Today the group went sightseeing around Cairo. First we went Saqqara and went in the Teti Pyramid, which was cool, but I had already been in there on my last trip. We also got to go in the mastaba of Khagemni, which had been closed last time, it was fantastic, really brightly coloured for an Old Kingdom tomb and it had a great false door in the burial chamber.

Next we visited the Step Pyramid, which was covered in scaffolding and had people walking all over it. I walked away from the group and sat in front of the false shrines just looking at it, most of the Pyramid was roped off so exploring it again seemed redundant especially when I had seen it three times without the scaffolding. I sat there and watched the people work and I made me really sad to see the pyramid like this. I muttered under my breath "What are they doing to you sweetheart", this pyramid has stood for nearly five thousand years on its own, they should leave it alone. I was really annoyed when I saw the new bricks they had put in. Great, another manufactured sight in Egypt I thought.

Next we went to "Memphis" which isn't really Memphis or Menn-nefer at all. It's just a random collection of statues dumped at the site of Mit Rhiana and called Memphis. We have no idea where the real Memphis is as yet. I spent most of my time here haggling for a rug, as I remembered there was quite a good bazaar here and this is the area where they make the best Egyptian rugs.

Onto Giza, I know this sounds really bad, but I was almost bored. This was my 5th trip to the Giza pyramids and I didn't know what to do with myself. I took Guy and Hylton in the pyramid of Queen Hetepheres and just sat around for the duration of our time there. It wasn't even a good day for it, it was so hazy that when we went up to the plateau view point you could barely see all three pyramids.

We drove down to the Sphinx and most of us elected not to go in as the crowds were just stupidly huge. Siobhan and I took photos from outside and marveled at how far we had come. Capetown to Cairo, we made it!

After taking over an hour to get back to the truck park, I emptied Gertie of all my possessions and then went out with some of the group for happy hour at the Hilton. It was great, 2 for 1 cocktails and I had a really nice pie. I wasn't out long as Siobhan got sick and I had to escort her home in the crazy traffic.