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Week 20
Sinai Peninsula, Egypt
As we recover from our caffeine induced euphoria in Jordan, we begin to question our ambitious wisdom of detouring to Egypt as the scenery the first several days of our walking consists of this…
...and this
...and this
Alexandria, Egypt
We finally come across what is not a mirage but Alexandria, the second largest city in Egypt, known as "The Pearl of the Mediterranean". Founded by Alexander the Great in 331 BC, Alexandria became the center of culture for centuries, and it remained Egypt´s capital for nearly a thousand years.
In Alexandria, we check off seeing another on of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, the Alexandria lighthouse or Pharos. Constructed in the 3rd century BC and standing 387 feet high, the lighthouse was severely damaged by three earthquakes between 956 AD and 1323 and became an abandoned ruin. It was the third longest surviving ancient wonder (after the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus and the Great Pyramid of Giza), surviving in part until 1480. French archeologists found remnants of the lighthouse at the bottom of the sea in the 20 century.
As with most wonders of the ancient world, there is a "then"...
and a "now"...
For our book lovers, we discover the site of the largest library in the ancient world at one time housing up to 4000 scrolls. For celebrity gossip types, we visit where Cleopatra and Mark Antony used to hang out as Alexandria was their favorite party city.
We also learn that Alexandria was home to a populous Jewish colony and was a major center of Jewish learning. The translation of the Old Testament from Hebrew to Greek, the Septuagint, was produced in Alexandria.
Today, Alexandria has an atmosphere that is more Mediterranean than Middle Eastern. At the end of a long day of historical sight-seeing, we get a good night’s rest and then wake to feast on a breakfast of ful medames before heading south.
Ful medames is an ancient, pre-Ottoman and pre-Islamic national dish of Egypt, a traditional breakfast food consisting of slowly simmered fava beans seasoned with a squeeze of lemon juice, olive oil, garlic, and selected spices. Some remnants of the dish were found in the 12th Dynasty Pharaonic tombs in Egypt, and any food that has been found in an ancient tomb must have been a wildly popular culinary treat
Cairo, Egypt
From Alexandria, we head south to Cairo. Founded in 969 AD, Cairo (“victorious” in Arabic) is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world. Its metropolitan area, with a population of over 20 million, is the largest in Africa, the Arab world, and the Middle East, and the 6th-largest in the world.
We get to check of another of the Seven Ancient Wonders of World as we visit the Giza Pyramid Complex, also called the Giza Necropolis, in Greater Cairo. The site includes the Great Pyramid of Giza, the Pyramid of Khafre, and the Pyramid of Menkaure, along with their associated pyramid complexes and the Great Sphinx of Giza. All were built during the Fourth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom of Ancient Egypt in approximately 2600 BC. It is the only one of the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World which still exist today.
The pyramids of Giza and others are thought to have been constructed to house the remains of the deceased pharaohs who ruled over Ancient Egypt. The Great Pyramid of Giza stands 481 feet high, has length at its’ base of 756 feet, and it is estimated that it took over 400,000 men and 30 years to build.
The Great Sphinx of Giza is one of the most recognizable monuments in Giza measuring 240 feet long and 66 feet high. A sphinx (or sphynx) is a creature with the body of a lion and the head of a human, with some variations. It is a prominent mythological figure in Egyptian, Asian, and Greek mythology and, in ancient Egypt, the sphinx was a spiritual guardian likely built in Giza to protect the burial site of the pharaohs.
As we walk into the main city of Cairo, we take a quick tour e of the most important and lasting institutions founded in Cairo was the Mosque of al-Azhar, founded in 970 AD, which competes with the Qarawiyyin in Fes for the title of oldest university in the world.
We then wander into Old Cairo, so-named as it contains the remains of the ancient Roman fortress of Babylon and the predecessor of Cairo. The area includes the Coptic Cairo, which holds a high concentration of old Christian churches such as the Hanging Church, the Greek Orthodox Church of St. George, and other Christian or Coptic buildings, most of which are located over the site of the ancient Roman fortress.
We finish our time in Cairo at the Khan el-Khalili, an ancient bazaar adjacent to the Al-Hussein Mosque. It dates back to 1385 and in addition to shops, there are several coffeehouses restaurants, and street food vendors distributed throughout the market.
The coffeeshops are generally small and quite traditional, serving Arabic coffee. Still slightly wired from our Jordan experience, we choose to pass on the coffee, but do dig into a plentiful plate of kushari, Egypt's national dish and a widely popular street food.
An Egyptian dish that originated during the mid-19th century, the dish combines Italian, Indian and Middle Eastern culinary elements. kushari is made of rice, macaroni, and lentils mixed together, topped with a spiced tomato sauce and garlic vinegar and garnished with chickpeas and crispy fried onions.
While the desert did not always make it easy, we covered over 600 miles this week are just two weeks away from arriving at Bethlehem. Don't let up now and keep those miles coming!