Cairo

I know it's going to be a chore to get caught up to the day I'm living now but I'll keep posting when I can to have a bit of a record of our trip. We had to leave on the drive to Amman, Jordan early in the day despite the fact that our flight out would not be until late in the day because the border would be closing at noon. If you could just drive right along from Jerusalem to Amman it might take less than an hour because it is only about 40-some miles. However, since there is a national border between two countries who manage to co-exist but are a bit mistrustful, there is checkpoint after checkpoint so it takes more like 3 hours, more at busy times. We had to pay $50 each for Russ and me exit tax to leave Israel. Then we had to go through checks on the insurance on the car and our passports. A great advantage we had to speed things up (if you can call 3 hours speedy), was traveling with James who has a diplomatic license on his car and diplomatic status. That will come to benefit and amaze us in other ways as we traveled through Egypt. Since the day was Russ's birthday, we went out for lunch- to a P.F. Chang, believe it or not. There are parts of Jerusalem, most of Tel Aviv, and much of Amman which are quite western/modern. Then we spent a couple of hours at the home of friends of James and Susanne who are with the embassy in Amman. They were kind enough to drive us to the airport so we didn't have to pay to park the car for a week. Our flight to Cairo was fairly uneventful, again going through the "VIP" lines was very nice.
Egypt has some 88 million people, nearly all living within a very short distance from the Nile because the rest of the country is over 95% desert. One fourth of the population lives in Cairo, a crowded, busy, and very dirty city- at least to me. The smog in the air made it difficult to breathe. However, the travel agent who planned the trip for James and Susanne had booked us into a 5-star hotel, the Conrad, where we were treated like royalty. We had 2 double rooms which Russ and I, then James and Susanne had, and a triple room for the 3 kids. The room was lovely with a nice view from the 8th floor although we didn't spend a lot of time there. Much as I dislike cold air conditioning, it was certainly better than the smog outside!
After a good night's sleep, we were up early (it was that way every day trying to get everything in!) and out to our little bus to see the pyramids. Everywhere we traveled in Egypt we had a driver, a tour guide, and security. The drivers were amazing at wending their way through the traffic. One guide joked that the white lines on the road were merely decoration. It sure seemed that way! There were very few traffic lights, no visible traffic cops, no speed limits, and apparently no rules of the road. Drivers would just make a lane wherever they had room and horns were used frequently but because it was so congested in the city nobody could get up enough speed to have an accident. We drove across the "longest bridge in the world" as we headed out of Cairo, surrounded by a tangle of roads on bridges going all directions. There was mile after mile of what our guide called "illegal buildings". Apparently people built huge concrete apartment buildings and moved in quickly. "Squatting" seems to be an expected means of acquiring property here in the Middle East. The buildings were only partially occupied because the people were saving rooms for family members to move there or grow up to marry and start families of their own. The masonry was always difficult to differentiate from the ancient ruins we saw. Sometimes the ancient ruins, made of stone and some with remnants of paint still showing, were even more attractive than the newer buildings!
There are 108 pyramids in Egypt. The Great Pyramids of Giza took 30 years to build by 100,000 workers, most of whom were only seasonal because they were farmers.

 I was a little surprised at the size of the Sphinx. It wasn't all that huge. Somehow I had always envisioned it to be comparable in size to the pyramids. As you can see, it's considerably smaller, although still impressive in its design and structure.

This is the view with our backs to the pyramids and Sphinx. Cairo is quite close by, although due to the traffic it took at least an hour to get from our hotel to the site.