Day 7 Giza Necropolis and GEM
Arriving at Giza station just after 7:30 a driver picked me up and took me to the hotel, a very quick turnaround - luckily my room was ready - and onto a bus with a small tour group heading out for the day.
The first stop was Giza plateau and a breathtaking view of the pyramids from the panorama viewing area. The whole tour group was keen on taking a camel ride so we all mounted a camel and went down toward the pyramids for some photos. A very cool experience for sure, just leaning in to what the camel was doing made it a lot more comfortable. We then hopped on a bus down to the Great Pyramid of Khufu, we briefly stopped between Khafre and Khufu as Khufu is built on a lower part of the valley it looks a little shorter from the top but it is the tallest of the three. Another short bus to the base of Khufu and it was time to go inside the Great Pyramid.
This pyramid is one of the only ones that you go up to get to the burial chamber, it was also very very hot inside again, and after quite a long climb it was definitely worth it again. Though funnily they have air-con units set up inside the chamber.
After returning to the cool seeming breeze I walked around the pyramid passing the remains of temples and having a quick look at the queens pyramids and boat pits at the foot of the pyramid.
It was then on to another bus down to the Sphinx, impressively carved from one piece of stone majestically guarding the path to the great pyramid.
We then had a quick lunch, stopped by a gold bazaar and made our way to the Grand Egyptian Museum.
This place is magical, walking in through the pyramidal entrance and seeing the colossi or Rameses II standing there was amazing.
The design of the building is all inspired from the pyramids, and the top of the grand staircase looks out over the Giza pyramids.
Our guide took us through to the boat gallery which houses the remade Royal barges of the King, uncovered in the boat pits beside the great pyramid and remade painstakingly using only papyrus and timber as it would have been originally made.
We then moved into the main gallery housing a history of Egyptian culture dating back 7000 years to their origins and migration toward the river nile. A quick pace with so many things to see showed us documented working conditions of the workers making the pyramids and temples, the importance of the gods and the development of their society and harvest and food production.
Then it was on to the Tutankhamun exhibition, housing the entirety of artifacts exhumed from his tomb in the valley of the kings. The mummy and sarcophagus being the only piece remaining in the tomb. The over 5000 items on display showed everything that the young king was buried with to prepare him for his afterlife. It is always interesting that king Tut would have been forgotten to history if not for the discovery of his tomb untouched, he was not remarkable compared to other kings and did not have any large impact on Egyptian history overall.
It was time to head back to the hotel, and after a little break a few of the tour group and I headed out for an early dinner before an early pickup for my flight to London in the morning.









