Cairo · Nasr City
Nasr City International Park
The countries of the world in miniature, a small zoo and fairground rides: you pay to get in, then you pay by zone.
The International Park sits at the far end of Abbas El-Akkad street, in the middle of Nasr City. It is a large municipal garden cut into sections that reproduce countries — European, Arab, Egyptian — with their model monuments, and you cross from one to the next in a few steps. Added to that are a small zoo, a reptile house, a museum of stuffed animals, a fairground area called Magic Park, horse and camel rides, and water games. The rule of the house is simple and worth knowing before you go in: you pay for the garden at the gate, then for each zone at its own window. It is an attraction from another age, popular and cheap, where Nasr City families come on Fridays and at Eid — you come for the whole afternoon, not for a visit.
The extra bit
Go in first, walk the whole garden, and only buy the rides package once you have seen which rides are turning: it costs several times the price of admission. For the horse and the camel, settle the price and the length of the ride before the child gets on, never after. And come late in the afternoon: the garden is open and unshaded, and a summer afternoon crosses it badly.
Know before you go
Nothing is included in the entry ticket: the small zoo, the rides, the animal rides and the water games each have their own price, and a family's bill quickly passes the figure posted at the gate. The small zoo, the reptile house and the stuffed animals are not modern attractions — go and look before you pay for everyone. Some of the rides may be out of service with nothing to say so: that is the question for the ticket window. On Fridays, at Eid and during the school holidays the garden is full and Abbas El-Akkad is blocked long before the gate. And we found no official source on this garden: the prices and hours quoted by local guides may have changed, so check at the gate.
