MDs World Travels - Part I Egypt

Having spent a year in the UK office with only one quick excursion away I thought 2008 should be the year when I go and see where our Destination Managers hang out and what they get up to.  I embarked on a month long semi-‘ Round The World’ Tour from the Middle East to South East Asia.  

First up Egypt where I went to Cairo to see our Destination Manager Mohammed El Fayed and his team.
His staff of five all work out of a small office in Cairo booking transport, hotel accommodation, organising the tour leaders as well as training them and checking all the health and safety aspects of the trips.

Unable to experience a full Egypt trip I restricted myself to a City Starter Tour, half a day of checking out the Pyramids, the solar boat,  Great Sphinx and Egyptian museum followed by a half day on foot seeing the real Cairo. 

The sights, sounds and smells are amazing and two of the highlights were climbing to the top of the Bab Zuweyla gate and also finding a genuine Fez hat craftsman at work - a hat I could start my ‘Hats of the World’ collection with. We visited mosques, markets and ‘real life’ streets where people work and craftsmen build furniture.

Later, the guys took me to a local shisha bar, a popular past time.  Smells great but having given up smoking 10 years ago I wasn’t about to risk starting again.  I stuck to the Egyptian coffee!

In conclusion, Mohammed and his team work in a great city and do a great job.  No wonder Egypt is still such a popular destination - and I definitely recommend the city tour.

Off to Istanbul now .......To Be Continued!

Matt West
Managing Director
Imaginative Traveller