The Valley of the Kings

Basheesh: A tip, or the practice of tipping

Touts: A sales pitch

Basheesh and Tout, two words we have become very familiar with in our 4 days in Egypt. In Egypt the basheesh is an expected part of the culture. As a visitor to Egypt, you are expected to tip everyone for every service offered. Of course you can choose not to tip, but it somehow seems offensive not to. (Perhaps that is the Canadian in us). Basheesh is fine, even the Egyptians themselves tip eachother for services offered. Touts however, can be very overwhelming and tiring to deal with...

So we left Cairo and took the overnight train to Luxor on the advice of our hostel. (Good advice!). The train was great, we opted to take the sleeper train, so we had an entire cabin to ourselves, with a concierge, two meals and two beds to sleep the through the train ride. We saw some other travellers who had opted for the first class cabin, and it did have air conditioning, but as one person we met put it, "it was hell".
We arrived in Luxor and were met at the station by Jamal with a group called "Amigo Tours". From there he took us to a nice hotel (it had AC and a pool on the roof). He left us alone for the morning and we wandered Luxor on our own. It is a town that caters to tourists. There are large sidewalks, tonnes of western style cafes, and Egyptians touts everywhere.
"Do you want a carriage, do you want a felucca, do you want a tour". You hear this from every person you pass on the street. It is somewhat difficult, because if you say no thank-you then they follow you, asking "where are you from", "what is your name". If you engage in the conversation then they will again try to pull you in "My brother has a nice boat", "come with me etc". But then you actually feel rude just saying "no" and ignoring people. Hmm.. We haven't quite learned how to deal with the tout yet. We met a couple from Australia who had an interesting idea yesterday. Their advice was to hold hands and run full speed towards the tout, then at the last second to break apart and run on either side of the person. This will cause an extreme sense of bewilderment and confusion, and probably the person would leave you alone. Unfortunately, none of us had the guts to try this out, but it was good for a laugh.
We spent the afternoon of our first day in Luxor touring the Luxor museum and the East Bank Karnak and Luxor temples. It was fabulous. The fact you are standing in ancient Thebes surrounding by thousands of years of history is overwhelming in itself. We spent the first day touring with an interesting guy from Israel who didn't wear shoes (don't know how he could handle it in the heat) and an Aussie guy who was very fascinated that Christians had been burned in a crypt at the Luxor temple. We had thought about watching the music and light show that first evening at the temple, but somehow after seeing the temple it really seemed as though modern lights and flashy music would detract from the majesty of it.
The second day we were met in the morning by a new tour guide "Rami" who took us to the West Bank. We were again with some other travellers, a great Aussie couple, a nice American family, the same Isralei guy, and two American peace corps guys who really represented the bad side of the American traveller. (They took off at every site and we were happy not to spend too much time with them). We visited the Valley of the Kings, the Valley of the Queens, and the temple of Hatshetsup. It was beautiful, hard to do it justice in a web description.
Somehow in my idea of a tomb, I pictured something that was cool, with cold stale air...Well, the tombs were some of the warmest temperatures I have ever experienced. It was like walking into a sauna that kept going down and down...
By the time you left the tomb you were dripping in sweat. It is amazing how the paintings have been preserved (especially with all the tourists breathing on them). The west bank desert is extremely dry as well. We drank about 3 litres of water each and I think we were still dehydrated. (Yes, I know we need to get hats)
After we returned from the West bank, the temperature was about 39C in the shade, so we went up to the roof and had a swim, then we lay in the shade for a while. It was too hot to move and we felt like we were melting. We then met up with the Aussie couple for a walk and a coffee before heading on the overnight train back to Cairo.
So now we are back in Cairo, the city called the "Mother of the World". We have two days before we head out East to the Sinai, so hopefully we will get a chance to visit the market and the Egyptian museum.

As an aside, it is funny to watch how quickly Shawn becomes accustomed to the local currency. Really the Egyptian pound is only about 20 cents Canadian, but after being here for a few days, Shawn starts thinking in the Egyptian pound, and water that costs anything over 2 pounds is deemed expensive. I do have to give him credit, he can bargain. This morning coming back to our hostel even the locals were impressed we managed to get a taxi for 7 Egp when it should have cost 10. (Go Shawn!).
Loved hearing from everyone, we will try to do one more update before we head out East.

Here is a photo of us at the Valley of the Kings.

This was a spice stall in a market in Luxor. The man who owned it was quite nice and allowed us to take some photos without paying him or buying spices (a gesture we are learning to appreciate in Egypt).

Unidentified Meat products in a market in Luxor.

Shawn at Karnak Temple in the East Bank of Luxor

View from the roof of our hotel in Luxor, overlooking the city and the nile. The East bank of Luxor (where most of the town is), is very lush compared to the West bank (where the valley of the kings is).

View from outside our hotel in Luxor at night.