Alexandria

It opened in 2002 near the site of the ancient one. The roof is tilted at an angle so that it faces where the sun rises over the sea.

Raised in the fifteenth century where the lighthouse had fallen, out of its own stone. It occupies the far end of a breakwater with water round three sides.

A spiral stair drops three levels into a Roman burial complex. Egyptian and Greek styles are carved together in the same chamber.

The road follows the bay for 20 kilometres and people sit along the sea wall. When the swell rises the spray comes over onto the road.

A single block of granite worked into a 27 metre column stands on the rise. In spite of the name Pompey had no connection to it.

Thirteen tiers of marble seating survive in a half circle. It turned up by chance during other work and digging continues beside it.

Pines were planted around a royal summer palace to make a garden running to the sea. The building stays closed and only the garden and the beach open.

Built in cream stone, its minaret reaches 73 metres and tops everything in the city. Marble paves the courtyard and stays cool underfoot.

As the boats land in the early morning an auction begins on the quay. A fish chosen there is taken next door and cooked to order.

The flat where a Greek poet lived stays untouched with his belongings on view. The street he wrote about shows through the window.

Opened in 1892, it was shut for renovation for years and reopened in 2023. A black granite statue of the bull god Apis is its signature piece. Coins, sculpture and mummy portraits of Ptolemaic Alexandria run in date order.

An Italianate mansion turned museum, one age per floor: pharaonic below ground, Graeco-Roman at street level, Coptic and Islamic upstairs. Sculpture raised from the eastern harbour seabed sits among them. Its size suits a one-day sweep of the city's past.

Princess Fatma al-Zahra's former palace in Zizinia, showing jewels of the Muhammad Ali dynasty. The building rivals the exhibits, its stained glass and painted ceilings differing room to room. Many leave only after inspecting even the bathroom tiles.

Rock-cut tombs of the Ptolemaic era, around the second century BC, with chambers opening off a court lined with Doric columns. A Greek-style painting of a horseman survives on one wall. Tucked among apartment blocks, it gets few visitors.

Ptolemaic rock tombs near Ras el-Tin palace, their walls painted to pass for marble and alabaster. Egyptian gods and Greek ornament share a single room. They are small, an easy stop between the fish market and Qaitbay Citadel.

A Nabi Daniel Street synagogue whose wide prayer hall, lined with marble columns, dates from an 1800s rebuilding. The Jewish community that once numbered tens of thousands here has almost gone. A government restoration brought it back into use in 2020.

Built in 2001 to carry the corniche across Stanley Bay, with tower-like ornaments at each end. Lit up after dark, it shows off the rows of beach cabins ringing the bay. Photos come out better from the beach cafes below than from the deck.

Furniture, mirrors and chandeliers from the Greek and Italian homes of the old cosmopolitan city are piled in shop after shop down the lanes. Digging turns up old postcards and photographs too. Furniture is hard to ship, so bargain over the small things.

Here the Nile's western branch reaches the coast; the Rosetta Stone turned up nearby in 1799. Ottoman houses of red and black brick still line the lanes with their wooden lattice windows. With Alexandria just over an hour west, one day covers it.

Site of the 1942 desert battles of the Second World War, where the Commonwealth cemetery ranks thousands of white headstones. German and Italian memorials stand a few km off. The coast road west from Alexandria runs just past a hundred km to reach it.

A fishing town at Alexandria's eastern end; in 1798 Nelson wrecked Napoleon's fleet in this bay at the Battle of the Nile. Ruins of ancient Canopus have been lifted from the seabed. Waterfront fish restaurants grill whatever you point at.