Qasr El Nil

‘Palace of the Nile,’ after a riverside palace whose name outlived it by a century.

The street — and the famous bridge with its bronze lions — take their name from a khedival palace and barracks that once stood by the river and vanished long ago. Today Qasr El Nil is Downtown’s great shopping run: banks, old cinemas, and cafés under continuous Belle Époque arcades, still busiest after dark.