Days 8 & 9
Day 8​
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It was time to get off the cruise now as we got ready to board the 10:30AM flight from Aswan to Cairo. We were shuttled off to an extremely busy Aswan airport. We landed in Cairo around mid-afternoon to be greeted by the familiar face of Ahmed, our driver and guide from the first leg.
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We drove straight to the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization first to see all the various artifacts that have been unearthed over the years. There are a wide array of sculptures, tablets, pots, and tools from the various era’s ranging from Predynastic Period (5500 BC) to the Ottoman Period (1805 AD) and some from the 1900s.There were remains of the oldest skeleton every found from the Predynastic period and some marvelous well preserved tiny dolls, actual ancient models of boats with intricate artwork, stone statues of pharaohs. There were many well preserved and restored sarcophaguses of varying sizes and jewelry that you must see to believe.
But the most impressive attraction of the museum was its Royal Mummy Hall, which housed 20 Royal mummies (18 kings and 2 Queens). Most notable of them were Seqenenre Tai (reigned from 1560 BC – 1555 BC and first pharaoh of the New Kingdom). Other notable ones were Ahmose I (son of Seqenenre Tai), Amenhotep I, Thutmoses I, II & III, Hatshepsut, Seti I & II, Ramses II, and
Queen Nefertari. The most fascinating part of this tour was that we got to see the actual sarcophagus and the mummy themselves in all their glory.
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You cannot stop to wonder the skill of the craftsman who created these beautiful burial coffins and the high priests who embalmed and wrapped the kings and queens that their facial features after 3500 years are still so clear to see. These were the holy and mighty pharaohs of the Egyptian dynasty, and you are automatically drawn to walking through the well laid out exhibit in absolute stunned silence and almost a sense of reverence.
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No photos allowed here so for the first time as a tourist you are absorbing everything in with no distraction.
Next on the agenda was the historic Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, built in 1835 a massive building housing the largest collection of antiquities. The museum is a treasure trove of some of the most fascinating pieces of ancient Egypt from gigantic statues to a marble Sphynx to the doors used to seal the burial chambers to gigantic outer boxes for the sarcophagus to rows and rows of crafted sarcophaguses to some of the most beautiful and tiny jewelry every excavated including the one and only miniature sized statue of King Cheops. At the entrance to the museum was the Rosetta stone. A replica is displayed here since the original is currently displayed in the British Museum.
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The Rosetta stone which was discovered in 1799 is a black granite slab which has 3 different texts (Hieroglyphic, Ancient Greek and Demotic) inscribed on it by King Ptolemy V in 196 BC praising him for his generosity and piety is probably the most significant find ever. The same writing in the 3 scripts is what helped decipher the Egyptian hieroglyphics and lead the understanding of that dynasty now.
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The highlight of the whole museum was the Hall of Tutankhamun. No photos allowed so let me try and describe it. We already saw the mummy at the Valley of the Kings in his actual resting place, but here there was
something else. King Tut died at the age of 18, but the ancient Egyptians seemed to have buried him in total opulence. His head piece was made of solid gold with carvings on them, his sarcophagus was made of gold filled with cartouches, hieroglyphics, and images; his jewelry was so intricate that you needed magnifying glasses to appreciate the beauty of the craftsmanship. Outside the hall were on display the canopic jars with the actual preserved organs (lungs, liver, stomach, and intestines) still in there, Kings Tuts royal chair and his chariot. There were more mummies and artifacts to admire as we walked around in the museum before finally retiring to our hotel for the night.
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Day 9
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Being the last day in Egypt, it slowed down bit in terms of rushing to wake up early and run out. We started later than usual and after a filling breakfast, we headed to Coptic Cairo which is in the Old neighborhood of Cairo.
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Coptic Cairo was a stronghold for Christianity, before and during the Islamic era.
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We drove through what our guide described as the Ancient city of Cairo that was once occupied by Persians, Romans, and Christians which is now in ruins for the most part. It did appear like some of those old buildings were still being used or were being built over to recover all that land space.
We were dropped off at the entrance for a short walk to visit the most important sight here, the Hanging Church. We had to pass the Fortress of Babylon, which was an ancient Roman fortress built in 30 BC when Emperor Augustus arrived in Egypt. It was mostly in ruins, but the missing outer walls in one section meant you could see inside its cylindrical structure with its stone inlay designs and the arches over the windows and passageways as it extended a few floors below into the ground.
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The Hanging Church was built over the walls of the Babylon Fortress, with the church’s nave suspended over a passageway… and hence the name ‘hanging.’ The land surface had increased by about six meters since the Roman period, so the Roman tower is buried below ground.
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The Hanging Church was built in 690 AD and is one of the oldest churches in Egypt. The entrance from the road is ordained by an iron door with carvings on the walls on either side of it, which opens out into a long open passageway with beautiful murals on one side and a narrow-raised garden in the middle. At the end of which are stairs up onto a landing covered in delicate and intricate carvings. The church
is dedicated to the Virgin Mary and is still very well preserved with all its curved arches and original roof and pillars standing strong to the day.
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Once outside we walked through a narrow passageway passing shopkeepers on one side and a wall of books wrapped in dusty plastic wrapping or old pictures of Egypt depicting the way the various historical sights, we had seen over the previous few days stood, some buried in water and others in sand.
It was a very well shaded, but dusty passageway as we made our way to the Church of Saint Sergius and Bacchus, dating back to the 14th century. The church is dedicated to two Roman soldiers, Sergius and Bacchus wo were martyred for their Christian beliefs.
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The church is believed to be built over the crypt where the Holy Family (Mary, Joseph, and infant Jesus) had stayed during their flight from Roman King Herod (reigned from 37 BC to 4 BC).
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The inside walls of this church are very different compared to any I had seen before, with the baren brickworks clearly visible with the roof believed to be made from the wood of Noah’s ark held in place by multiple layers of brickwork and arches and marble pillars. The main sanctuary is dedicated to Archangel Gabriel and another one to Archangel Michael. On the way to the crypt, you can see the well from which the holy family drank. You can walk down into the crypt and right through the actual resting place of the Holy Family.
Once outside we were officially done with our tour of Egypt, but we made a last-minute request to visit the famous Khan el-Khalil bazaar, and our tour coordinator, Ahmed was happy to oblige. It was a 25-minute drive from where we were through the busy streets of Cairo before we arrived at our destination. True to its word it’s a vibrant market filled with shopkeepers in close quarters displaying their multicolored clothes, ornaments, trinkets, stonework’s, lanterns and other do-dats which in almost all cases were spilling out onto the narrow streets. There were clothes, beads and lanterns hanging overhead as we walked through what was clearly built on the grounds on some historic structures. There were old stone arches and doorways visible in many places. A place of some serious commerce and extremely safe. The shopkeepers can be after you, but they meant no harm, just trying to make a living. The piece of advice we got was always haggle. It’s common here and the merchants expect you too, so the price is always jacked up, double in almost most cases. We stopped at the historic El Fishawy tea cafe, where we enjoyed some Koshary Shai tea, which is a black tea brewed with cane sugar and fresh mint leaves. A tea pot with the hot tea, mint leaves and sugar came out and our guide showed us how its mixed as we enjoyed some refreshing tea surrounded by lanterns and mirrors of all shapes along
the passageway, as we watched tourists and locals walk by.
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And that was it. It was time to get back to the hotel to rest up and pack to catch our flights out early at 2AM the next day. Ahmed was back with the driver around 10PM to take us to the airport and bid us goodbye as we ended what was an enlightening experience in Egypt as we got to experience a historic civilization that we had only read in books and seen on television so far.