Well, we've dreamed of this day so many times in our life, we wake up quite in disbelief that it's actually happening. Better than Christmas morning! It just may be the most EPIC of days of our entire 4 months. We rise early, meeting Mohamed for 9 am. We hop in the car and are driven a few blocks away to the camel tour store.
We are seated in front of the tour operator who explains our choices for the morning, small, medium and big tour via camel, and then our jaws drop at the minimum price he quotes. It is about 5 times what we've researched and been prepared to pay. We are truthfully stunned and Mohamed recognizes it. He nudges me and quietly whispers, "it is now that you can begin haggling". We are terrible at this part, always have been! 30 years ago in Morocco we discovered our weakness, we loved Italy because by law, every item has to have its price displayed, and there are no hidden costs allowed!
And so we begin. Through that invisible language of long-married couples, I open the negotiations at about 30% of his quoted price. I know it's low, but I'm trying to get to half! It is more money than we've spent on anything on this trip and it represents a massive dent into our budget, so I get pretty good, and am also prepared to walk, which always helps.
We manage to find the middle ground, negotiate eliminating even more of the small tour to reduce the price even further, we all seem to be happy, we are escorted to the nearby bank machine to get the cash and off we go to get on a camel!
We'll be out in the desert for about 2 hours, we meet our guide, who was a kind, kind young man, I'm sorry I forget his name, because all of these pictures were taken by him.
The smiles on our faces are indeed from ear to ear.
We started off so early in the morning, knowing the heat would rise quickly, that there was literally no one else in the desert. We will never forget the hot, hot wind, the silence, the comfortable sway of the camel's gait. It's easier than a horse! Getting off and on is a bit wicked, they are massive animals.
Our guide ends up taking us on the big tour any way, which reinforces my low starting point at bartering! We end up way out in the desert, on top of a low rise, the sand undulating and softly blowing all around us, the pyramids off in the distance. It was an unforgettable ride.
It was so perfect, approaching the 3 pyramids from afar, getting used to the idea of what exactly we were experiencing. We have seen so much beauty and achievement on this trip - art, history, landscape, people - but nothing, absolutely nothing compares to what we experienced on this day.
The Sphinx - massive. Pausing for a moment as our guide began to rush us. We were in awe, felt like our holy place, something Marc has dreamed about since he was a little boy. He had tears during part of this journey, as did I.
We reluctantly turn our camels towards the exit path, our guide broaches the topic of tips, and for the 2nd time in Cairo, Marc is told that what he's handed over is not enough! This part of Egypt really, really irks us.
We hop in the van, and head to our 2nd location of the day, the Step Pyramid of Saqqara. Built 3000 years ago, these 19 pyramids and rubble tombs were the burial grounds for the Kings of Memphis. You cannot get inside but Mohamed walks us around giving us a most excellent history lesson in this time period. It is still an active excavation site, as the scaffolding shows, but it's a Friday, Egypt's holy day and holiday, so there are no workers present.
Our third stop for the day is the town of Memphis, where we can see the massive, massive Ramses statue, currently housed in the protected zone of an open-air museum. You can see the scale of this statue, in the upper right photo, compared to Marc. The rest of the Museum was disappointing, dog day afternoon with them all asleep in the shade, exit through the gift shop! (Which most seemed to be closed)
Mohamed brings us to our final stop, lunch! where we watch a woman baking pita bread , we have never tasted bread so delicious as we have in Egypt. It sells for pennies, and is fresh, fresh, fresh, no matter where we've bought or eaten it. Our lunch is a multi-plate affair in an thatch-covered tourist cafeteria, the food is aplenty and delicious, we're all starving and parched, we hop back into the van, our driver has waited outside, Mohamed falls asleep on the way back, he's a dad to two young children and has been working hard with us! We're dropped off, empty our socks full of sand, have some cool drinks marvelling at our day, and fall into a happy, happy, happy slumber. We are still talking about this day 3 weeks later! Unreal.
Many, many times on this trip, we've been silenced by the beauty and achievement we've seen - art, history, landscape, people. Nothing, nothing compares to this morning. The Pyramids at Giza, Cairo.
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