Alexandria: a Tough Life

So this past weekend we headed up north to Alexandria. It's supposed to a 2.5 hour drive, but it took us about 4 hours due to a late start (sitting in the bus), a traffic accident ahead of us and a bathroom break 1.5 hours in. We got there at about 7pm on Friday night and checked into the Windsor Palace Hotel, which sits fairly unassumingly on the Corniche, overlooking the Alexandria Bay.

The hotel was a beautiful example of classical 1920s architecture, with a large sitting room off of the lobby housing a piano, exquisitely upholstered couches and frescoes on the ceiling. The lobby opened into a large winding, carpeted staircase which encompassed an open elevator shaft where two dark-wood cars climbed up and down with the help of a visible dumbwaiter system. John (my roommate) and I checked into our $115/night room which had a little balcony with a view of the bay.

Friday night, we walked and walked to find a suitable restaurant (which really wasn't all that hard, but we took a poor route and spent a lot of time waiting for a giant group to form). After a while, four of us just wound up at a place called the Grand Cafe which had mediocre food and very good ice cream. After we ate, we headed up to a classmate's room (he got a gigantic single with two balconies) and a good number of us hung out there for the night.

Saturday was an incredibly relaxing day at the beach. We started it out at the rooftop cafe of the hotel, which gave a whole new meaning to the term "Continental breakfast," what with pastries, eggs, potatoes, beans, six different fruit and veggie salads, etc. We then made our way to Mamurah, to a private beach resort where everyone swam in the Mediterranean, laid under the big umbrellas, played soccer on the beach and just enjoyed themselves (tough life, eh?). The price of the beach for the day (11am-7pm), including lunch, was 120 L.E., about $22 per person. Despite applying lotion three times (SPF 60, no less) I did get some color on my shoulders and scalp, but have yet to actually be sunburned in Egypt, knock on wood.

By the time we got back to the hotel, most people were pretty exhausted- is there an actual physiological reason that the sun and outdoors makes you tired? I was so tired, I forewent dinner and fell asleep at about 8:30. I slept until 7am. After another incredible "Continental breakfast," we checked out of the hotel, sadly, and hopped on the bus for some sightseeing. We went first to the catacombs, which were discovered in 1900 when a donkey fell through the ground into the hole that made up the well in the middle of the tombs. While the tombs were historically interesting (they dated to the 2nd century), there were no actual remains left and compared to the vastness that were the Parisian catacombs, they lacked a bit.

Next, we went to the new Alexandria library, built in 2000 (I think). The ancient library in Alexandria was the foremost of academia in its day, but was destroyed in two fires, with all of its texts, save one- which now sits in Austria, for some reason. The new library isn't actually even on the site of the old library, but it is a pretty amazing library with amazing state-of-the-art technology- the coolest of which is a machine which will, for a particular price, copy an entire book from the library's archives and bind it for you. We spent some time on a tour of the library and then wandered around the archives for a bit. Then it was off to lunch- which for most, sadly, was McDonald's. Come on, people. I walked across the street to a pizza/sandwich place with a couple friends where we watched a guy flipping dough to make stuffed pies and cook them in a big stone oven. Take that, Ronald!

Finally, we drove to Quait Bay, a fort set on the site of the Alexandria Lighthouse (one of the seven wonders of the ancient world). Here, we walked through a short tour of the fort and saw some of the great architecture before we headed out to the outer walls which the Mediterranean waves smash up against. The sky was an amazingly brilliant blue and it was picture time- speaking of which, I've updated all my photos to the Alexandria folder. If the old link doesn't work, let me know. I'm also putting some others in the old Cairo folder.

We hopped back on the bus after Quait Bay and ended our Alexandria excursion. All in all, the city itself is similar to Cairo (though less crowded). It's still not the cleanest city in the world and the food, while different, isn't the best in the world. However, the waterfront in Alexandria is absolutely gorgeous, helped by the fact that the weather is perfect every day. It never rains and the heat is better than in Cairo, with a soft little breeze to move through the palm trees. While the historical sites weren't as stressed on the trip as other Egyptian history is, having a day to just sit around at the beach and goof off was nice (despite all the writing I do about Egypt's culture, etc. and sites I've seen, and despite my Dad's last comment, we do actually get quite a bit of reading to do for classes).