After a couple of days in this buzzing city, Crazy is the only way to describe it really. Spent the first day since arriving here just having a butchers around although many locals come up to you to try and get you into their shop to give you their 'business card'. Yeah right. Soon cottoned on to them so my favourite and most used catchphrase has been "Leh shukran" aka No thanks! Saw a demonstration by Syrians in Tahreer Square which got progressively bigger, louder throughout the day which ended up in a procession towards the Syrian embassy. By this time I had befriended an Egyptian dude called Emad and we talked away the afternoon watching the world and protesters go by. Emad was fascinated by the liberal nature back home and that the birds and the bees happened frequently before marriage!

Had an early night as was up at crack of dawn on Sunday for the main event. Mahmood 'the mental taxi driver' took me around the ancient sites in and around Cairo. When he first picked me up at the airport he told me to do Pyramids etc on Saturday. Now I can see why.. The traffic was heaving due to it being the first day of the working week here, at least 7 cars wide on a 3 lane road, bonkers! There's more beeps of horns then at an Italian wedding although here there's no wedding or bloody honeymoon for that matter! The drive out of Cairo was good although weirdly there was more smog the further you went away from the centre and it was strange seeing plenty of partly built apartment blocks due to starting the building work but then running out of money and bricks!! Once got out into rural areas there were more donkeys than Dahtsuns with the occassional buffalo thown in for good measure.

Memphis was fascinating, more so for the fact (according to my guide Ahmir) that King Ramesses II had 69 wives?! Respect man! ;) We swiftly moved onto Saqqara which is a vast sprawling neocropolis, managed to go down into one of the pyramids (which felt a bit like a Beatherder experience earlier in the summer) with a tomb in it and sneakily took a pic when wasn't meant to tut tut ;) Finally we headed back up to Giza for the main course the Pyramids & Sphinx. Got to admit was expecting the Sphinx to be bigger than it actually was but still impressive. The pyramids are alright.. ;) It was hard having a moment's peace with them though with all the bloody beggars and b*****s but was still good being on me todd and soaking it all in.

This last day in Cairo has been spent sightseeing starting off religiously at the peaceful Citadel overlooking all of the city which is full of mosques and museums. Through the haze and clouds could see the Pyramids in the distance, just! It was then over to the Coptic quarter full of Christian churces and the Coptic museum which didn't really impress me much. The Egyptian museum of antiquities however was mega impressive, spent hours in there which felt like minutes and was completely mesmerized by all the artefacts. Seeing the russian doll like coffins and sarcophaguses was awesome as was seeing all of King Tut's finds from his tomb and his infamous mask and coffins. Befriended more locals than tourists over here which can only be a good thing I guess, randomly bumped into the same dude from San Francisco at the pyramids yesterday and museum today, what are the odds on that!? Finishing the day off with a meal at Prince restaurant which is always choca full of locals and is open 24/7 and then watching the footie, Brazil v Egypt been played in Doha this evening.

Off to Aqaba, Jordan in the morning via an 8 hour bus ride to Nuweiba and then taking a short boat across the Red Sea and Egyptian border to Aqaba.

Adios :D x