We stayed at the Marriott Zamelek on Gezira Island in the Nile. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cairo_Marriott_Hotel It used to be a palace.

We went to Giza to see the pyramids and the Sphinx.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pyramid_of_Giza

Inside the pyramid of Henutsen

We got a tour of Smart Village,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_Village_Egypt Lots of high-tech companies in this modern business park in reclaimed desert. Also a tour of a call center, and the cultural panorama http://cultnat.org/General/Cultnat.aspx.

We went https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coptic_Cairo to see some of the oldest Christian churches in the world. We several churches, and then went to the Coptic Museum (Nag Hammadi gnostic manuscript http://gnosis.org/naghamm/nhl.html), “Hanging Church”  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hanging_Church,

Ebony and ivory

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Barbara_Church_in_Coptic_Cairo,  also Jewish synagogue in former Islamic building.

The American University in Cairo

We drove to New Cairo to visit the American University of Cairo. We had a walking tour of the new campus (built in 2008—the old one downtown was built in 1919) and even picked grapefruits and oranges off the trees, listened to presentations by the dean of the business school, a few professors including one who runs the 10,000 women initiative by Goldman Sachs training women who own small businesses, also a professor who runs the startup training.

The Mosque of Ibn Tulun, the oldest Mosque in Egypt. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosque_of_Ibn_Tulun  It has a famous spiral minaret. There was a padlock on the door to the minaret, but it wasn’t locked, so I opened it and we climbed up—spectacular views. Also visited the Gayer Anderson museum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gayer-Anderson_Museum (kind of a mansion built in the 1800s), traffic back to the hotel was terrible as usual, but this time our police escort had their sirens on to try to get traffic moving for us—kind of funny.

On January 12th we visited the American Embassy and heard from deputies over commerce, economic development, politics, and USAID. Later we went to the Egyptian Museum of Antiquities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_Museum —all sorts of artifacts, upstairs was the King Tut exhibit including his famous mask and golden tombs—very cool, some of us paid an extra 75 LE to view the Royal Mummies exhibit http://www.egyptiansidekick.com/royal-mummies-hall/. They had Rameses II, III, Amenhotep, Hatshepsut, others—amazing to see the real deal, also saw mummified animals including two huge crocodiles, spent a few minutes at Tahir Square before returning home (site of 2011, 2012 revolutions).

Tahrir Square

Wednesday (1/13)—We drove to the Suez Canal. We had a police escort from the hotel, then different security team once we got to the Ismaili Governance. The Suez Canal Authority gave us a presentation including two videos, a tour of the Canal (mother channel and new channel) for about 1 hr on the same yacht that the Egyptian presidents use.    

On January 14th We drove out into the Western Desert (area called 6th of October) to visit Wadi Foods—an agriculture business specializing in olive products and poultry. We got into lab coats and hair nets to tour the olive pressing plant. They fed us lunch (sample products) at a summer home/oasis. To see the poultry and olive production we had to go into a room for an air blast/cleaning, then white jump suits, shoes washed, and hair nets. The bus had to go through a sanitizing car wash.

We had a river boat dinner cruise on the Nile Maxim. Live entertainment included a whirling dervish and a belly dancer.

Whirling Dervish

The crescent moon on its back

January 15th we went to Saqqara to see the step pyramid–the oldest in Egypt. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_of_Djoser, oldest pyramid. We were able to see the Bent pyramid and the Red pyramid. We also visited the Pyramid of Teti https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_of_Teti The temple outside has lots of hieroglyphics that still have full color. We were able to go into the pyramid.

Trash in the streets

Shopping with Phebe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khan_el-Khalili market.

Security: Egypt is serious about protecting its tourists. We always had an armed guard on our bus, police escort for our bus, bomb sniffing dogs at the hotel, airport like security for the hotel, universities, embassy, churches, museums, etc.