Cairo Landscaping

Not that I blog that often but whenever I do I try to put in a pic or Two. And with the recent discovery of mine of the fact that I can embed slide shows from the Picasa Web in my blog, I decided to be more exploratory and presentable with slideshows in my blog and not just pics. And I’ve always been a shutter bug of sorts.

So when I blogged about The Necropolis and not about anywhere where else in Egypt, people pointed it out. Of course, there’s more to Egypt than the pyramids but unfortunately for those expecting more and me obviously, I spent all my time being a pendulum between my work place and my hotel. So I am putting all the other pics (presentable if any) on this blog and album and hope those visiting Egypt through my blog like them.

Most of the pics are taken from my hotel room. I was staying at the Semi-Ramis Intercontinental Hotel which looms over the Nile River. Lucky for me, my room was Nile Facing on the 17th Level which made the view breathtaking. Some of the pics are from the drive from Cairo to Giza. Again quite a few are of my hotel which has been taken from the street, a couple of them at the Museum of Natural History at Cairo and a number of them are from the streets of the Old Cairo.

Cheers!

Glances at Necropolis

The Great Pyramid of Giza is the oldest and largest of the three pyramids in the Giza Necropolis bordering what is now Cairo, Egypt in Africa, and is the only remaining member of the Seven Wonders of the World. It is believed to have been built as a tomb for Fourth dynasty Egyptian pharaoh Khufu (hellenized as Χεωψ, Cheops) and constructed over a 20 year period concluding around 2560 BC. The tallest structure in the world for over 3,800 years, it is sometimes called Khufu's Pyramid or the Pyramid of Khufu.

This Ancient Egyptian necropolis consists of the Pyramid of Khufu (known as the Great Pyramid and the Pyramid of Cheops), the somewhat smaller Pyramid of Khafre (or Chephren) a few hundred metres to the south-west, and the relatively modest-size Pyramid of Menkaure (or Mykerinus) a few hundred metres further south-west, along with a number of smaller satellite edifices, known as "queens" pyramids, causeways and valley pyramids. The Great Sphinx lies on the east side of the complex, facing east. Current consensus among Egyptologists is that the head of the Great Sphinx is that of Khafre. Associated with these royal monuments are the tombs of high officials and much later burials and monuments (from the New Kingdom onwards), signifying the reverence to those buried in the necropolis.