Day Trip to Wadi El Natrun from Alexandria

Dier Al Anba Bishoy (Pshoi, Bishoi), which was founded by St. Bishoy (Pshoi). Though similar, the story of Saint Bishoy is sometimes told with varying details. However, in general, we believe that Saint Bishoy was born in the Egyptian Nile Delta in 320 AD. Apparently, his parents were deeply religious, and it is said that in a dream one night, an angel of the Lord asked for the services of one of his mother's children. St. Bishoy's mother gave the angel his selection of her children, and the angel chose Bishoy.A frail child, his mother thought that the angel might do better, but the angel said that, "the Lord's power in frailty is perfect". At the age of twenty, Bishoy joined the Monastery of Seetis. He was particularly fond of the book of Jeremiah from the Old Testament, and was therefore called Abbot Bishoy the Jeremian.

The modern name of the monastery, al-Baramus, is Arabic and is derived from the Coptic christian Pa-Rameos, which means "that of the Romans" in the honor of Maximus and Domidus , two sons of the Roman Emperor Valentinus who died from excessive fasting. Their bodies were buried in a crypt below the Church of the Virgin .

ngst clergymen and scholars around the world. Although the monastery’s foundations date back to the fourth century AD, it is known as the Monastery of the Syrians because of a group of al-Surian monks who settled in Wadi Natrun in 984 AD.

oriented desert depression about 60 kilometers long located in the Western Desert near the delta about 90 kilometers northwest of Cairo. Wadi el-Natrun lies some 23 meters below sea level, and lakes fed from the water table of the Nile dot the landscape.