What a wonderful and unique experience. We were able to visit, touch, and climb on pyramids that were over 4,500 years old!
Please watch this video it shows a little clip of our time in Egypt.
The first night when we arrived our driver took us to the grocery store. We walked around the store choosing items and filling our carts. Grocery items were about a third of the price, to what they cost in American. In Egypt they use Egyptian Pounds and 100 Egyptian pounds equal about 33 cents. So you can imagine our $100 of groceries were over 3,300 Egyptian pounds. I took a picture of the check out screen, because it seemed so crazy to see such a large number.
When we took our groceries out to our vehicle, there was a mother with a baby asking for money, I gave her some and then a little girl came up selling beads trinkets so we bought one and then another mother and baby came up needing money, soon we had all sorts of people around us and our driver had to hold back the crowd so we could get in. I felt so overwhelmed with what we have compared to so many people in Egypt.
The man who we rented our apartment from arranged drivers for us each day. This was very helpful. The drivers in Egypt are AWESOME! I don’t know how else to describe them. Half of the time there aren’t lane lines painted on the road, and even when there are painted lines no one uses them. It is chaotic, horn beeping, people darting in and out of traffic, motorcycles with ladies sitting side saddle on the back or men with three people to a motorcycle darting in and out of buses and cars. There are also donkeys pulling carts and trucks loaded high with items (we actually saw one truck tipped over from it’s extremely tall load).
The Great Pyramids of Giza
We went to The Great Pyramids of Giza. They were magnificent. The largest one had a tunnel you can walk through and go into the tomb. Of course, all of the ancient artifacts have already been removed and are in the Cairo Museum. But it was really a neat, scary, very hot and a bit claustrophobic experience, going into the tomb. We were grateful to get back out of the pyramid and I also found it exciting that we were allowed to climb and sit on the pyramid.
The kids all enjoyed buying and wearing Egyptian scarfs on their heads and the people selling the scarfs enjoyed teaching us how to properly fold and tuck the scarf on their heads.
I found it so sad that one set of pyramids, one large and three small, were for the pharaoh and his three wives, who after his death were put to death too.
Riding Camels
Riding camels was as my son said, Epic! We each rode a camel for only $20 each and we were on them for about 30 minutes. Camels are such incredible animals. The ones we rode were very calm and gentle. They let us pet their heads and walked with their long legs so gracefully. We loved the pictures of us on camels in the desert with the Great Pyramids of Giza behind us.
Church on Friday in Egypt
We attended church on Friday in Egypt. We learned that in Muslim Countries the weekend is Friday and Saturday, with Muslim’s Holy Day being on Friday. On Sunday in Egypt the children go to school and adults to work. So you can see how Sunday church would be hard for people to attend.
The Branch we went to was wonderful. It was an English speaking’s branch. I was able to talk with about eight different ladies who told me their story of how they came to live in Egypt. Two of them were nanny/housekeepers, two were English teachers, one married and Egyptian man and she taught elementary in an English school. Another lady was married to a man who taught history remotely from historical sites. All the ladies who had families homeschooled their children and most traveled around and were in Egypt for a couple years and about 3/4 of them spoke Egyptian Arabic. I found all of this very interesting.
Cairo Museum
We also went to the Cairo Museum and saw so many beautiful items brought out of the Pyramids. We saw King Tut’s exhibit and many mummies.
Saqqara Pyramids
We drove about and hour and a half to the Djoser Pyramid, or Step Pyramid. Here we were able to go inside some tombs and see many dig sites and more than 12 Pyramids, some close and some off in the distance. We also saw hieroglyphics that still had some of their color. I hope you watch my video above where you can see this area a bit more.
In Conclusion
In Egypt the tap water is not drinkable, so we drank bottled water. Half of us also got sick from something we ate and spent time in the bathroom because of it.
We had a great time in Egypt, but I think we were all looking forward to being back in the England countryside.
*As a side note…it took some of us about 4 or 5 days in England for our stomaches to feel 100% again after Egypt.
Loved seeing you all on those camels, so exciting. The tombs walking through was a bit scary l thought but what an experience. The museum was unbelievably impressive. What a wonderful time ❤️