I’ve been through Frankfurt Airport a number of times, yet its size and layout never fail to confuse me. Apparently this place confuses even its employees.
Urban trekking: FRAport (Frankfurt Airport)
Year: 2018
Catacombs of Alexandria and the kindness of a stranger
Alexandria is an interesting city, full of history from ancient times and forward. A lot of what we want to see is very walkable – an hour or less from our hotel. Today we walked through a series of interesting neighborhoods to the catacombs of Kom al Shoqafa, a tomb complex dug deep into the ground – so deep that the bottom level is now underwater.
Ancient Alexandria: Kom el Dikka and the Roman amphitheater
Today was our last full day in Alexandria, and there was one more place we really wanted to visit: the Roman amphitheater. Luckily for us, it’s just a short walk from our hotel – not much more than a kilometer – so we set off after breakfast to buy our train tickets back to Cairo and see the amphitheater.
Urban hiking: the Jewish cemetery in Alexandria
Whenever we get to a new place, Alan likes to pore over whatever maps he can find, looking for interesting locations that may not be written up in our guidebook. When you scan tourist maps of Alexandria, you can see the city offers a number of interesting places, including the old Jewish cemetery near Alexandria University’s Faculty of Pharmacy.
So after a visit to the Alexandria National Museum (great place, by the way), we walked toward the Jewish cemetery. As we got close to where it seemed to be on the map, we looked around, expecting to spot a large open space dotted with tombstones, just like other cemetery grounds in Egypt. No such sight appeared, so we walked slowly around the edge of a high wall overhung with tree limbs, looking across a small roundabout to the pharmacy school, where we could see lots of young people hanging out and chatting.
Net fishing in Alexandria
One of the great pleasures Alexandria has to offer is a morning walk on the Corniche. You can wander up and down, people-watching to your heart’s content, despite the constant flow of noisy traffic on the six-lane highway separating the seaside walkway from the rest of Alexandria.
You almost always see people fishing with incredibly long poles (I estimate they’re about 15 feet). But this morning we got to see something completely new to us: a large group of men wielding a huge net, and dragging their catch in to shore.
Visiting the Alexandria Library
When I first read about the rebuilt Great Library of Alexandria years ago, I wanted to see it. But it never occurred to me that someday I’d be able to casually stroll there after breakfast.
That’s exactly what we did this morning, after enjoying a plate of fuul and some tomato-and-cheese salad at our favorite coffee shop. We walked along the Corniche, enjoying the morning breezes and watching fisherman casting their lines, until the Alexandria Library came into sight.
Exploring the Shali, the central landmark of Siwa Oasis
You can’t miss the Shali. As soon as you arrive in Siwa Town, you see it looming at the center of everything – a small mountain surrounded by an ancient city of mud houses melting together. It looks like it’s caught somewhere between a fairy tale and a futuristic sci-fi movie.
Wandering the palm gardens of Siwa Oasis
When you read guidebooks or travel websites describing activities around Siwa Oasis, it’s easy to overlook that this area is largely agricultural. Most Siwa residents spend their days caring for crops – olive trees, date palms, vegetables, guava, nehbak and pomegranate trees, a bit of emmer wheat and forage crops for the animals. People here also keep domestic animals for their meat, milk or labor – sheep, goats, chickens, turkeys, rabbits, pigeons, cows, donkeys and horses – and the animals, too, require care.
More fossils: a bike-and-hike trip to the north edge of Siwa Oasis
On the way out to Taghagheen Island to watch the sunset with our friends Amal and Ahmed one evening, Alan noticed that there were tombs and interesting formations along the line of hills at the north edge of Siwa Oasis. “It’s not really all that far from town,” he said to me. “We could bike out here and hike around these hills.”
Fossils, tombs and demons: exploring Gebel el Dakrur
We’re enjoying how easy it is to explore Siwa Oasis on foot. You can walk to many fascinating landmarks, monuments and springs around the oasis, including Gebel el Dakrur, a collection of peaks that stands out in the desert landscape.
Rambulatory 