Swedish Chef Dave: The Arrival in Cairo and Trip To Aswan

I have a buddy who has been in Cairo and Egypt in General for 18 months and he has written many things about the country but his descriptions of Cairo never really did it justice, it is the most horrifically busy overpopulated and nasty place i have been. It is full of trash and zero planning so there are quarries next to highways and houses next to highways with roaring traffic 24 hours a day, I couldn't live like that, I would be a suicide bomber within months. we arrived late after flying to Luxor first and to be honest if I had the option again I would miss out on the pyramids and the Cairo museum as it was good but the extra messing about wasn't worth it, so we got late to the hotel which was a nasty cheapo place right next to the roaring highway. I hardly slept for the constant noise and the AC was crap and the tv was missing but as it was 2am and I didn't care. The next morning we went down for our trip to the pyramids and the breakfast was OK but no Bacon of course, but always these beans fried beans either white or red, I never touched them once. I then found out that Jenny had booked a totally personal tour, we had our own vehicle and driver and guide for every day we were there, very luxurious but expensive all the same. We could see the pyramids from out hotel we were that close, I never realised they were in the suburbs of Cairo, what a pity. You arrive to them to find millions of hawkers selling shite like plastic sphinxes and plastic pyramids. expensive water and anything else you could imagine. The pyramids are huge and look in a bad state of decay, not bad for 4500 years old. The guides were OK but they only knew what they had read, he didn't know that all the outer limestone casing had been used by the recent builders to make there houses, like the last 2000 years, all the big blocks remained as they were too big to use. Again the tomb robbers had stolen everything, we took lots of pictures and then we were told we were going to the papyrus museum, it was a lie it was a shope to sell us expensive copy's of hieroglyphics. we bought a few and then we ended up in a perfume shop on the tour, the guide must have been getting commission as always on these type of tours. We bought some great selling oils, but must have been a total rip-off again, then a nice meal at a fancy restaurant which was miles out of our way for the train journey over night to the Aswan station probably another commission paid meal, we finally went to the cairo museum, it was just crowded solid and this was the low season, it was full of the remains of the tombs and temples as the good stuff is in London and Paris and Turin and New York, the guide did a resonable tour but was complaining about it being hot and how tired he was, he was full of shit. The museum would be nothing without the Tutenkarmoun Treasure, it takes centre place in the museum and it just magnificant, it is breathtaking with its comlexity and beauty, the gold head covering which weighs 11 Kgs is just amazing. If that was in the London Museum then this place wouldn't be worth visiting. There was another small tomb found, the wife of the great Pyramid builder, a few things were found, her bed and some jewellry, it was all very nice but was nothing compared to Tutenkarmoun, it makes you think about what treasures were stolen from all the tombs.

I was looking forward to the train ride, I like trains. The station was full of two types of people, desperately poor going home after a day of toil for low pay and rich folks who were catching the overnight sleeper which costs more than a months salary for normal egyptians. The poor folks looked dangerous, some crazy even and they were filthy and stinking, our train arrived and was nice and clean and the cabins were OK, the food again was not bad for airline type meals and train moved along OK, I was happy to go for a beer in the bar which the train had. we slept bad as you can imagine but we arrived on time and to the most incredible heatwave of 47 C, it was roasting me ears off out of the sun. the hottest I have ever experienced. off to our first hotel, a marvellous luxurious place on the hill overlooking the Nile, I felt like a king.

The Pyramids of Giza