Road Trip!

A handful of Cairo's most impressive ancient sights lie a few kilometers outside the city's borders. We decided to hirs a van, blast some of our favorite tunes with the windows down, and pick up all of our friends for a wild Egyptian sightseeing time.




Well, not really - but we did have a van, an Egyptologist guide, and a driver. And it wasn't wild, but it was delightfully educational.


On our exursion, we laid waste to the ancient sites of Dashur, Memphis, Giza, and Saqqara - and by "laid waste," I mean we politely paid entry fees and asked lots of difficult questions.


All of the structures and statues we saw were dated 2750-2540 BC - among the impressive sights:

• The first pyramid (60m tall) at Saqqara composed of six stacked "steps"
• The "bent" pyramid (above, 105m tall) at Dashur, which still has some of its smooth casing. Its angle was altered from 54 degrees to 49 degrees mid-construction due to initial [mis]calculations.
• The "great" pyramid (146m tall)
• The sphinx, whose nose is missing due to either Napoleanic target practice or some malicous Turk
• The best falafils we've had, for less than $0.25. Worth the airfare alone.
• The world's oldest stone-brick building at Saqqara

We concluded our sightseeing with the evening "Sound and Light" show at Giza, a laser and projection show that explains the history and mystery of the pyramids and the sphinx. While it did bear some educational value, the projected face and pompous British accent of the sphinx (our narrator) cheapened the site's mystical ambiance. You can imagine.

We waste no daylight - we spent the night in a sleeper train to Aswan where our Nile felucca (sailboat) departs!