Dec 29, 2013
Flight: Khartoum, Sudan (KRT)
to Cairo, Egypt (CAI), Egyptair, economy
Today I planned to have a look around Khartoum city and Omdurman on the other side of the Nile. My flight left this evening at 8:30 so I had almost a full day to explore. After breakfast I asked about getting a taxi or tuktuk (they have them here in Sudan now) to the National Museum. The hotel offered their shuttle van though we didn't discuss a price upfront. Traffic wasn't too bad especially along Nile road and we were at the museum in 15 minutes. The driver said he could leave then for 40 SDG or wait and go to Omdurman and back for 150 SDG ($20).. sounded like a fair deal to me so told him I would be about an hour in the museum.

The museum was only 4SDG, a great deal. Their collection was pretty good, huge Egyptian style statues, pottery, sarcophagi, etc. Upstairs they had a collection of Byzantine-style frescoes from one of the old Christian cities in Sudan. Back outside the museum in the courtyard were several shelters containing temples moved when Lake Nasser was created. One of the temples still had vibrant colored paint on the walls.

Creepy Agustus head from Meroe



It was an hour exactly when I headed back out to the shuttle and we next drove across the White Nile bridge to Omdurman. The two Niles mix here but the coloring was hard to see today. During flood season the difference in colors between the two rivers is more pronounced. It is illegal to take photos from the bridge but I snuck a few from the car.

Confluence of the Niles

Omdurman is actually a separate (and larger) city than Khartoum itself. It was the headquarters of the Mahdi's army during the wars against the British. The Battle of Omdurman in 1898-99 finally saw the defeat of the Mahdi's forces and institution of British rule for the next 50+ years. There were a couple of places I wanted to visit in Omdurman. The Beit al-Khalifa or Khalifa's house (successor to the Mahdi), Tomb of the Mahdi and the souq.

We arrived at the Beit al-Khalifa and there were lots of schoolkids here on a field trip. They seemed surprised and excited to see me and asked me where I was from, etc. I bought a ticket (3SDG) and headed into the house to get ahead of the crowd of students. They were taking turns as I ran into a few other groups that were already in the house. At the entrance to the house was a Nordenfelt machine gun. There were several old dusty coaches sitting in the garage. There were several exhibits of Khalifa's clothes, bed, etc. Also they had General Gordon's robes.


After the house I walked across the street to the tomb. It is only open on Fridays so I was only able to see the outside. There were some schoolgirls here and I asked if I could take a photo. As I was leaving some other girls called me over from their bus to talk to me. Quite fun! Everyone in Sudan had been pretty friendly.



Mahdi's Tomb

We drove to the souq next, the largest in Sudan. It didn't look very interesting and there wasn't anywhere to park so we just headed back to the hotel. We passed the 'Gadaffi Egg' an oddly shaped building financed Libya. I had a few hours to kill before my flight that evening so I tried taking a bit of a nap.. I wasn't sure how much sleep I would get with two connections via Cairo and Addis.

Tuk-tuk everywhere

We left for the airport about 6PM for my 8:30 flight. As it was I had plenty of time.. no line at checkin for Egyptair. I didn't notice my gold status on the BP but this was an award ticket anyway so wouldn't be earning miles. The airport was quite small too and I didn't see any lounges. Next was going through immigration. Unfortunately they did check to see if I had the registration sticker.. which I did not. There was an office right before immigration where you can pay the 236 SDG ($30 at black market rate) or $50. I had already spent all my SDG so got stung for the $50. Getting the sticker took a few minutes with a bunch of paper pushing around.

Next through security but they wouldn't let me through as it wasn't yet time for Egyptair flight (still 2hrs before flight). So sat down to wait... and wait, reading a kindle book on my phone. I kept looking at the clock on the wall which didn't seem to be moving very fast. Finally looked at my watch and it was 8PM.. the wall clock was indeed broken as it only said 7:30.

The boarding area was freezing cold AC. We boarded the Egyptair flight via bus and soon were on the way north to Cairo. The flight was about 2 hrs and arrived into Cairo at 10pm (they are one hour different from Khartoum). The new terminal is quite nice from what I remember flying through Cairo years before. The Egyptair lounge was pretty nice as well, with good speed wifi.



EgyptAir KRT-CAI



EgyptAir CAI lounge