Egypt - Wednesday 14th May - Cairo

 

Finally after years of planning its May the 14th 2025 and we are in Egypt.

 

The flight was about 3 hours from London, and I saw the pyramids from the plane window. 

 

There was a friendly Viking staff member at the airport to help with our visa's. 25 US  dollars for each of us and we have coloured bit of paper (visa)  in our passports.

There were about a dozen people on the same flight that are in our tour group. 

 

Then we met Caroline who will be our guide in Egypt. We are on bus C, and we will be with the same group of people nearly every time we have a bus tour.

 Time changed and it was a bit of a drive from the airport so it was early evening when we got to our hotel.

 

For the  next 3 nights we are at the Fairmont Hotel Nile city. We have a beautiful view of the Nile outside our window.

They gave us twin beds!

That's okay, we might sleep better. 

 

London - Tuesday 13th May - Heathrow

We are staying near Heathrow as we have an early flight and have to be at the airport by 7am.

So this is a very boring photo from the window of the Ibis at Heathrow. 

 

Following a short but convoluted train trip from Coventry.  

We changed trains at Euston street and who did we run into.

 

Matthew Flinders and his cat Trim.

 

 There is a twin of this statue in Port Lincoln South Australia and we were only there six months ago.

 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-25/matthew-flinders-remains-discovered-london/10748938

 They found his grave when they were renovating the station.

 

Now its time for the main part of this journey although it feels like we have been traveling for weeks.

 

At least from now on someone will look after us and we won't be dragging our luggage around as much.

 

See you in Cairo.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Liverpool to Coventry - Monday 12th May - This bit of the journey is nearly over

We are heading by train back towards London.

As we had a night to fill in we stopped at Coventry.

 This is another cathedral that was bombed in 1940 so it has been left as a shell.

Graham took these photos as my camera battery died. 

They have built a rather beautiful new Cathedral next door.

 https://www.coventrycathedral.org.uk/

Okay - thats enough churches for one trip...

 

Lets go and find Lady Godiva. 

Yes, she's a Coventry local. 

 

 

Liverpool - Sunday 11th May - Liver Building

A nice man from Melbourne took this photo for us, and Graham took one of him.

 With the Beatles.

 

Today we have tickets for a tour of the Liver Building  and we are going all the way up to the top above the clocks. All those stairs! It was a bit of a training session for all those tombs and temples we will be visiting in less than a weeks time.

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Liver_Building 

 

Now for a bit about the fabled Bella and Bertie.

 

Some say - that if Bella and Bertie leave town Liverpool will fall.

Others say - That Bella is waiting for sailors to return and Bertie is looking to see which pubs are open.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liver_bird 

 

We have made it to the first stage below the clocks.

That is the bronze of the Beatles circled in blue. The white building is the ferry terminal where we were a few days ago. The ferry is on its way in. You can see the old docks.

 

They showed us a great in the round film about Liverpool which was beautiful (but couldn't take pictures), It showed the difference of the pre war and post WW2 city, with added Beatles of course

(At least it didn't breakdown like the Banockburn one).

This is a trick.

They are not the clock faces but projections.

 

Then more stairs and we are at the very top.

 

 

I think that was the best thing we did in Liverpool, even beats the ferry and the Beatles museum.

I was tempted by the fluffy Liver birds in the gift shop but I decided I was carrying around far too many fluffy souvenirs for a 62 year old woman.

 

  

Then we intended to visit St Georges hall but when we got there we found you needed to pre-book so we went to the natural history and saw more rocks and taxidermy. (I must have been a bit 'tired'  at this point because I took no photos).

 

Tonight I'm a bit fed up with this eating/cooking at home stuff,,,

 

We went to a beautiful Lebanese supermarket, just down the street from our apartment, and if I had more time to think about it I could have put something together for dinner. The flat breads looked amazing. I wish we had a supermarket like that at home. 

 

So instead across London street was a middle Eastern Restaurant.

 

 

 We ordered what seemed like sensible sized meals.

But they gave us and everyone an unexpected but delicious lentil soup starter.

That and the beautiful bread would have done me.

 

But. then the delicious food kept coming.

 

Others in the restaurant ordered big meals then took half of it home in takeaway boxes, which is what I would have done if we weren't traveling on the next day!

 

Oh goodness, just as well I love middle eastern Food.

We are going to have a lot of it over the next 2 weeks

 

 

 

  
 

Liverpool - Saturday 10th May - Three churches in one day

But before the Cathedrals and the church, we visited a different place of worship, the cavern club in Matthew street and above is me outside posing with Cilla Black.

 

It isn't even the real Cavern club which no longer exists. 

 

Do you think this bloke is a bouncer?

 

 

There is a cruise ship in port. So thousands of German speaking tourists wandering around.

 

Now to the cathedrals.

Neither of us is very religious but we do like an historic building and interesting architecture,  long time readers of the blog will know how many churches we have visited.

 

So our first stop was the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral.

 

This is affectionately known by locals as 'Paddy's Wigwam'. 

It was opened in the late 1960's and they are currently building a new cafe (and new shop I bet).

 

 

 

I do like to see a church in use by its congregation.

This was defiantly in use with a first communion going on when we got there, so we were shoo-ed away. We went and had some lunch and came back an hour later. Little girls all in white dresses, and boys in white suits.

 

 

The interior is all round which is lovely.

 

Then we got into trouble from the cathedral bouncer for taking photos in the sanctuary. 

There was nothing to tell me not to take photos and I'm so careful to respect the wishes of places like this when we visit. Well that's my illegal pic above which includes candle snuffing cathedral bouncer man...

 

So lets go somewhere we will feel more welcome. That other Cathedral from the Anglican mob.

Liverpool Cathedral. 

 

 

This ones not very old either, started in the early 1900's and finished in the1970's. Although it hasn't got a spire so maybe its not finished yet.

Its the largest Cathedral in Britain and one of the largest in the world, and its made of brick. 

 

I wonder if these two cathedrals compete against each other.

Surely not.  

 

 

Of course they do. Its like being on two opposing football teams. 

 

 

 

 

A Liver bird?... Maybe.

 

 

 Then our last stop for the day.

 

St Luke's Church. 

 

 

Its been left as a ruin and today there is an international  food festival on, lets dance like Greeks and smash some plates. A lovely space that welcomes the whole community.