Egypt 2025 Post 7 - Last day and final thoughts.

Our last day, and we had opted to be guideless! A nice breakfast, suitcases to reception, and now to try out Uber in Egypt. As in every other country I've used it in, it worked perfectly. Five minutes later we are in a Comfort Uber being driven by a charming man who explains he is a pharmacist and this is his second job to make ends meet. His children go to private school which he must pay for. 'Ah' you might think, 'There is his problem', until he explains that free Government schools are often a very poor standard with up to 100 children in each class and high illiteracy rates. What would you want for your child? Although the private schools can still have 40 - 50! Most health care must also be paid for, and social care is very restricted.

Cairo and London have a very similar footprint area, but London has 8 million people and Cairo 22 million, because many here live in poor quality apartment blocks, and many refugees live wherever they can find. Yet an 8 mile, 25 minute taxi ride costs us just £3, so not much profit for the driver unless we tip well.

We had come back to Giza, and, with the Pyramids in front of us we headed for the huge, much hyped, brand new GEM museum.

The Grand Egytian Museum has taken over 20 years to complete - official opening July 2025 - and has cost over One Billion dollars to create. We were excited to visit.

It's architecture is astounding, and the entrance hall makes a powerful impression.

We knew that it's biggest attraction will be a new Tutankamun exhibition, which is not open yet, but even so, our admission ticket was 3 times the price of any other museum we had visited at almost £20pp. We had high expectations which, I am sorry to say, were deflated quite quickly. The grand staircase up to the galleries is lined with iconic statues and stelae.

But the lighting is awful, with bad glare coming from the picture window at the top.

There is one small balcony at the base of each item, so people huddle round to read it... and all this on highly polished, slippery and narrow rose granite steps with no edge markers... at least put one label each side! Accidents waiting to happen!

At the top there is a good view of the 2 main pyramids, and then we go into the 12 big galleries.

Again they have some superb items - statues, mummies, stelae and pottery but the labelling was really poor in many places. Some items were not named or described, and in other cases there was a description but the item was either right at the other end of the case, or we couldn't find it at all! This is a brand new museum for goodness sake!

There were some wonderful objects though.

And some beautiful jewellery

and these funerary items.... canoptic jars, and offering plates and houses.

These coffins were incredible, each with eyes of horus level with the mummies head, so they see their way to the afterlife.

And the mummy cases were gorgeously decorated.

In our humble opinion it needed far more social and cultural relics like these, and lifestyle information to accompany them, to supplement the many, many statues and parts of statues. And pots. And parts of pots!! One exhibit was lovely, but very difficult to photograph! A small room representing a tomb. Starting with bare walls, projections appeared, firstly with line drawings, then carving and colour infilling until the scenes were complete, and some of the figures became charmingly animated.

These ancient funerary and cargo boat models were exquisite too.

Once the Tutankamun hoarde is moved here, it will be a huge tourist destination, but our words on leaving were 'underwhelmed' and 'disappointed'. We had some time left before our airport transfer, so we took another Uber, through some of the worst driving we witnessed all week, (and that is quite a title to win!) back to the Old Cairo Museum. I had one last quest. Another photo taken by my father was of a huge statue and John had told us it was in this museum. As we walked around, the museum was dusty and had empty cases just left in full view.

However, in less than an hour here, we found more treasures that captured our interest than we had in the brand new GEM, like this 2000 year old bread, in similar shapes to that being sold on bread stalls outside.

A 4,000 year old model of a whole family working together on all the processes of bread making; a 2 tier bread carrier, and this beautiful necklace; the gold skeleton frame of a King's coffin waiting to be inlaid with precious stones, and a rather unusual baboon on a scooter!

A beautiful statue

and a rather unusual statue.

Scholars are divided but many think this is possibly the only known full statue of Queen Nefertiti. The only other 3D representation of her is a bust in a museum in Berlin.

This painted plaster floor, and delightful plaster panels are from a Pharoahs palace in Amarna.

This is what the floor would look like if restored!

Then we found dad's huge, 3,400 year old statue of King Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye exactly where he left it 97 years ago.

As I looked at his photo I saw a figure standing next to it. I had never noticed this before and I got goosebumps!

It was either my dad himself or his friend. So, I took a photo from the same spot dad would have been in, and then Penny took one of me next to the statue, so I was standing in his footsteps in one of them.

Definitely Mission accomplished! Thanks dad! Next time I will come back with my daughter!

Now a final Uber back to the Hotel and our transfer to the airport. This wall art commemorated October 6th 1973 when the Egytians crossed the Nile and pushed the Israeli army back from Sinai in a clever surprise attack. It was a short lived gain, and led to the Yom Kippur War, and the Camp David Peace agreement when Egypt got its land back. There are roads, a bridge and even a city called October 6th. A reminder that Egypt's neighbours are Libya, Sudan, Saudi Arabia and Israel, so treading a careful democratic path is essential, although it seems to have the potential for some dangerous liaisons.

Despite heavy traffic, we made it and had a smooth check in. We had been offered the chance to upgrade to Business class for £50 each, so we headed for the lounge to reflect on our adventure.

We both agreed it had been fantastic and had greatly exceeded our expectations. We also agreed that our tour company Journey to Egypt, our guides Mayer and John, and all the drivers were excellent.

Neither of us could really pick a best moment as every single place we visited had a wow factor. The Pyramids are astonishing up close, no matter how many documentaries you have seen. Going into Teti's tomb on day one was very special, as was walking through Islamic Cairo, cruising down the biblical Nile and eating the delicious food.

We had to constantly remind ourselves how old everything was because it often showed a very unexpected level of precision, engineering, sophistication and detail for its age. What surprised us? Security... our guides and drivers had to notify our route in advance, and we were checked off at many checkpoints. Apparently this was for our safety?? There were heavily armed police and soldiers in many places, but, having said that, it was low key, and we did feel very safe. In Giza, they even have Camel Police! Spot the gun In the checkpoint! And how is this for a Police car!

I forgot to mention that it is garlic season so these are scenes everywhere.

The tower at the front is a pigeon tower. Many rural homes have one. They are similar to our dovecote, but the purpose is to breed pigeons which they eat as squabs (young) before they fly, so they are unpolluted!

We also discovered that the Ancient Egyptians were far more ahead of their times than the archeologists realise.. from the temple engravings we discovered that they had bicycles and CDs, and Karaoke was a big thing if this microphone is anything to go by!

We learned never to be driving between 5.30 and 6.00pm in Ramadan as everyone is driving as fast as they can to get home for Iftar, to break their fast. It was 6.00pm while we were on the Felucca, and in a lovely moment, Mohammed and our Captain broke their fast in the traditional way by eating dates, which they shared with us.

Another incredible moment was on our first night in Cairo. A huge football match was being shown on the TV. It was the pre kick off chat, and the staff told us it was the local team Zamalek playing the other top Cairo team Al Ahly, they likened it to a Liverpool vs Everton derby! There were over 50,000 in the stadium. At that point we finished dinner and left! Next day we found out, that due to corruption with referees, and match fixing, the clubs had a prematch deal that they wanted foreign referees. No-one had been found in the short timescale, so Al Ahly refused to play! Zamalek said they would play and were awarded a 3-0 win without a ball being kicked. Al Ahly were also fined! Not sure what happened about the ticket holders!

All these things help sum up this crazy, dusty, friendly, financially poor but culturally so rich country that has a single line back through history like no other we have ever been to.

Add in the emotional side for me of reconnecting with my dad and finally bringing his photos to life, and this was truly a wonderful adventure. Did we really go up in a hot air balloon?!

Yes we did!!

Thank you to our husbands for being happy for us to go adventuring again, and a huge thank you to Penny for putting up with me, for all the giggles and for being a great travelling companion. We ❤️ Egypt.