We had brekkies at the Hotel, a nice, simple, offering of a mix of European breakfast, American breakfast, and Egyptian breakfast. The foul was not as good as the Ritz-Carlton. I don't think anyone can live up to that standard...so good!
We wandered down to the waterfront to try to see if we could find the Sudan, our boat that we leave one tomorrow. We were inundated with touts. Eventually, we had to escape into a hotel. The Winter Palace. It indeed was a fabulous old lady of a hotel.
A beautiful garden which led to a pool area and a bar! Woohoo. We had drinks and lunch and reveled in the old world, old money charm of the place.
We wandered through the lobby on our way out, and wow, very high ceilings and old clubby chairs and lots of brass. The rooms where very large in this wing. There is a newer wing where, according to Yelp, the AC works better. Those were blocky buildings near the pool and did not have the dreamy Raj feel to them.
Leaving left us back on the tout filled streets. They just didn't take no for an answer, pester, pester, pester. There were times that I was about to scream.
We walked down the corniche to the museum only to find that it was closed until 5 pm. We wandered some more side streets and ended up circling back to the hotel. After a bit of a nap, we hit the streets again for a dinner. Our original destination was a restaurant that was near the Winter Palace. We opted for a back loop by way of the train station. Somewhere we picked up the very dedicated tout who followed us with his horse carriage even thought Bill made it clear that we were not going to use it, get in it, or pay for it. Bill also pointed out that he would be better looking for other customers as we were not going to use him. The tout was unperturbed. He kept following us and injecting some comments into our conversation every once in a while. It got so annoying that we opted to escape in a fish restaurant. What a fabulous decision that was. This was a little hole in the wall, clean restaurant that specialized in fish. The proprietor brought out a plate of prawns for us to see how fresh they were. We stayed.
This fish soup was AWESOME. I have never had such flavorful broth in a soup. No whiff of oldness in it. Dream worthy.
There were also Nile Perch that were roasted with delicious herbs and spices on top. Both Bill and I were swooning over this meal.
As we exit, damn, there is the tout again. Now he is complaining that he was waiting for us, blah, blah, and Bill just turns around and say, "Look, we told you, you made a decision to follow us and we said we were in no way going to use your carriage or services. So that is on you." He finally took off.
On our way back to the hotel, we run into the guide/tout from the previous night, come the t-shirt guy is waiting for you. There is no breaks here! Bill and I ended up buying 2 polo shirts with our motto in hieroglyphics "annoyance equals love".
We wandered down to the waterfront to try to see if we could find the Sudan, our boat that we leave one tomorrow. We were inundated with touts. Eventually, we had to escape into a hotel. The Winter Palace. It indeed was a fabulous old lady of a hotel.
A beautiful garden which led to a pool area and a bar! Woohoo. We had drinks and lunch and reveled in the old world, old money charm of the place.
We wandered through the lobby on our way out, and wow, very high ceilings and old clubby chairs and lots of brass. The rooms where very large in this wing. There is a newer wing where, according to Yelp, the AC works better. Those were blocky buildings near the pool and did not have the dreamy Raj feel to them.
Leaving left us back on the tout filled streets. They just didn't take no for an answer, pester, pester, pester. There were times that I was about to scream.
We walked down the corniche to the museum only to find that it was closed until 5 pm. We wandered some more side streets and ended up circling back to the hotel. After a bit of a nap, we hit the streets again for a dinner. Our original destination was a restaurant that was near the Winter Palace. We opted for a back loop by way of the train station. Somewhere we picked up the very dedicated tout who followed us with his horse carriage even thought Bill made it clear that we were not going to use it, get in it, or pay for it. Bill also pointed out that he would be better looking for other customers as we were not going to use him. The tout was unperturbed. He kept following us and injecting some comments into our conversation every once in a while. It got so annoying that we opted to escape in a fish restaurant. What a fabulous decision that was. This was a little hole in the wall, clean restaurant that specialized in fish. The proprietor brought out a plate of prawns for us to see how fresh they were. We stayed.
There were also Nile Perch that were roasted with delicious herbs and spices on top. Both Bill and I were swooning over this meal.
As we exit, damn, there is the tout again. Now he is complaining that he was waiting for us, blah, blah, and Bill just turns around and say, "Look, we told you, you made a decision to follow us and we said we were in no way going to use your carriage or services. So that is on you." He finally took off.
On our way back to the hotel, we run into the guide/tout from the previous night, come the t-shirt guy is waiting for you. There is no breaks here! Bill and I ended up buying 2 polo shirts with our motto in hieroglyphics "annoyance equals love".
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