The day after the Pyramids we woke up pretty early. It must have been the sun and the heat of the desert and the more fatigated versions of our ourselves that made us move at a slowlier pace. On this day we would go on a road trip to Alexandria, the second largest city of Egypt, just about a 3-hour drive (sometimes 4, depending on the traffic) from Cairo. Alex, how locals call it, is the largest seaport and also the largest egyptian city on the Mediterranean coast, which is why it is very important, as the port serves approx. 80% of the country's imports and exports.

My uncle and his family love to drive to Alex whenever they can, so my visit was the perfect moment to go back to a city they really love and enjoy. Cairo is fantastic, but it can be asfixiating to live there and to be exposed to hours of traffic jam and chaos on a daily basis. On the other hand, Alex has that charm that only the Mediterranean sea grants to a special number of cities. I couldn't way to get there!

This city has also been the location of significant historical buildings throughout History. One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World was located here; The Pharos of Alexandria or Lighthouse of Alexandria was the tallest man-made structure on Earth for many centuries. Badly damaged because of three earthquakes, it would then become a ruin. The remnant stones were used to built the Citadel of Qaitbay around 1480. The city also hosted the Library of Alexandria, one of the largest and most significant libraries of the ancient world. The burning of this famous library meant the irretrievable loss of public knowledge. It is now replaced by a new one, the Bibliotheca Alexandrina.

To sum it up, Alexandria was on my top ten list of historical places to visit, and I still couldn't believe we were going! 
We took the Cairo-Alex highway, which is supposed to be faster, but we still got stuck in a brutal traffic jam just outside the city. The road to Alex was incredible: we drove past deserted landscape and the fertile lands of the Nile Delta. Every now and then, date palms adorned the sides of the road; small canals were to be seen and structures that looked like honeycombs, which are used to feed pigeons, as I was explained.
 We spent the next four hours listening to "C'est la vie" by Cheb Khaled and other songs that were simply fabulous for such a long drive. Every now and then, my little cousin Adrian would say "We are going to the Mediterranean sea", in such a funny manner I could only smile.
We were getting close, as I started to see the slums on both sides of the road. All of a sudden, I noticed a huge checkpoint adorned with Greek letters, which could only mean Alexandria. We were finally there!

The first stop was the Misr Train Station, of which I will tell you more on my next post!

Misr Train Station in Alex, Egypt

More about my road trip to Alex on my next posts!!!!
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Xoxo,
Astrid