Alexandria Day 2 - 9/22/17
Hello everyone! It's Rachael. Today was our second day in Alexandria.
After fueling our bodies with yet another outstanding hotel breakfast buffet, we set out to tour four sites. The first was a 15th century defensive fortress, called the Qatay Fortress, right on the coast of the Mediterranean and on the site of the old lighthouse. Next, we saw some catacombs, which were apparently discovered when some donkey fell into it while they were excavating the site, so that was kind of funny. After that we went to Pompey's Pillar at the Serapeum, which apparently is also sometimes referred to as simply "the column" because it's pretty much just a giant old column that used to be surrounded by the rest of a temple. The fourth site we went to was Kom el Dikka which is the site of a Roman amphitheater and some other structures dating back to the Graeco-Roman Period. The sites were each pretty cool in their own way and I think it's been interesting to see sites from different eras because I have often clumped "Ancient Egypt" together in my mind as one thing but seeing these distinctly different sites really helps to date events and form a chronological story of Egyptian history.
After our four hour bus ride home, a group of us went to an outdoor concert with a few AUC friends. The main band was The Sharmoofers, which I would highly recommend to anyone who enjoys a strong dance vibe and doesn't mind meaningless lyrics. It was another long, eventful day in Egypt.
After fueling our bodies with yet another outstanding hotel breakfast buffet, we set out to tour four sites. The first was a 15th century defensive fortress, called the Qatay Fortress, right on the coast of the Mediterranean and on the site of the old lighthouse. Next, we saw some catacombs, which were apparently discovered when some donkey fell into it while they were excavating the site, so that was kind of funny. After that we went to Pompey's Pillar at the Serapeum, which apparently is also sometimes referred to as simply "the column" because it's pretty much just a giant old column that used to be surrounded by the rest of a temple. The fourth site we went to was Kom el Dikka which is the site of a Roman amphitheater and some other structures dating back to the Graeco-Roman Period. The sites were each pretty cool in their own way and I think it's been interesting to see sites from different eras because I have often clumped "Ancient Egypt" together in my mind as one thing but seeing these distinctly different sites really helps to date events and form a chronological story of Egyptian history.
After our four hour bus ride home, a group of us went to an outdoor concert with a few AUC friends. The main band was The Sharmoofers, which I would highly recommend to anyone who enjoys a strong dance vibe and doesn't mind meaningless lyrics. It was another long, eventful day in Egypt.
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