David in North Africa
From London Airport, I flew via Madrid to Casablanca in Morocco. There was a good Airport Train service there from the airport into town. I had booked a hotel at the town end of this service -- I had a nice room, with a large balcony which overlooked the train station tracks.
Hotel in Casablanca
I had been commissioned to find a nice necklace for daughter-in-law Sarah in Casablanca. From my hotel, a good tram service went first to the Medina (old walled city, now full of winding alleys and shops), and then further on to the beach.
Casablanca tram map
The first thing I noticed at the Medina was a shop selling second-hand false teeth.
Spare false teeth
Then, close by, was a little silversmith who had two attractive necklaces. First was a more modern design with marcasites, suitable for Sarah. Also he had a more traditional design with tiny pineapples hanging from the chain. This seemed right for Ros.
Ros with pineapple necklace
After the Medina, I took the tram on to the beach. Casablanca is on the Atlantic coast of Africa, with the ocean to the west.
Casablanca tram
The beach was a bit busy -- kids in bathers, their mothers with feet in the water but still wrapped up in traditional Muslim garb. Riding along the beach was a man on a horse.
Casablanca beach
Horse on beach
The next day, I flew on to Cairo. Some of the passengers from Casablanca to Cairo were women with full face veils. The check-in staff at the EgyptAir counter were women -- they were able to ask these women to lift their veils at the counter for the identity check.
Waiting to board the plane in the departure lounge, I noticed one younger man asking for help from an older man. The older man oriented the younger one towards Mecca, so he could kneel and pray. Many hotel rooms in the Arab world have an arrow on the ceiling for this.
In Cairo I was booked into the City Hotel, a small private hotel on the seventh floor of a building in the city centre. From a balcony I could see Tahrir Square, the centre of protests in the recent Egyptian regime change.
From the hotel Tahrir Square was visible
With the hotel manager, I arranged two trips with private cars. The first, taking up most of the next day, was a drive to Suez at the head of the Red Sea, about 180 km from Cairo. Suez is where the Suez Canal starts on its way north to the Mediterranean.
Everywhere in Egypt I saw massive apartment buildings, unfinished or only recently completed, mostly occupied. My driver told me that they were begun at the time of the recent revolution, when the government was shaky or absent. New official building controls have called a halt to these projects.
The road to Suez was under construction or rerouting almost everywhere. It was flanked either by desert or by new apartment buildings. Drivers took their own routes any way around construction work, making their own roads throgh the desert as they went.
On the road to Suez
Arriving at the town of Suez, we came first to the harbour, a commercial port at the head of the Red Sea.
Suez harbour and the Red Sea
After the harbour, the driver was able to take me a strongly-fenced place where I could see the current Suez Canal, with large ships disappearing into the distance. This was a security zone, and photography was not permitted. From there we went to a section where an old part of the Canal had been set aside for local pleasure craft -- the current commercial canal was just beyond the distant bank.
Old Suez Canal
From Suez we returned to Cairo. The hotel manager had arranged a private car trip to the Pyramids for me the next day, after which I would be left at the Airport for my trip home. On the way to the Pyramids, we were able to see sights on the Nile.
From hotel, looking across square to Nile
The Nile in Cairo
David on Nile Bridge
The famous Great Pyramids which everyone knows about are in Giza. Giza is officially a separate municipality from Cairo, Giza is on the west bank of the Nile, Cairo proper is on the east. All are within what we think of as the city of Cairo -- you can travel close to the Pyramids by Metro.
At the Giza Pyramids
At the main Pyramids site, I arranged a tour by buggy. Tourists are still pretty scarce in Egypt, and local tourism operators are rather despondent and very keen.
The Sphinx and I
The Pyramids site is on an elevated area on the west of the Giza suburbs. Beyond it is only desert. Only the watered Nile valley itself is populated in the ordinary sense.
All together
Beyond the Pyramids
After the main Pyramids site, the driver took me to another area about 10 km further south, where there is a considerably older type of pyramid called a "Step Pyramid". There was also a quite well preserved building there, with many columns, which I was told had been used by the priests serving the step pyramid.
More ancient step pyramid
At the end of the afternoon, the driver took me out to the new Cairo Airport to catch the plane for my trip home. Waiting there to greet me effusively was our cat Ellie.
Welcome home from Ellie
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Last update 2015 Dec 24
