House of the Purple Worms: Day 2: First Day in Cairo The Citadel Aug 29 Part 1

We slept deeply and well, but I really wish we could have had one more hour of sleep. It was really tremendous to look out our window and see this in the distance:

Here is a close up of what got me so excited.

That is right I could see the pyramids from my hotel window. It was hazy and they were far in the distance, but there they were the real pyramids. We were actually in Egypt. There was no denying it now! We got up at 6:30 and had a sumptuous buffet breakfast in the hotel.

Below was our first sight of the people on the cruise with us.

Early in the morning we met and climbed on a bus so we could go to the citadel of Salah ad Dhin ( قلعة صلاح الدين) that sits in the Muqattum hills overlooking Cairo and get a glimpse of daily life.

The roads that crossed the Main Street were full of shops and people selling their wares. It is not very easy to get good quality shots from a moving bus, so I apologize for the quality of some of these images, but I want to include them to show what we were seeing.

Often people were out on the street corners selling fruit in large baskets.

We also saw palaces and monumental buildings. Our guide identified some of them, but I no longer remember what they are.

Of course there are many Mosques and minarets. I believe in the picture below, you might be able to see the mausoleum of Sultan Qaytbay from the 1740s (central dome and minaret or maybe it is just in the style of his mausoleum).

Here you can see the Citadel in the background and I believe Egypt's largest cemetery al- Qarafa (القرافة) in the foreground, known in English as the City of the Dead.

The cemetery surrounds the Citadel which divides it into Northern and Southern halves about 4 miles long.

The Citadel is where the Arabic lands were governed between the 13th and 19th centuries.

In the 1800s many of the buildings were demolished by Muhammad Ali Pasha who then redesigned the area adding new buildings and giving the Citadel its current look.

It was begun during the attacks of the crusaders by Salah ad-Dhin (Saladin) and his idea was to wall in the former capital city Fustat with Cairo to unite it as one large city protected by a wall from Nile River bank to Nile River bank. Below you can see the members of our tour as we prepare to enter the Mosque of Muhammed Ali Pasha.

The building was made of limestone quarried from nearby (and alas also from some of the pyramids of Giza). Below is a kind of court yard between the buildings with a wonderful panoramic view of the city.

The facade is gently decorated.

Originally, the Mosque was clad in alabaster, but the panels on the upper level were stripped away for the palaces of Abbas I (a grandson of Muhammad Ali Pasha.)

Here is a picture of our guide describing the Carrera marble of Muhammad Ali Pasha's tomb.

When you enter there is a central plaza in front of the mosque.

Our guide said the King of France, Louis Philippe had given Egypt the clock and the story goes that it was in return for the gift of the Luxor Obelisk that is still in Paris.The clock was famous for not working and many attempts had been made to repair it, prompting some wisecracker to say something about the nature of French gifts.

Below you can see our group shod in temporary booties as we have to remove our shoes to enter the mosque.

The interior is beautiful with lots of gilt and geometric patterning.

Below you can see the lighting which is suspended from the ceiling, but hangs very low.

The view of the city was stunning. It was a jumble of buildings in various states of repair. (Evidently earthquakes have taken quite a toll on the city and many people live in buildings that need work.)

Every tourist group also has a security guard provided by the State. Here is ours for the day. He was a wonderfully sweet man who took very good care of us.