Walk from Bab el Futuh to Bab el Nasser,
Babylon Fortress discovery &  Nilometre uncovered

Bab el Naser, old Cairo city gate

                                                                                                                                                       

Yesterday, before coming back to Sharm el Sheikh I decided to take Cairo city tour and to visit places I went before, around 5 years ago and see how they changed since that time. Honestly, they changed a lot, some to better some to worse, some lost their authentic atmosphere, became more touristic destinations then before. But let us start from the beginning.

In the morning as it was Friday, the city was really empty, so we could reach so many places just in a couple of hours. I took my hubby and daughter and we went to Khan el Khalili area, but this time I did not want to enter from the bazaar, I decided to take a tour from one Cairo city gate to another, exactly from Bab el Foutuh to Bab el Nasser via street called el Muaz el Din. The street is known for its Islamic monuments, old mosques and sabils, beautiful nobles houses. So we started from el Hakim mosque toward el Hosein area. The street now is clean and paved, became wider then some years ago when I was there last time. Now cars can pass by, so not that safe place to walk became, but still it is the place to be and to discover all those sabils, kuttabs and madrasas. Just to see the changes and take pictures as I lost my pictures archive recently, we spent one hour walking around.

Bab el Futuh, Old Cairo city Gate

Our next destination was Old Cairo, it is really close to Khan el Khalily area, so we took just 15 minutes to reach our next destination. The place surprised and amazed me at the same time, so many changes, and all to the better. Old Cairo is famous for its Christian monuments such as Hanging church el Mualaka, St George and St Barbara churches. Also you will find ancient synagogue there. But again, the aim was not the Christian monuments, the aim was more ancient place, fortress known as Babylon! I do believe you heard about it (remember the TV series Babylon 5? :)) At last I saw the ruins of this famous fortress, shame to me, I visited Old Cairo so many time but could not do a couple of steps to see the fortress.

The remains of Fort Babylon, Old Cairo, Egypt

And now the place arranged better with easier excess to the monuments than some years ago when I was there. There is a wide and cars free street along which you can easily walk and observe huge churches. Entrance to all churches here is free of charge and you will always find there Egyptian Copts, especially they are many on weekends. So, our goal was reached.

I took a lot of pictures and we moved to another very interesting location. I heard about the location, I read about the location, I even passed by the location but never entered! It was my mistake, to wait for so many years before I discovered the place, amazing place called Nilometre.

Nilometre, view from inside, from down

Nilometre is situated in a very distant place, not on touristic trap at all and is not that easily to be reached, we spend around 1 hour searching for it, even Google maps did not help us, we passed by so close, but still could not find the entrance! At last, after so many circles around Manial island, where the building is located we could manage to find the entrance to the place. To tell the truth, the time, wasted to reach the location worth every minute. Nilometre is amazing, very unique structure and deserves to be on touristic maps. I will just tell you that the structure was used to measure the Nile, to see if there will be flood or no. And the unique feature of the structure is that exactly here the 1^st time in Egypt Kufic script was used for inscriptions. Here are some pictures to get the idea.

On the way home, we passed by one more interesting structure, but pictures unfortunately are not that good as the structure is situated on a busy highway, so not that easy to take good picture. I am talking about Aqueduct. It was use to bring water to the Citadel of Salah el Din from the Nile. The structure remains is long enough and very well shown from many streets, you can pass by it easily, but again – not a touristic trap.

Aqueduct, to the right side

More pictures later on I will put in the album
in my Google + profile, do not miss it.