Excited to go and see them but not excited to walk all around, feeling sore and tired still from yesterday.
Everyone seems to have a friend that works here or there or does this or that so after a few calls our friends found someone that works at the pyramids. Its about an hours drive there from our hotel and we stopped to pick up the young man that worked there on the way. Its 60 Egyptian pounds to get in but you would have to walk around all of it and its up hill and very hot. There are a few options to remedy this-you can book a tour on an air conditioned bus usually right from your hotel, but they can't stop in front of the pyramids you still have to walk alot. We opted for the horse drawn carriage ride, it holds 2 ppl plus the driver, so we needed 2 carriages. This was about 240 EGP (40 usd pp) for ea person in the carriage, you can negotiate some and we did get a better price than the original quote.It does feel like everyone is out to rip you off at least when you go to disney world you know its a rip off but the price is set. Negotiate, be firm and walk away if you can't agree, more than likely they will run after you with a better offer if not there is 10 others waiting for your business. There weren't many outsiders there, looked like a lot of local ppl.
The driver of the carriage motioned for us to get off so I did and was promptly handed over to a man with a camel. I thought this was included in the tour and since he handed me over to him I went willingly. The camel guy had a turban and crop in my hand before I could even ask anything and up I went on the camel. We took a few pics and when I got down the guy demanded more than 300 EGP LOL for sitting on your camel? Rayan glared at me for even getting on it but I shrugged my shoulders as I thought it was part of the tour and eventually they agreed upon about half that. There were also many kids following us trying to sell their trinkets which were priced only 20 EGP for most small things, but I won't be home for a long time and I have no where to store stuff and no where to ship it to so I passed. Just say chokran la which means thank you no.
The tour guide/carriage driver did speak english and he did give a nice narrative of each pyramid. There are about 97 in Egypt but this of course with the Sphinx is one of the most popular. The tour takes abt 1 hour and I was glad to be done with it. Our guide asked us for a tip and then lead us over to stores where I am sure they get a commission for bringing tourist to them. I got angry and refused to go up to the lame papyrus museum located about a perfumery. The perfume guy kept trying to get me to sample his wares and I finally said I am allergic, I was waiting for the rest of the party to return from the paper museum. The "friend" of our friends wanted to take us into more spots and stay for the night time laser show, which is about 15 more EGP and 4 more hours waiting around for it to start so I said I needed to go back to the hotel. I was still feeling achy and sore and tired from yesterday and I wanted air conditioning and a nap.
I got my nap and was sniffling and sneezing when I woke up and didn't feel like going shopping even. If you know me you know I will do almost anything to go shopping so I must not be feeling well. I ordered some soup from room service and I asked Rayan to go shopping in my place and do me proud. Rayan obliged, he was probably happy to get out of my presence because in addition to not feeling well I was cranky, irritable and whiny.
Rayan returned several hours later and said I indeed missed a great shopping/eating/ppl watching expedition. He went to an open market really streets and streets lined with vendors for several miles. He was able to find some inexpensive colored contacts for my daughter, less than 2 dollars a pack and it came with solution and a lens holder. I was excited because they are 30 bucks in the US and these were "fresh look" made in Germany. He was even a sweety and brought me a pair but I try as I might I could not get those things in my eyes, so he tired the one on that I didn't use. Dang they change even the darkest brown into a cool color, he used gray and it gave him an eerie wolf like appearance (see pic).
Sadly the Cairo HRC is no longer in business either.
I wanted to go to the hard rock cafe in cairo but it had closed about 6 months ago and there was one in sharm or hurghada but it was a 5 hour bus ride ea way.We also wanted to go to alexandria but I was definitely coming down with something and didn't feel like doing any of it. I also didn't feel up to the 15 hour ferry/bus ride home so I suggested we fly back. I tried to validate the cost saying it would be a good evaluation of the other travel options since we came bus ferry/bus.
All in all I didn't like Cairo but they were recovering from a revolution and it could have been much worse. It was very dirty but they said the garbage guys had not resumed working since the revolution. I am now able to cross this country off my list but would like to eventually go to the other places I mentioned.
Everyone seems to have a friend that works here or there or does this or that so after a few calls our friends found someone that works at the pyramids. Its about an hours drive there from our hotel and we stopped to pick up the young man that worked there on the way. Its 60 Egyptian pounds to get in but you would have to walk around all of it and its up hill and very hot. There are a few options to remedy this-you can book a tour on an air conditioned bus usually right from your hotel, but they can't stop in front of the pyramids you still have to walk alot. We opted for the horse drawn carriage ride, it holds 2 ppl plus the driver, so we needed 2 carriages. This was about 240 EGP (40 usd pp) for ea person in the carriage, you can negotiate some and we did get a better price than the original quote.It does feel like everyone is out to rip you off at least when you go to disney world you know its a rip off but the price is set. Negotiate, be firm and walk away if you can't agree, more than likely they will run after you with a better offer if not there is 10 others waiting for your business. There weren't many outsiders there, looked like a lot of local ppl.
The driver of the carriage motioned for us to get off so I did and was promptly handed over to a man with a camel. I thought this was included in the tour and since he handed me over to him I went willingly. The camel guy had a turban and crop in my hand before I could even ask anything and up I went on the camel. We took a few pics and when I got down the guy demanded more than 300 EGP LOL for sitting on your camel? Rayan glared at me for even getting on it but I shrugged my shoulders as I thought it was part of the tour and eventually they agreed upon about half that. There were also many kids following us trying to sell their trinkets which were priced only 20 EGP for most small things, but I won't be home for a long time and I have no where to store stuff and no where to ship it to so I passed. Just say chokran la which means thank you no.
The tour guide/carriage driver did speak english and he did give a nice narrative of each pyramid. There are about 97 in Egypt but this of course with the Sphinx is one of the most popular. The tour takes abt 1 hour and I was glad to be done with it. Our guide asked us for a tip and then lead us over to stores where I am sure they get a commission for bringing tourist to them. I got angry and refused to go up to the lame papyrus museum located about a perfumery. The perfume guy kept trying to get me to sample his wares and I finally said I am allergic, I was waiting for the rest of the party to return from the paper museum. The "friend" of our friends wanted to take us into more spots and stay for the night time laser show, which is about 15 more EGP and 4 more hours waiting around for it to start so I said I needed to go back to the hotel. I was still feeling achy and sore and tired from yesterday and I wanted air conditioning and a nap.
I got my nap and was sniffling and sneezing when I woke up and didn't feel like going shopping even. If you know me you know I will do almost anything to go shopping so I must not be feeling well. I ordered some soup from room service and I asked Rayan to go shopping in my place and do me proud. Rayan obliged, he was probably happy to get out of my presence because in addition to not feeling well I was cranky, irritable and whiny.
Rayan returned several hours later and said I indeed missed a great shopping/eating/ppl watching expedition. He went to an open market really streets and streets lined with vendors for several miles. He was able to find some inexpensive colored contacts for my daughter, less than 2 dollars a pack and it came with solution and a lens holder. I was excited because they are 30 bucks in the US and these were "fresh look" made in Germany. He was even a sweety and brought me a pair but I try as I might I could not get those things in my eyes, so he tired the one on that I didn't use. Dang they change even the darkest brown into a cool color, he used gray and it gave him an eerie wolf like appearance (see pic).
Sadly the Cairo HRC is no longer in business either.
All in all I didn't like Cairo but they were recovering from a revolution and it could have been much worse. It was very dirty but they said the garbage guys had not resumed working since the revolution. I am now able to cross this country off my list but would like to eventually go to the other places I mentioned.
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