's tomb, then to the step pyramid at Saqarra. This, too, has the facing that has deteriorated, or been re-used at other places. A quick wander and then we are interested in lunch and Giza. 

Lunch is at Oasis, formerly known as Andrea, which is why we chose it. Food is buffet-style geared for the tour buses, but the view of the pyramids through the haze and fields is awesome. Eat, WC and off we go! 

The back way into the Giza pyramids

Sayed takes the back way in, and we arrive at the "back" entrance, where it is not possible to get a ticket to go inside the pyramid, which is fine by me. We start right at the Sphinx, and take a quick wander through the site, which guards announce is "closing" shortly after we get there. What?! Neither Andrea nor I checked to see what time, but that's ok. It's Omar and Moses to the rescue! Omar is a camel herder and Moses is a camel, and they take us for a really nice 45-minute or so camel ride. We get some awesome photographs of us on the camel as well as the pyramids. I was a little hesitant, but I'm glad that Andrea persevered, and I have this wonderful memory. 

Giza

We are let off by the Pizza Hut, where we go up for a non-alcoholic drink and to watch the sun set. Awesome! Then, with the museum not on the agenda any longer, we are back to the hotel.

Andrea & I and Moses

But we are not done yet. For my last night in the city, we try our hand at street navigation again and go "off book" to a restaurant that my friend Gina recommended on Zamalek, and since it looks like a straight shot, we decide to walk it. We seem to doing ok, and then the path takes us up a bridge and we realize that there are three lanes merging. An observation of how the locals do it tells us that you pretty much wait until there are no cars, then cross over to the rather wide pedestrian walkway... hmmm... ok, we try it and are not killed, so away we go. A stop to observe the decked out and rocking felucca boats on the Nile below, and then it's off the other end. And, yay, I feel rather proud when we descend and are right there... large wooden doors, no sign. The interior is really interesting, and somewhat reminiscent of Fishawis, with the lamp shades and the hookah. Food is so-so for me. We order a "very old recipe" that tastes like chicken pot pie, and traditional Moloquiyyah, the gummy spinach soup that I did not enjoy. But all in all, great meal, and Andrea negotiates for us a cheap cab ride back.

Sphinx

The End of my first visit to Cairo. I say first because, after a rough start for me, I really enjoyed my time here. There is a lot to see and it's a bustling city, in the vein of NY or Paris or London, that invites further discovery. Overwhelming at first, Cairo really invites you to get to know it better, and if you persevere, it rewards you with giving up some of it's secrets, and tantalizes you with the more it has to offer. I think I can say the same for Egypt, and was pleasantly surprised at what I found here. I can't wait to be back for more... But, my vacation is not over yet! Three more days in Jordan await!