Day 15 Friday January 26 First Night in Rwanda

 Tim sent this picture of the view from the hotel in Kigali.

Day 15 Friday, January 26 Arrival in Kigali

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by Henry

Today was almost entirely consumed with travel, starting with our midnight arrival to Cairo International Airport. Our first flight to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia was less than four hours, but we were loaded onto the same size plane that is usually used for trans-oceanic flights. Addis Ababa is a much larger city than I appreciated prior to landing there for the layover. Ethiopian Airlines has a near monopoly at Bole Airport, filling nearly every terminal gate. 


Looks like the entrance to restrooms at Bole Airport, but actually are separate entrances to prayer rooms for men and women.


Our next flight to Kigali was delayed, so we ended up with a 5 hour layover. The initial views of Kigali are completely opposite from the Egyptian desert. Green rolling hills and red dirt.


After retrieving everything from baggage claim, bikes and bags were loaded onto trucks, and we were bussed to the 2000 Business & Leisure Hotel. Having spent three weeks in Egypt, the cleanliness of Kigali streets and boulevards was eye-popping. Lush green landscaping abounded. There wasn't trash blowing across road lanes. Traffic was busy, but flowed smoothly. Motorcycle taxis comprised at least 50% of the traffic. The city is crowded, but does not have the same mad crush of humanity seen in Cairo. The hotel was very modern and up-to-date.


View from our hotel room. Kigali is situated at 1570 m elevation, roughly the same as Denver.


Those of us who arrived in the second wave were tired, but we got down to business – we unpacked our bikes and reassembled them to open up more free time to explore Kigali the next day.

After walking to a nearby cell phone service provider outlet, Linda got a physical SIM card. This was a protracted process, requiring her passport and what seemed like 1,000 computer clicks. Her Sim card was USD $4 for 30 days and 7 GB of data. My phone is newer, and only operates with eSIMs, so I bought mine online. 


We were all tired after that excursion, and settled in for a family-style Chinese dinner at the hotel. There were two live musicians playing classic American pop hits.


After dinner, we retired early.

A few final thoughts on Egypt:

It has an amazing history. In antiquity, it was a relative superpower. The impressive pyramids, temples, statuary, etc still standing today were created on the backs of untold millions of man-years of slave labor. The scale is hard to appreciate until you are standing within.

Their society has challenges. It remains a developing country. Their infrastructure, and ability to maintain it, remains far from standards we are accustomed to. The poor are barely scraping by to make a living. There are so many underemployed men and women. It is not the easiest country to visit, if one doesn't have a working knowledge of Arabic. Cultural differences from the West abound. The ever present police are more a curse than a blessing. Many Egyptians literally see us as the walking personification of Western money and act accordingly. Today, it's hard for me to imagine making a return trip, even though there is so much more that could be seen.

Tomorrow, will see Kigali in more detail.

Day 14 Thursday, January 25 Last Night in Cairo

by Henry

Our last day in Egypt. High temperature 18° C. We forayed to Decathlon, a French-based sporting goods chain. Probably the most similar chain in the US would be Dick's. There was a miscommunication, and the group of 10 ended up at 2 different Decathlon stores at 2 different malls. They carried camping supplies, and Linda and I each bought an extra foam mat to protect our inflatable sleeping mats from possible thorn punctures further down the road in Africa.

Egyptians have honorable nomenclature for handicapped parking. The most elite parking slot that is closest to the entry is reserved for expectant mothers.


The mall was extremely upscale and modern, rivaling anything in the USA, and there were many people shopping there, unlike in most American malls.

Our next destination was Cave Church. To get there, our driver had to wind through a very narrow street in the Cairo's Moqattam Garbage City, which is inhabited by up to 150,000 marginalized Coptic Christians. 60% of Cairo's trash for 22 million passes through here. It is like nothing I have ever seen. Innumerable bags of trash are piled high on trucks and spilling out of buildings. People, including families with children, are sitting on the mountains of trash and sorting. They apparently manage to recycle 85% of the trash. Despite the filth, there are restaurants, shops, and people living here as in any other neighborhood. The residents receive a small stipend from the government for their labor. The juxtaposition of poor vs rich (at the mall) was not lost on us.

One of the smaller trucks. Many bigger trucks were piled four times as high.


Trash is collected in the city into reusable bags, which look like they're made from recycled plastic.








At the end of the road, on top of the hill, is the Coptic Cave Church.


The larger sanctuary can seat up to 20,000.


I noticed several of these rugged-looking, yet cute, Suzuki minivans in the neighborhood.


A smaller sanctuary with seating for 2,000 in the Cave Church complex.


This is a pilgrimage site for Coptic Christians, yet there is the strange proximity of zip lines and a climbing wall to entertain the youth.


There is only one road leading away from the Cave Church, so we had to drive through Garbage City again. We arrived in the Zamalek neighborhood and tried to get into the Museum of Egyptian Modern Art, but it was closed because it was National Police Day. The infrastructure and plaza surrounding the museum was not in terribly good condition, although the museum was in a nice park with other cultural buildings, including the Cairo Opera House.


Back to Le Passage Hotel, the Cleopatra ballroom was set up for a Coptic Christian wedding that day.


The bright and groom made a grand entrance into the lobby at about 10 PM.


Hotel lobby where we were waiting for our bus, which picked us up at 10:45 PM to go to the Cairo airport. Because EgyptAir could not handle all the bikes on one flight to Kigali as previously promised, we had been separated into two groups. An earlier group had left four hours earlier and would enjoy a nonstop flight from Cairo to Kigali. Fortunately, Linda and I did not have to check out of the hotel until 10 PM. Unfortunately, our itinerary was a distant second choice. We would be flying Ethiopian Airlines from Cairo to Addis Ababa, endure a four hour layover, and then take a second flight from Addis Ababa to Kigali. We would arrive in Kigali 12+ hours after the first group. As we walked outside, it had briefly rained for the first time since our arrival in Africa.


We were reunited at the airport with our bike boxes (which had been trucked up from Aswan), our permanent bags, and daily bags.


The check-in process for each person's bike and two bags took a long time, but went about a smoothly as could be expected. Our flight departure time was 2:20 AM on January 26, so we would have to cool our heels at the boarding gate for a very late night flight. 

Day 14 Thursday January 25 Cairo Waiting for flights to Kigali

 Tim and Jeff took an Uber to a mall for supplies

McDonalds lunch in Aswan. Had a LeGrande

Cairo mall shopping for SPF 30 lip balm

Day 13 Wednesday, January 24 Last Day in Aswan then fly back to Cairo

by Henry

Today is our last day in Aswan. High temperature 22° C with sunny blue skies.

Our departure time from the hotel to Cairo was slated for 5:30 PM, so we tried to make use of the available time. We took a morning boat ride from the east to west bank of the Nile River. There we could climb a hill to look at some ancient nobles' tombs, and also get a good view of the city. As is customary, we were able to contract a fixed price with a boat captain for 10 of us to go across the river round-trip. He would wait on the shore for us to finish sightseeing.

Our boat on the left. The captain is dressed in a traditional Egyptian galabeya. Common colors are brown, gray, white.

For any tourists who don't want to climb the hill, the ubiquitous camel is available for a ride. I am told the return trip down the hill is harder on the tush than the journey up the hill.

Preserved wall art in one of the noble's tombs. When we reached the top of the hill, a "caretaker" immediately appeared. The tombs were all locked behind gates. The caretaker is the keeper of the keys, and for baksheesh, he unlocks them for our viewing. The caretakers adeptly latch on to any foreigners. At other tourist sites, English-speaking "guides" similarly appear offering their services for a "tour". All very customary in Egypt .  . .

Well preserved pillar art in a tomb.

Looking south on the Nile from the hilltop. The Low Dam (1902) would be on the horizon, and the High Dam (1970) further south, creating the giant reservoir that is called Lake Nasser. Like all dams, hydroelectric power is generated, and the temperamental flooding of the Nile is now under human control.

Descending back down to our waiting boat captain.

McDonald's triple cheeseburger is not just for Americans.

Having checked out of our hotel room earlier in the morning, the only reasonable place to take an afternoon nap would be poolside overlooking the Nile, right?

We were loaded onto two buses at 5:30 PM from the hotel, taking us to Aswan airport for our one hour flight to Cairo. Our flight was on time, and we checked into our highest quality Egyptian hotel so far, Le Passage Cairo Hotel & Casino (at the airport), although the casino is not open.

Tomorrow, we will separate into two groups for flights into Rwanda.

Day 12 Tuesday, January 23 Rest Day in Aswan (Part 1 of 3)

by Henry

It promised to be cooler today. High temp will only reach 24° C. First on the list was a 45 minute meandering stroll through the souk to the Unfinished Obelisk site.


Public drinking water stations are scattered throughout Aswan neighborhoods. Most have a small supply of reusable drinking cups.


Many bakeries were making their daily deliveries.


Attractive doorway, in better shape than most.


Very common scene in neighborhoods. Garbage strewn everywhere. Stray dogs just lying around. Fortunately, none are aggressive.


A newer local school. The front gate had just opened to admit students.


Typical neighborhood with unpaved road; these buildings are in better condition than many other neighborhoods.


Open spaces just fill up with garbage.


The Unfinished Obelisk in a pink granite quarry from approximately 3500 years ago. If completed, it would have been 42 m tall, 1/3 larger than any other currently standing obelisk. Unfortunately, the obelisk cracked and the project was abandoned.


The historical significance of this UNESCO site is the demonstrated technique of initially carving on three sides, and then carefully chipping away at the undersurface to separate it from the bedrock. Ancient Egyptians were not afraid to take on massive projects.


Picture standing inside the obelisk channel to emphasize scale. 


Across the street from the Unfinished Obelisk was Fatimid Cemetery with origins dating back to the ninth century.


There were two of these within the cemetery complex. Not sure if they were coffins being prepared for upcoming burial.

Day 12 Tuesday, January 23 Rest Day in Aswan (Part 2 of 3)

by Henry

Walking away from the cemetery, we happened upon a public library. 

Tim likes to explore libraries, in honor of his librarian wife (Priscilla). 


The library was preparing for its grand opening in a few days, and there was a local reporter who interviewed all of us to get our thoughts on traveling through Egypt. We became their celebrities for the day.






Outdoor amphitheater at the library. In the background is a Coptic Christian church. The Egyptians are proud to tell us at every opportunity that all religions live in harmony here. Not sure that is 100% true, as we happened to walk by a "Fuck Israel" sign in the souk.


Typical spice basket collection in the souk.


Egyptian post office. Not a very enticing entryway.


Street stand selling freshly cooked falafel.


Upon return to the hotel, we spent the early afternoon relaxing poolside on the Nile.