3. Yet Another Travel Day - Sept 27th 2025

 We get gently woken up from our in flight sleep on our Toronto to Cairo leg. The cabin lights are gradually brightened and there is quiet activity happening with cabin staff handing out neatly rolled and heated face clothes.  

Breakfast comes fast.  I decide on an omelet even though I’ve never had a decent in flight omelet and I left this one unfinished too.  Judith managed some fruit and a warm cinnamon roll.  As soon as the breakfast trays are cleared, we’re given some souvenir Turkish candy and then start descending into Istanbul.  It’s a big city (16 million).  We’re quickly on the ground and start our 3 hour layover.   

The layover goes fast.  We spent the time going through the stores and looking at how expensive everything was.  

A small part of the shopping concourse at Istanbul.  In the other direction of this walkway were all the designer stores such as Fendi, Chanel, Prada, Bulgaria, etc) 

I bought a bottle of water which worked out to $4.86 Cdn.  We saw an interesting piece of luggage and I was tempted…

This was an electric ride on carry on suitcase.  It was on sale for 479 Euros, or about $782 Cdn.  There are foot pedals at the sides.  We saw people riding them around.  

I did like the Istanbul Airport.  This airport is the first in the world to have “Triple Runway Operations” which allows simultaneous takeoff and landing on three independent runways.  To get to the terminal, our plane used a roadway at the end of these runways which was set well below the height of the runway.   

The control tower.  I like the fact the base wasn’t a plain cylinder shaped tower.  

The Istanbul terminal is being expanded to accommodate over 200 million passengers.  Compare that with Vancouver airport that is currently being used by around 26 million.   

Most of the airport time was spent chillin’.  I worked on my blog; Judith went to get in some steps.   We walked over to the boarding gate to wait for our flight.  The gate areas were huge and impressive.

The boarding gates area.  There were 4 boarding gates in this large wing.  

The flight to Cairo was only about 2.5 hours long and we expect to arrive about 9:00pm.  While we were waiting to depart at the gate, we were given entry cards to complete for our Egyptian visas.  Judith started completing hers and couldn’t find her passport.  She looked through all her baggage, pockets and seat several times before calling over one of the stewards who asked if she could help Judith look for it.  She went through all of Judith’s carry on and was there for what seemed like several minutes searching.  One of the other stewards came over to urge his colleague to prepare for takeoff.  But she was determined and finally found the passport under the footrest of the seat.  Our seats were like recliners with a leg section that folded outwards; she would have had to sweep her hand under that footrest section to find it.  It was tense while the passport was missing but a big relief when she held up her hand with that passport.  Both of us were thinking that we would be spending time at the Canadian Embassy…

We were met in the Cairo airport by Zevra, who was in the long line up of tour guides looking for their guests.  His sole job that evening was to help us through the visa process, gather our luggage and pass us over to another guide and driver who would take us to our hotel.   Zevra quickly negotiated us through that visa process and he was the first of many receiving baksheesh, an expected tip, for services rendered.  It supplements the low wages they receive and they rely on it to make a living.  

Zevra takes us out of the airport into a busy parking lot where we meet Yousef, our guide and Ashra, our driver.  We pile into a mini bus and we drive about an hour to our hotel, the Marriot Mena House Hotel.  The traffic reminds me of India where there is frequent lane changing, aggressive tailgating, horns and head light flicking.  It makes for an exciting drive.  

We pass by several buildings of note, but it’s dark out and difficult to see much.  Plus the driver is driving like everyone else on the road, so it’s as fast as possible even though there is lots of traffic out there.  Apparently people are pretty active at night; hence all that traffic.  That is so different in the city I live in.  

Our hotel looks pretty swank.  I’m looking forward to the morning where I should be able to view the Great Pyramid of Giza and the Pyramid of Khafre from my hotel room.

Judith and Yousef walking up to the hotel entrance.  The water feature is beautiful and impressive.  

Our hotel room.  I’m looking forward to getting a good sleep.