Saqqara is where Zoser’s and the Step Pyramid are located. It is in the middle of quite a long stretch of agricultural land. As those of you who know me, I am always interested in what people are growing – especially when I’m doing plenty of eating.

I will tell you that I thought that the crops in Egypt looked very good. Stands of wheat, barley, alfalfa and so on looked as good as maybe any that I have seen. The fields were not huge (American size), but the crops looked very consistent in size and color with no weeds or bald spots in most of the fields. The Egyptian farmers seem very experienced – like perhaps thousands of years worth.

In the first photo, you can see alfalfa in front, then wheat, and more inter-cropping of alfalfa and wheat. There’s a small patch of corn on the left about center of the picture. In the back, you can see date palms which were plentiful in Egypt.

In the second photo, alfalfa is again in front. If you look close, you can see that some has been harvested, but not like we do it. They only cut enough each day for their animals to eat that day. So the alfalfa always has patches that have been cut with other sections that are very tall. You can also see more wheat in the background. There are also some vegetables growing in this picture. On the left, I think is a small bit of sugar cane. And of course, there are more date palms growing here as well.

Much of the farming is being done very low tech. We saw most people cutting the alfalfa by hand. In the next photos, I will take a look at agricultural transportation. You can see how much of the crops, or in the next photo - manure, is transported to market or between farms or whatever. They use a lot of mule power in Egypt.

The same appears to be true on the part of the retail business in Saqqara.

Even automobiles and trucks seemed to be getting pushed to the limit in the Saqqara area. There are three cows in the back of this small truck.