First day in Cairo

 Wednesday, February 4, 2026

First day in Cairo

 The trip to Cairo was uneventful!  How’s that for travel these days.  On Monday afternoon we drove to Toronto where we stayed overnight.  The Egyptair flight nonstop to Cairo left at noon on Tuesday, and we arrived at 11:30 PM Rochester time which was 6:30 AM Egypt time.  Neither Kathy nor I slept at all on the flight, so after getting to our hotel, we took a nap from 9:00 to 1:00 PM. 

 Our hotel is right on the Nile, on the Giza side; the other side is Cairo itself, although both are part of greater Cairo.  Here is a view from our hotel room: 

There are 25,000,000 people in Cairo alone, of whom 4,000,000 are refugees, mostly from Sudan.  The traffic is horrendous, the morning sky was dim with smog, and it is noisy.  By afternoon, however, the skies cleared and there was brilliant sunshine with a temperature of 70 degrees and no humidity. 

 We went for a walk from our hotel.  The concierge told us we needed a car to get us to the restaurant we chose for dinner, which was literally across the street.  He said there are no traffic lights, the traffic does not stop for pedestrians and we should go by car.  We walked down to the road and this is what we dealt with:

 

We crossed, and walked up to the nearby bridge.  As we approached, we could see chairs along the railing which we naively thought were there for people to rest and look, sort of like park benches.  

But no, the chairs were part of a lemonade café.  The lemonade came from this proprietor: 

We did not indulge.  On the Cairo side of the bridge was a very large mosque which we did not visit, as we couldn’t cross that street.  


We walked back to the hotel, and then across the street again for a 4:30 dinner.  It’s  6:30 PM now and we’ll go to bed early.  We meet our group in the morning.  More when I can.

Comments

  1. Ralph P. LockeFebruary 4, 2026 at 11:58 AM

    Startling! Crossing the street becomes a major challenge....! I remember heavy traffic in, say, Madrid, but not moving so fast and, I assume, heedlessly. Take caution, follow advice.....!

    ReplyDelete

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