Bahla Fort

Bahla Fort - UNESCO World Heritage Site

From the World Heritage inscription for the Bahla Fort: The immense, ruined Bahla Fort, with its walls and towers of mud brick on stone foundations and the adjacent Friday Mosque with its decoratively sculpted prayer niche (mihrab) dominate the surrounding mud-brick settlement and palm grove. The fort and settlement, a mud-walled oasis in the Omani …

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Historic Cairo

Historic Cairo - UNESCO World Heritage Site, Egypt

From the World Heritage inscription for Historic Cairo: Tucked away amid the modern urban area of Cairo lies one of the world’s oldest Islamic cities, with its famous mosques, madrasas, hammams, and fountains. Founded in the 10th century, it became the new center of the Islamic world, reaching its golden age in the 14th century. …

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Memphis and its Necropolis: the Pyramid Fields from Giza to Dahshur

Memphis and its Necropolis: the Pyramid Fields from Giza to Dahshur World Heritage Site

From the World Heritage inscription for Memphis and its Necropolis: the Pyramid Fields from Giza to Dahshur: The capital of the Old Kingdom of Egypt has some extraordinary funerary monuments, including rock tombs, ornate mastabas, temples, and pyramids. In ancient times, the site was considered one of the Seven Wonders of the World. There isn’t …

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Nubian Monuments from Abu Simbel to Philae

Nubian Monuments from Abu Simbel to Philae - UNESCO World Heritage Site

From the World Heritage inscription for the Nubian Monuments from Abu Simbel to Philae: This outstanding archaeological area contains such magnificent monuments as the Temples of Ramses II at Abu Simbel and the Sanctuary of Isis at Philae, which were saved from the rising waters of the Nile thanks to the International Campaign launched by …

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Ancient Thebes with its Necropolis

Ancient Thebes with its Necropolis - UNESCO World Heritage Site

From the World Heritage inscription for Ancient Thebes with its Necropolis: Thebes, the city of the god Amon, was the capital of Egypt during the period of the Middle and New Kingdoms. With the temples and palaces at Karnak and Luxor and the necropolises of the Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the …

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Saint Catherine Area

Saint Catherine Area - UNESCO World Heritage Site

From the World Heritage inscription for Saint Catherine Area: The Orthodox Monastery of St Catherine stands at the foot of Mount Horeb where, the Old Testament records, Moses received the Tablets of the Law. The mountain is known and revered by Muslims as Jebel Musa. The entire area is sacred to three world religions: Christianity, …

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Visiting the Pyramids of Egypt: A Survival Guide

How to Survive a Visit to the Pyramids of Egypt

Usually, I write about the history, the mystery, and the grandeur of a place like the pyramids. For over 4,000 years the pyramids have been one of the best-known structures on Earth. We’ve probably all seen TV shows, read books, or perhaps wrote a fourth-grade report on them, so there is nothing I can really …

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Photo Essay: 20+ Photos of Amazing Egypt

Photos of Egypt: Pyramids, Sphinxes, and more

Egypt had long been a place I was eager to visit, it was high on my travel bucket list during my previous two years of traveling the world. The Pyramids of Giza and the other Egyptian ruins are some of the most ancient remnants of human civilization. Visiting Egypt didn’t disappoint. Despite a rather negative …

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Out of Africa

The last 60 hours have been interesting to say the least. To tell the story will take a bit of time and is a great reminder of how things on the road are totally out of your control. The plan was to leave Luxor on Friday evening hoping to take a bus to Hurghada on …

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