Egypt | edcyadventures

We decided to venture up north to Alexandria for the day. To get from where we live in Al Rehab to Ramses train station in downtown Cairo took around 30 minutes. It was our first time at the train station. A bit of a chaotic place. People everywhere carrying boxes and bags, cars beeping non stop..the usual. It took us awhile to find the place to buy the tickets. We bought 2nd class tickets to Alexandria for 9am which cost 45EGP each. Once at the platform the trains have the number of the coach in both english and arabic so that helps to know where to go. It was our first time on the train in Egypt and it was a comfortable journey. A big difference form China and Japan, but there was plenty of space and it was clean. The windows had blinds and curtains which is definately needed as the sun is a blinder shining in. There is also some service, a man coming around with drinks if you want to buy anything, and it has AC. It was all cool until as soon as we were taking off it became super loud, kids screaming usually. We also witnessed this massive arguement on the train. We had no idea what it was about but a lot of people were getting involved. In the end one kind of security came and sorted it out. The journey took around 2 hr 40 mins.

Once we arrived at the station in Alexandria we decided we would book our tickets back to Cairo for the evening. That turned out to be an adventure. When we asked for a ticket back to Cairo, the teller said no more trains to Cairo today, all booked! Eh? Ok, so we might stay in Alexandria, not a big problem. So, then we asked for the train back to Cairo for the next day. Again..he said all booked no trains available. At this stage we were wondering whats going on..there’s no big holiday, why are they all booked out? I didn’t believe this guy. So while Edgar was at that counter I went to another man, asked the same thing..tickets for today to Cairo. There was no problem here. We bought our tickets for a 6pm departure from Alexandria and bought the first class ticket to see what the difference was from the second class we had taken in the morning. Once we had our tickets we were much more relaxed and headed out of the station to check out Alexandria! Not sure why the first teller told us there was no tickets left!

Just outside the station- Taxi’s reminded us of Barcelona

It was a bit chaotic when leaving the station..like all places i suppose, but we managed to walk to the corniche area. There seemed to be a lot of traffic, but not so crazy like Cairo. Alexandria has trams too which was interesting. At this stage we were starving, so we found a place called La Taverna which did the job.

We walked for the whole day in Alexandria. The first thing we wanted to do was to walk along the corniche, to see the Mediteranean sea. Not like there is a beautiful pavement to walk along, it seemed to be under construction. Along the way, we passed many vendors selling everything from sweet corn to coffee, sheesha, boat trips, horse trips around the city, and many people fishing. The public beaches were completely packed. The cornish on one side has the Mediterranean and the other a really busy road the 26th of July, so its not all a relaxing walk. Its quite stressful with the busy traffic and horn blowing. Eventually we arrived to the citadel. We didn’t go inside (its 60le) if you are interested. We went to whats called the aquarium. (10le). Strange aquarium. Nothing was real. Bit sad to see that it had a lot of coral on display. Just outside the citadel too there is a huge market where they are all selling corals ;-(

Anyway, near the citadel theres a nice few places to sit and watch the fishermen, so we hung out there for awhile.

Started making our way back along the corniche, stopping off at a huge mosque called Abu sid…really stunning. Again, we witnessed a big fight between 2 vendors.

We walked to the library

Back to the station. Big difference between first and second class train was that the seats are a little bigger in first class..the AC was stronger so it was freezing. No big difference other than that really.

2hr and 40 minutes later we were back at Ramses station in Cairo with the difficult job of getting an Uber to get out of there..it was really mental!

Difficult moments in Egypt right now. Like always this doesn’t stop us from travelling to countries with economical or political problems. We decided to spend our honeymoon in the red sea, the peninsula of Sinai. It’s there that Moses opened the sea and did something with the ten commandments. Can’t remember exactly! We decided to take a relaxing break and spend 11 days in a place called Sharm el sheikh.

Sharm el sheikh

This time, for the first time we took a package holiday. Flight and half board. We decided to take a package to relax ourselves after the stress of organising a lot of paperwork for our new lives in Qatar. We booked 11 nights in the hotel, situated in Sharm el sheikh, close to the national park Ras Mohammed.

The connection Barcelona-Cairo-Sharm el sheikh brought us to the south east point of Sinai, far from the conflicts that succeed in this marvellous country, Egypt. We spent most days going to the beaches, either Reef beach which was walking distance from the hotel or other local beaches which the bus from the hotel provided transport to. We snorkelled most days or stayed at the pool. We really enjoyed snorkelling. We have done scuba diving before along the coast of Catalunya and in Jordan but for this trip we decided we would just snorkel. So we bought the equipment before our trip.

Fanar Beach

Camels on the beach

Paragliding seemed to be a big thing there as well as the other water sports.

Paragliding

You can see plenty of life in the Red Sea just snorkelling at the local beaches. But because there are many trips to do there, we decided to do the boat trip to Tiran Island. This island is an Egyptian island but I think it’s shared with Saudi Arabia. It was pretty great, apart from the boat ride. Got a little sick on there. We also went to the famous natural park called Ras Mohammed which again is known for its corals and fish. We saw many fish, mantas etc..