Having survived our longest flight segments of our trip (4 hours from Auckland to Melbourne, 14 hours to Abu Dhabi, 4 hour to Cairo), we arrived into a completely different part of our trip. In the 2020 version of our trip, we were planning on meeting my parents and a number of couples from our church on a tour of Israel. All those plans got scrambled and we had to look for a new way of exploring this area.
We recognized that though it might be possible to do some of this on your own, this is an area where a local guide can really make a difference. I had been to Israel a long time ago as part of an archeological dig with the family of my best friend from high school. They had been to Israel many years in a row and knew the area really well, so I reached out to them for recommendations on a local tour guide which they gave us. We were initially looking at doing just Israel and Jordan, but this agency also offered a package that included Egypt, following the way of the Israelites. Annika really wanted to see the pyramids and was disappointed that it didn’t fit in the 2020 plans, but we felt we could make it work in the 2023 version! We were also excited that one of the couples from our church that would have joined us in 2020 agreed to join us this time so it made it even more special to share this experience with friends from home. These three countries ended up being the most expensive part of our trip, but it was worth it.
We soon learned what “guided” meant on our arrival in Egypt where someone with our name was waiting before immigration in order to ensure we got into the country properly. Having done this all by ourselves many times before it was a little unnerving to just hand our passports off to someone and then him asking for our phones – we were unsure what was going on. Turns out he wanted to take our picture here in the airport before immigration.
Giza
We arrived in the afternoon and our friends arrived later that night. The next morning we set off to our first stop, the pyramids of Giza.
The Great Pyramid (Pyramid of Khufu). There is a reason they are called great; man they are tall.
Annika doing a perspective shot of the Great Pyramid and Pyramid of Khafre (the second tallest) on the right which still has the facing rock on the top.
Our guide asking us to “walk like an Egyptian” at the overview of all three of the larger pyramids where he told us what that really means: receiving blessings from those that are higher than you (God) so that you can give blessings to those that are lower than you.
The Sphinx is in that area as well and was pretty cool to see.
Memphis
We also travelled to the ruins of Memphis and learned a bit more about Egyptian history. There was a massive statue of Ramses II.
On the way from Giza to Memphis we stopped at a few shops and demonstrations that were important to Egypt: cotton, fragrances, and papyrus. The papyrus demo was the most interesting with the following steps: cutting strips from the reed, pounding it flat, soaking it, weaving it, and lastly pressing it (for quite a while). Out of that process you get a piece of papyrus.
Also on the way to Memphis we saw lots of poorer neighbourhoods and trash. We were a bit surprised at how much of Cairo reminded us of Latin America.
We ended the evening at our hotel which had an overview of the pyramids from the roof terrace.
Cairo to Sinai
On our way out of town, we stopped at two Coptic churches where we got our first taste of churches in this area. These churches were built over locations where it was believed Joseph, Mary, and Jesus were at when they lived in Egypt after fleeing Herod. One was at a well where they might have gotten water, and one was over an old cave that could have been their dwelling. This is repeated in many locations in that it is equally likely these events could have happened somewhere else, but early Christians built a church there so it is the best guess.
On our way out, we asked if we could stop for a picture of the Nile and we were granted permission. For such a historical and geographically significant river, it wasn’t the best looking river we have seen.
Unfortunately we weren’t able to stop at the Suez canal, in part because we took the tunnel under it. This is the best shot I got from a moving van and I was to late to capture the top of a ship going by.
If you thought the comment above about asking permission to visit the Nile river was a bit odd, then you are correct, it was a bit odd. That morning our guide told us that we had an addition to our group: an armed tourism officer joined (and our guide had checked with him whether it was okay for us to stop on the bridge of the Nile). He slept half the way, but he did get us through all the police check points. At some checkpoints we had to wait for other buses and/or tourism vans and we drove with police escorts in front and in back of the convoy. The larger buses had multiple officers. That was a first experience for us and a bit unnerving.
A lot of nothing along the way. Kind of gives you a different perspective about the Israelites complaining about water and food.
Mount Sinai
We knew from the itinerary that we had an early morning departure to get to Mount Sinai for the sunrise. However, what we didn’t know is that “early morning” was defined as a 1am wake up call with a 1:30am departure. We had to get up, drive to the entrance, check in, and then climb all the way to the top before the 5:28am sunrise.
At the check-in gate at 2:15am ready to go with the base of the mountains lit up with spot lights.
They had numerous rest stations along the way.
We arrived just after 5am as dusk was breaking. It was a glorious sunrise, stunning surroundings and a highlight of this part of the trip.
Seeing the shadow of Mount Sinai on the next mountain and looking down the way we came up.
There was both a small church and a small mosque at the very top.
There was also a very small cave where it is historically believed Moses stayed in while he was on the Mount receiving the Ten Commandments.
After a while we had to go back down. Now that the sun was up we could see a lot more!
Lots of different rock hues, from yellow to pink to brown.
As we went, we could see how far and how steep at times the path was and we determined that maybe it was a good thing we hiked up in the dark and you couldn’t get a good sense of how far you needed to go. If we could see from the beginning that we had to go where Julia was pointing, we might have had second thoughts. In the end, it was a wonderful and blessed experience.
St. Catherine Monastery
There is a phrase associated with physical locations of the Bible that goes “if not here, then near here” meaning that often we don’t know for sure that this is where things happened (and even sometimes have a skeptical take of it), but even if it isn’t the exact location, it is near. Most of these sites were identified once Rome accepted Christianity (381 AD) and some people accept the sites because a church or monastery was built there 1,500 to 1,600 years earlier to the events than us, but they were often still 400-500 years after the events!
That being said, this monastery is still interesting in that it was built at the base of Mount Sinai in the mid-500s and has been an active monastery ever since, making it the longest running monastery in the world. It was originally built at the supposed location of the burning bush of Moses. However, it also claims to be the spot where Moses met Jethro’s daughters at the well, and it is at the bottom of Mount Sinai. Add to that fact that it was named as St. Catherine in honour of St. Catherine of Alexandria who was martyred in Alexandria and whose body, centuries later, was supposedly discovered in the area of the monastery. Also, along the path up to the chapel on the top of Mount Sinai was “Elijah’s Basin” which is a spring where Elijah supposedly travelled 40 days and 40 nights to flee Ahab and Jezebel.
A small entrance, and the supposed burning bush (it was originally in the spot where the alter for the church is at but they transplanted it outside to save the bush.
Gulf of Aqaba
The next day we drove to the Gulf of Aqaba, said good-bye to our Egyptian driver and guide (and armed tourism official who is taking this picture!!), and boarded a ferry headed to Jordan.
It was exiting to see and experience some of Egypt and were are thankful we made it all the way safely through.