January 19, 2010 – Day Three

EGYPT

We arrived at our hotel, next to the pyramids around 6pm. Cairo Egypt is a city of over 20 million people, it took a while to commute from the airport.

It was raining in Cairo, which is a rare event and only occurs about 7 days out of the year. The traffic is unlike anything we had ever experienced. In the four marked lanes going in one direction, eight cars filled the lanes and traffic was bumper to bumper.

Father Mark Solomon (one of the two priests with us) agreed with us, that the traffic was quite stressful, even for those who are used to heavy traffic. The roads showed a lot of diversity, with cars, street buses, tour buses, camels, motorcycles, donkeys with carts, pedestrians, and various other things, all sharing the road at the same time.

There are very few traffic lights in Cairo, and the traffic merges itself into the roads and byways. There were car horns honking all night long. We did not witness one traffic accident the entire time we were there!

That night we met up with Rita Wenning and Carolyn Olsen at dinner. They were joining up with our tour group after having spent the previous week traveling through Italy.