The Grand Egyptian Museum finally has its grand opening today - here's our verdict

Ramses II was a bit of a megalomaniac. He ruled ancient Egypt for 66 years and died at the age of 91 - at a time when the average age of humans was about 35.

"He was Egypt's greatest pharaoh, but he was also the biggest robber of his time," Egyptologist Laila Morad tells me.

"He wanted to be everywhere ... he wanted to be seen everywhere. So he built many statues honouring himself. He even engraved his name on things - temples, statues, obelisks - that he didn't build."

If Ramses II was alive now and could walk into the Grand Egyptian Museum, which officially opens in Cairo in full fanfare today, he would be extremely pleased with himself.

Architects from 103 countries pitched when an international competition to design the museum was launched in 2002, with Dublin-based Heneghan Peng winning the bid. The Irish firm has come up with an astonishing design for the enormous building, set over more than 50,000 square metres: its geometric facade is an ode to the timeless forms of the pyramids; its soaring ceilings reflect the grandeur of ancient Egyptian temples.

But despite the breathtaking scale, the mesmerising triangles and the heaven-like natural light streaming through thousands of glass panels in the ceilings, as I enter the Grand Egyptian Museum, my eyes are squarely drawn to a single, unmissable, unfathomable figure: an 11-metre-high granite statue of Ramses II, located in the atrium.

It is so tall, so unblemished and so hypnotic, my partner and I are convinced it's a replica of something much smaller and much more tarnished. Until we learn it's an 83-tonne original, more than 3200 years old.

It was discovered in 1820 in a temple dedicated to Ptah - the Egyptian god of craftsmen, architects and artists - in Memphis, which was once the capital of ancient Egypt.

By 1955, it had been relocated to a dusty square in Cairo, where - for more than half a decade - it was stained by traffic fumes and shaken by vibrations of the passing trains.

It now occupies the pride of place at the Grand Egyptian Museum, the world's largest museum dedicated to a single civilisation and, perhaps, the most significant cultural opening of this century.

Indeed, if Ramses II could be a fly on the wall today, he would be ecstatic.

I visit the museum in early October, during its soft-launch phase. It takes me a good 40 minutes to get over the figure of Ramses II and to begin to notice other things.

The museum is home to more than 100,000 artefacts from ancient Egypt, with even the most recent ones thousands of years old. So it's safe to say it's impossible to check out - let alone comprehend - everything. But here's my pick of the museum's most unmissable aspects, beyond the statue of Ramses II.

Just off the atrium, I walk up the Grand Staircase Gallery, which rises to a height of about six floors, with 60 larger-than-life relics - columns and lintels, sphinxes and statues, doorways and obelisks - sprinkled along the staircase's ascent.

At first, it seems there's a hierarchy - pharaohs at the bottom, gods towards the top. But the incorrigible Ramses II breaks the rules again. One of the most intriguing exhibits is a statue of three figures, depicting God Ptah on the left, Goddess Sekhmet on the right and, no surprises, Ramses II in the middle - his stature taller than the gods.

The Grand Staircase Gallery is such a visual feast, I ascend it three times, once using the steps (so I can stop, soak up the exhibits and read the descriptions), and twice using the escalator (so I can glide through the ages).

At the top of the Grand Staircase Gallery, floor-to-ceiling glass windows with panoramic views of the bucket-list Pyramids of Giza await. It's not my first viewing of the pyramids - I was there just hours before my visit to the museum - but there's something about these glass windows and how they frame the pyramids that once again renders me speechless.

The pyramids are just two kilometres from the museum, which was intentionally built on this site so it could be close to the place where the ancient Egyptians lived and built the country's most magnificent monuments. A walkway connecting the museum and the pyramids is currently being constructed. Watch this space.

On the left-hand side of the pyramid windows are the Main Galleries - an enormous open-plan space divided into four sections: from the oldest (Prehistoric Period) to the most recent (Greco-Roman Period). By the time I get to these galleries, my head is spinning. It's impossible to see, understand and digest it all. So a great idea is to join a small-group tour of the museum, and let the guide cherrypick the best exhibits for you. Or - like me - you can pick up the audio tour headset from the lobby and seek out artefacts with red dots and numbers, and learn about some of them at your own pace.

The most significant and sought-after section of the museum is the Tutankhamun Gallery, housing more than 5000 artefacts - chariots, thrones, weapons, ornaments and more - discovered in the pharaoh's tomb in 1922 by British archaeologist Howard Carter in the Valley of the Kings near Luxor. Many of these artefacts have never been on public display.

During my visit, the Tutankhamun Gallery was not open. And even though I got to check out the most significant items from his tomb - including his golden mask - at the Egyptian Museum on Cairo's Tahrir Square, I know I'll be returning to the Grand Egyptian Museum sooner or later. Because one visit to this magnificent new landmark is just not enough.

The writer was in Cairo as a guest of Viking Cruises

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