Alexandria and the North Coast

Alexander's city

Alexandria was founded in 331 BC by Alexander the Great, whose name it bears. Capital of the Ptolemies, it was one of the great intellectual centres of the ancient world, with its library and its lighthouse. Nothing visible remains of either, but the city keeps their place:

• Qaitbay Fort, built from 1477 to 1479 by the Mamluk sultan Qaitbay, stands on the ruins of the ancient lighthouse, by the sea. It is open from 9 am to 8 pm local time; entry costs 200 Egyptian pounds (EGP) for a foreign adult.
• The Bibliotheca Alexandrina, opened in 2002, takes up the idea of the ancient library: a large, circular, tilted building designed by the Norwegian architecture firm Snøhetta, housing the library, a planetarium and several museums.

Roman Alexandria is easier to see:

• The Kom el-Shuqafa catacombs are an underground necropolis of the Roman period.
• Diocletian's Column, raised in the late AD 290s, is wrongly known as "Pompey's Pillar".
• Kom el-Dikka is a Roman and Byzantine quarter of the 2nd to 6th centuries: a small Roman theatre, the only one of its kind in Egypt, baths, lecture halls and the Villa of the Birds, with its mosaics.
• The Graeco-Roman Museum reopened in October 2023 after nearly twenty years of work: about 10,000 objects found in Alexandria, from the 5th century BC to the Byzantine period, shown in chronological order.

The cosmopolitan city

Alexandria is now Egypt's second city, and Egyptians call it the "Bride of the Mediterranean". Its cosmopolitan history can still be read in the city, and explored on foot:

• The Cavafy Museum, the former flat of the Greek Alexandrian poet Constantine Cavafy (1863-1933), which keeps his documents and manuscripts;
• The Antoniadis Villa, a 19th-century residence with gardens laid out like a small Versailles;
• The Montaza Gardens, east of the city, once the gardens of Muhammad Ali's royal family;
• The mosques, churches and synagogues of the centre, witnesses to the city's communities.

The Corniche, along the sea, links all these districts. In the evening, Alexandria is one of the good places in Egypt for fish and seafood.

A day or a night

Alexandria can be visited in a day from Cairo. The Talgo train takes about 2 h 30 from Ramses station; it is best to buy a ticket to Alexandria's central station, as Sidi Gaber station is about 3 km from the centre. Organised day trips last around twelve hours.

Sabaro suggests this order: the Kom el-Shuqafa catacombs and Diocletian's Column in the morning, then Kom el-Dikka and the Graeco-Roman Museum, the Bibliotheca Alexandrina in the early afternoon, and Qaitbay Fort at the end of the day: it stays open until 8 pm.

A night in town gives time for the cosmopolitan city and the Corniche in the evening. The Four Seasons, on the Corniche at San Stefano, has a private beach and a pool.

The North Coast and El Alamein

West of Alexandria, the North Coast, the Sahel to Egyptians, is their great summer holiday destination: they head there mainly in July and August to escape the heat. Most beaches are private, reserved for residents of the developments and hotel guests, and the best addresses fill up early in the summer.

• Marassi, at km 129 of the Alexandria-Marsa Matruh road, holds two hotels from the Sabaro selection: Al Alamein Hotel, a beach hotel opened in 1960 on Sidi Abdel Rahman Bay, and Address Marassi Golf Resort, beside an 18-hole course.
• New Alamein, a new city under construction, has already opened a 14 km corniche.
• El Alamein is also a place of remembrance. The two battles of El Alamein, in 1942, left more than 26,000 killed and wounded in the Commonwealth armies alone. The Commonwealth war cemetery holds 7,240 Second World War graves, and a military museum tells the story of the fighting.

Seasons

The 1991-2020 normals of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) for Alexandria show a Mediterranean climate, unlike the rest of Egypt:

• Winter is mild and wet: 18 to 20 °C average maximum from December to February, and 61 mm of rain in January, over about 8 days. A jacket and an umbrella are worth packing.
• Spring and autumn are the best seasons for the city, around 24 to 28 °C in April, May and October.
• Summer stays moderate, around 30 to 31 °C in July and August: this is beach season. The sea then reaches 27 to 28 °C, against 17 to 18 °C in February and March.