Cairo day 2

Cairo Day 2 – Egyptian Museum

Not much to report here. We walked around our neighborhood, checked out Tahrir Square where the big riot/protest was back in January. There were still protestors sitting in the square. A military presence was nearly everywhere we walked. The main reason for our walk was to get to the Museum, and to locate some vegan friendly food, and possibly an ice cold Sakara. The museum was pretty amazing, especially the funerary mask of King Tut, which is made of solid gold, which is life size and features a Vulture and Serpent on its forehead. The museum was so huge, I’m sure we could have spent more time looking around, but because of Ramadan it was closing early. We rushed a little through the exhibits but felt we had gotten plenty of time to see the main attractions, including some mummies.

Tutankhamun's Funerary Mask, Personal Chest and Gilded Bed. There were hundreds of items taken from his tomb and are at the museum.

 On the way back to the hostel, we found a street market and bought some fruit and veggies from a nice old lady sitting on the sidewalk; it was great food at an amazingly good price. Once back to the room we ate and relaxed.

After a long day of walking around in the heat, then recovering, it was time to go back out. The time was bout 22:00 and the streets were alive with people everywhere, nothing like the daytime hours in Cairo. We found a rooftop hotel bar to finally get that cold Sakara then walked around and found a street coffee shop. Sitting in a huge open area was really cool, people everywhere celebrating Ramadan. The kids were lighting fireworks, music playing, flashing lights, etc.  We ordered 2 coffees and smoked a shisha pipe with mint leaves. Smoking these things was fun, it was really smooth on the lungs, and made us both a little light headed J Happy Times. After a couple hours it was finally bed time, at about 0200 we went walking back to our hostel. At this time the streets are still buzzing with action. Heidi and I decided we will go back to this same coffee shop tomorrow night, armed with or camera. We slept like babies. Oh, so far everywhere we’ve stayed there has been a Mosque next door; I’m starting to like the sound of the singing prayers from the Quran.