Goodbye Paris, Hello Cairo
Saturday 5 July
Today we were off to Cairo, our plane was due to leave at 3.45pm from Cdg airport. As it was an international flight we had to check in about 2 hours before then, so we needed to catch the 11.30am bus to leave us plenty of time.
We had packed carefully and were still under our limit, so we left our bags in our room and walked down to Galleries Lafayette, David's turn this time.
We had about an hour to spend, however nothing was quite what he wanted, so we called it a day and went to the station for one last coffee and Quiche Lorraine - we had had no breakfast, so I was ready for something to eat and of course it was delicious.
Back to the hotel to collect our luggage and wait for the bus. It was on time, there were quite a few people waiting, there was a big burly guy there to load our heavy bags, we chose good seats at the front and 5 mins later were on our way.
It was a lovely ride through Montparnasse and the suburbs of Paris, such a lovely city, full of side walk cafes and somehow the French women look smart and chic - I must try harder to check what I am wearing, baggy jeans and sweatshirts don't cut it really!
We arrived without incident and looked up at the 'departures' board, a nice helpful lady showed us where to go to find Egypt Air and without much effort we were next in the queue such as it was, more of a gathering on the line! Our bags were checked in, we were checked in and were given two seats together at the back, which was ok. The lady behind the counter said "only two bags?" and looked surprised, I looked around me and realised that everyone else had a trolley full, five, six bags, no problem, they probably paid for the extra weight, but Arabic people don't travel light!! And as for their hand luggage, well........
It's a long way to walk to the gate!
We now had a couple of hours to wait, so we went through customs and immigration and found our gate number and read our current reading matter. Our boarding passes said boarding at 2.45pm. The Egypt Air plane came in and disembarked its passengers, then at 3.15pm we told ourselves that 2.45 was too early to embark anyway. Then 3.30, then 3.45, then 4.00pm. Mmmmm.... There were a lot of families milling around, school holidays had a just begun in France, so I guess they were going home, probably for the festival of Ramadan.
Then a garbled announcement came over in French and English, something about a technical problem. No worries, we started boarding around 4.15pm and it was absolutely packed, a 777-300 with around 380 passengers and crew. So we sat and sat, others got up and opened the overhead lockers, others used the toilets, which happened to be right next to our seat. No word from the captain or crew. The crew sat in the kitchen behind us chatting and laughing, meanwhile the passengers are getting louder and more active, then suddenly we are backing out, great, at last, no word about seat belts or 'crew arm your doors', the safety procedure film was shown when we first got on. But we were at least moving. But not for long, I guess they wanted to use the gate for the next plane to disembark. So we sat on the Tarmac for an hour and then another garbled message about having to disembark, please take your luggage. People who were not already up got up and opened up overhead lockers, this inspite of the seat belt sign still on, without warning the plane moved off, stewards just walking around not looking like they knew what was happening either, we did a full circle of the aerodrome and came back to the same gate we had boarded on an hour and a half ago.
So we scrambled for a seat in the lounge and the children were irritable and bored, glad I didn't have any to look after. We were all hungry and thirsty by now, it was after 6.00pm, there was another announcement that I couldn't decipher, but most of the others got up and pushed their way to the sandwich bar, it was madness. There was nothing else open, all the shutters on the shops were down. How can two people serve 380 with a limit of one packet of sandwiches each? David lined up (well sort of) and it took 20 mins of queuing to get ours. At 7.00pm a big sigh of relief (certainly from me, we had the pyramids to see tomorrow) and we were told to board again. Same procedure, tickets and passport checks.
Good, all set to go, passengers were understandably restless and children calling out, some crying, it was well past their bed time and they were probably hungry. Still no word from the captain, and the crew did not seem to know any more than we did. Then 15, 20 mins still waiting to go. One guy called for the cabin steward, by this time half the passengers had been up and down getting bags out of lockers, putting them back, going to the toilet again, so when she came he seemed to be demanding to be let off, quite a lot of discussion in raised voices, then some of the other male passengers joined in, I think there were a lot of families who knew each other from Paris and so there was a lot of group talk going on between rows and aisles. The crew member must have gone to get someone senior to speak to this man as she came back with the only male steward on the plane. Then without any warning we were being pushed backwards again, the seat belt signs were still on and here was this gathering still standing and some people were still opening their lockers.
Unbelievable - note the seat belt sign on !Such a lack of discipline, I was really quite alarmed, why on earth weren't the cabin crew telling people to sit down. This was still going on while we were taxiing to the runway. Eventually the passengers settled down and the crew did a cursory walk up and down, still no word from the captain, I guess the crew weren't told anything either so did their best to allay anyone's fears, no apology or explanation, nothing. I think everyone was just glad to be getting in the air, it was 8.30pm, five hours late.
We didn't get any refreshments served until about an hour and a half into our flight, people were going to the back getting themselves drinks of water - me too, I was so thirsty. Half an hour before coming into land the message came over about landing, in Arabic and French, we came into land and I realised that I was still reading from my iPad, the stewards had done the check but obviously didn't know what to look for, I certainly got no reminder, neither did the man behind me who was talking on his mobile!
David and I were a bit worried that the tour guide would have given up and we would have to find a taxi at 1.00am! We got through customs ok and almost as soon as we entered the baggage claim area, our guide came to collect us, such a nice guy, he introduced himself "Mohamed".
The arrival hall at Cairo Airport
He was full of apologies for the late arrival, and David wasted no time before telling him how appalling Egypt Airlines was. It was at least half an hour before our baggage appeared so I took a few photos (as you do!), and I carefully avoided taking shots directly of people, especially women in Burkas - I had been warned!
So we then met Steve, our driver, and his combi van, well a van type people mover. And we took off, even at that time of night it looked chaotic, he seemed to race from gap to gap in the traffic, I was to get used to this over the next two days! We arrived at our hotel, strict security, the van was stopped and guards checked it out, and as we entered the doors to the reception we had to put our bags through their x-ray machine. But we were soon in our room, they had upgraded us to a lovely room on the 10th floor with a huge picture window overlooking the Nile, the lights were twinkling on the other side and boats were going up and down decked out in colourful lights.
We unpacked as little as we could, we had to be at reception by 8.00am next day so we set the alarm for 6.00am! It didn't take long to go to sleep on our huge king bed.
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