DAY TOUR TO THE CAVE CHURCH OF SAINT SIMON, GARBAGE CITY AND COPTIC CAIRO

At 8:00 am you need to be ready at the lobby area of your hotel in Cairo. Our expert tour guide will pick you up from there holding a sign of your name. Firstly,  you will visit the Cave Church which is one of the largest churches in the country, a place where 70,000-plus Christians gather every week to worship and praise Jesus — a place that’s home to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities. The cave, also known as the Monastery of Saint Simon, is located in the Mokattam mountain in southeastern Cairo, in an area known as “Garbage City” due to the large population of garbage collectors, or Zabbaleen, that live there.

The Zabbaleen are descendants of farmers who started migrating from Upper Egypt to Cairo in the 1940s. Fleeing poor harvests and poverty they came to the city looking for work and set-up makeshift settlements around the city. Initially, they stuck to their tradition of raising pigs, goats, chickens and other animals, but eventually found collecting and sorting of waste produced by the city residents more profitable. The Zabbaleen sort through household garbage, salvaging and selling things of value, while the organic waste provides an excellent source of food for their animals. In fact, this arrangement worked so well, that successive waves of migrants came from Upper Egypt to live and work in the newly founded garbage villages of Cairo.

Then visiting Old Cairo that known as Christian Coptic Cairo which is Among the most important locations visited by the Holy Family where the spiritual impact of their presence is most felt still; though their stay was brief, for the Governor of what was then Fustat enraged by the tumbling down of idols at Jesus’ approach sought to kill the Child. But they took shelter from his wrath in a cave above which, in later years, the Church of Abu Serga (St Sergius) was built. This and the whole area of the Fort of Babylon is a destination of pilgrimage not only for the Egyptians but for Christians from around the world. An air of piety and devotion pervades the whole district there. Also There you will be able to visit and Enter the Church of Abu-Sergah and St. Barbara, the hanging church, and the old Jewish synagogue – Ben Ezra Synagogue.  

At the end of the Tour, you will be transferred back to your Hotel.