It was a beautiful Saturday morning in October, in the sprawling city of Cairo, with temperature around 75F. After some delay at the hotel waiting for the hired car, we finally drove south west, weaving through the bustling streets, heading towards Giza plateau. Like any big city in a developing world, the roads were packed with old cars, motorcyles, cyclists and pedestrians. Although, occasional glimpses of donkey carts on streets came as a somewhat surprise, but we did anticipate such sights .
Our first stop was Giza pyramids, which was about 45 - 60 min ride from our luxurious Marriott Omar Khayam Hotel & Casino. We were ready with our cameras, as we approached, eagerly waiting to see the world's oldest and most beautiful man made structure, that still defies time. The great pyramid of Khufo with its stunning magnificence rose 450 feet above ground. For the past almost 4500 yrs, it held the record for the world's tallest structure, until Washington monument in D.C surpassed it.
There are two ways to see the pyramid. The first is to waltz through the main gate, like hundreds of tourists, get a ticket and go straight to the Spinx and the Khufo pyramid. We took the second. The driver took us straight to camel and horse rentals. Along the way, the sights of kids cleaning the camels / horses and feeding the emaciated animals and getting ready for another day filled with camel and horse tours are common. After some negotiation with the camel / horse wrangler, we rented two camels and two horses. The gates to the pyramids for the camel and horse tours opened at 9 in the morning and there were few more early tourist enthusiasts just like us, waiting to get in. We were more excited to be on the camel and horse, so the waiting didnt seem to matter to us, as we were engaged in taking photos. Camel and horse riding was the most thrilling experience, being the first time, at least for me. I am glad I mustered enough courage to go horse galloping with the tour guide. The tour guide knew all the great photo vantage points. We stopped at every one of them to take photos. We even climbed one of the section of a smaller pyramid, which is not permitted. The so called giza securities who patroled the place to prevent such mis behaving by tourists and also as a protection for them, seemed to look for tips, rather than fulfilling their duties.
As we continued our camel / horse tour, we saw the area around the pyramids littered with trash. It was sad to see how a monument with such a long history has been neglected by the local government. We finally arrived at the front, near the Sphinx where we spent some time enjoying the beautiful and often photographed view of the Sphinx and the pyramid.
After thanking with generous tips, we bid good bye to our tour guide and drove off to Khan el Khalili, knowing well, that we will be back in few hours, for the sunset and Laser light show.
