A journey to the Land of the Pharaohs

Cairo, Egypt.

Jul 11, 20173 min read

I was living in Tel Aviv, Israel when my family and I decided to take a trip to Egypt. we wanted to make it more adventurous than just a simple vacation so we decided to make it a road trip.

My father drove us for 6 hours within Israel and then we had hired someone to drive us from the border of Egypt to Cairo.

At the start of our journey through Israel we travelled through the beautiful rocky desert, Negev (Hebrew: הַנֶּגֶב).

We also made a visit to the Ramon Crater which is the world’s largest erosion crater, or makhtesh. A landform unique to Israel’s Negev and Egypt’s Sinai deserts’, a makhtesh is a large erosion cirque, created 220 million years ago when oceans covered the area (the word crater is therefore a misleading translation of Hebrew to English). The Ramon Crater shaped like a long heart, and forms Israel’s largest national park, the Ramon Nature Reserve.

After crossing the Negev, we made our way through to the southern-most tip of Israel and northern tip of the Red Sea, the city of Eilat (Hebrew: אֵילַת). A resort city where all the activities devoted to sun, fun, diving, partying and desert take place.

Once we got to the border of Egypt and Israel, we traveled by road through a completely bone-dry Sinai desert . Although it seemed quite monotonous, it was an experience of a life time. There were as expected beautiful mirages as you can see in the picture below.

We also crossed from under the famous Suez canal, an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez.

Thereon, we made our way to Cairo, the capital and largest city of Egypt. Being a big fan of ancient history, I had always been a great admirer of Egypt be it because of the pharaohs, the pyramids, the stories/myths, their historical language Hieroglyphics, and so much more.

In Cairo, we first went to see the Pyramids of Giza. The pyramids were exactly how I had imagined them to be, sublime and colossal. Their construction amazed me, compelled me to wonder how much efforts must have been put to build them in that era without the people having access to today's technology.

We saw The Great Pyramid of Giza, the oldest and largest of the three pyramids. It is also the only ancient world wonder that still exists.

After the pyramids, we went on to see the Sphinx.

We spent one of our nights on a beautiful dinner cruise in the Nile river, the longest river in the world. We had a beautiful view of the lit up buildings' reflections on the river outside. Right before dinner we had live dance performances for our entertainment inside the cruise like Egyptian belly dancing and Tanoura, an Egyptian folk dance which involves the dancer to constantly change clothes while taking rounds at the same place. It was simply breathtaking!

One of the other days we visited the The Egyptian Museum of Antiquities where I was in complete awe upon seeing the three gold coffins of King Tutankhamen, which I had been waiting to see since forever. The grandeur in his death was unbelievable.

Not only was it a vacation for me but also very educational, seeing all the artefacts supporting facts of history right in front of my eyes.

Rest of the trip included exploring the local bazaar where I bought a belly dancing dress, visit to the blown glass factory, traditional perfumeries, Mosque, etc.