Fayoum

Fayoum was the first capital of Egypt and is now an agricultural town that is steeped in history. I was drawn to the area when I heard about the whale bones that were discovered there in the late 1800s. I was assured that a quick day trip would allow me to see all of Fayoum and have plenty of time to spare. Well I think it is a weekend trip if you have any interest in history.

It took 2.5 hours to get to the whale bones area and that is not the furthest thing to see. We stopped at the waterfall area first and saw it was frothy, which means pollutants. Big surprise that water in Egypt would be polluted!

Anyways...

2 dudes working for The Geological Survey of Egypt scoped out the area and unearthed a wealth of fossils. One of them recognised the remains of a Palaeomastodon, the oldest known elephant, discovered by a Bedouin in the Fayoum.

Here is a vertebrate from a Basilosaurus whale. Looks like a fungus is growing out of it but that is part of the spine stuff.

This dude is long.
The girls born to be paleontologists!


If you could see it better you would see where the teeth that looked like saws where.

Cool stuff petrified to the rock.



Ain't she a poser!

Cathy is kind enough to give us a lesson in geology.


Petrified Mangrove roots (grow in very salty water)



It takes 3 of them to figure out what we are looking at.







Looks like the Sphinx with his head turned.

A giant sea slug?









Laura's favorite area, turtles!



After several hours on this beautiful sunny day and 13 sights later we saw the exit sign. It was a little anti climatic for me. I had heard that you could see complete skeletons of the whales. I found out from a local that the "guides" sell the bones to tourists for money. There use to be 50+ sights but they have been sold, stolen, vandalized, and move to museums.


They have a camel ride if you want to climb aboard these little baby camels. How cruel for the youngins. The cattle Egret was getting its full though.







This is the local Police station. No one was there though, must have been out on patrol, or a sleep in the desert somewhere.



Definitely a highlight! We are on our way back to Cairo and Sameh, our driver, keeps stopping and asking the locals something in Arabic. We finally realize that the car is almost on empty. We pull into a gas station and wait our turn like a normal fill up. After 5 minutes they tell us no buy here that they do not have the right kind of gas for this car. Sameh asks feyn? Where do they sell it? Over the tracks and through the trash to the gas station we go.

Sameh pulls to the side of the road like he has done 10 times already so we assume he is asking for directions again. Then he smiles and says "no here we get petrol".

After they negotiated a price and verify the gas can go in this kind of car the "owner" pulls out a funnel and sticks it in the gas tank.

Sameh had the man measure out each liter and then pour it into the car.

Backup supply of gas...for the other kind of cars.

Son in training, hoping one day, to inherit this fine operation.

Younger sibling is fascinated by the cameras.

Lookie that another customer!

These guys do not worry about gas. They carry the fuel with them.

And so we left Fayoum with many thoughts of returning to enjoy the peacefule life the country folk live.