tombs and more temples
July 24th, 2008After meeting Brian on the Felucca, me, Hugh and Brian formed a little team for the following week. Hugh, the english gap year student, extremely polite and frequently uses words such as “wonderful” and “delightful” (I know you are probably reading this Hugh), travelling in Egypt for 6 weeks and still manages to remain mostly calm at all the touts and somehow has managed to get by being gluten intolerant in a country that lives and breathes bread. And Brian, the fast talking New York student who sounds like he is off TV. Somehow manages to make friends with everyone who talks to us and once spent 400 EL on dinner (that is probably more than what I spent total on food in 2 weeks) by getting carried away ordering lobster and prawns.
So it was good to have a couple of people to hang out with, even better because they are guys which means I generally get left alone when it comes to touts. Brian had prebooked most of his trip but we were all generally going the same way, I ended up chopping a few plans to head to Dahab earlier which is a beach town because it was just too hot to look at more monuments.
But anyway, back to post felucca. From the end of our boat trip we stopped at 2 temples on the way into Luxor, one not too impressive but one very cool place, the temple of Edfu, massive and really well preserved. It was discovered awhile back by archeologists underneath buildings and things and would have been an incredible thing to ‘stumble’ across. I watched a short national geographic doco on it while escaping from the heat in the visitors centre which was interesting. The temples are just so huge and complex and would have been amazing in their day, now all the colour has worn off but still impressive. Just very very hot.
By the time we arrived in Luxor I was hot and tired, Brian had a hotel prebooked so me and Hugh went off to find a budget place dragging our packs through the dusty streets. Eventually found a great place and my room was only $2.50. I got distracted by the cheap price so didn’t get air-con (which was double the price…so really only $5 but seems like a big deal). So didn’t get too much sleep due to the heat. But other than than really nice place and friendly people (called Oasis if your ever there).
I headed off to see the temples of Karnak which is a huge ruins of a temple that has been added to over the years by pharaohs, roman emperors, Alex the great and Christians.
Its pretty impressive, but there were so many tour groups it was disturbing, most people wearing very little clothing. It was all a bit too much so had a quick look around and headed back to town on a horse and carriage! A little bit lame and touristy but cheap and a nice way to travel.
Me and and Hugh meet up with Brian in the evening and we went off in search of a good mango juice and some dinner. After finding both we went for a walk along the Nile where the Luxor temple, all lit up, stretches along side. We avoided felucca captains to just hang out with everyone else in the much cooler night air. After walking Brian back me and Hugh stumbled across a photographers with a bridal party outside, all chanting and dancing, holding up their 80’s style soft focus photo’s. It was cool, they were so happy and showed us the photos, trying to get us to dance around with them. A bit surreal as it was the middle of the night but with the days as hot as they are it makes sense.
(street side mango juice, my favourite thing about Egypt)
The next day I did a tour of the West Bank, Luxor’s crowning glory, this is where all the tombs are and lots of other important bits. Hugh went ahead to the next town and Brian was booked in on a different tour. Another painful minibus tour this time with a guide who spoke terrible english and liked to explain long history informational in the blazing sun. We visited the Valley of the Kings which is where King Tut and Ramses and the like were buried. All the contents of the tombs are now in the Cairo museum but the tombs themselves are cool to look in. Again more tour groups and really really hot, with very little shade anywhere. You have to line up for ages in the sun to get into these tombs which are built in the hillside. While waiting I am thinking its all a wasts of time but actually once you get inside they are amazingly preserved tombs that are all these different rooms with perfect hieroglyphics along the walls still with all their colour. So it was worth it, just a damn lot of effort. We had to make a mandatory and painful stop at an Alabastor factory to see how pottery is made then strongly encouraged to buy some. After a few awkward moments we got to leave. We also visited another huge temple and some more tombs. So cool to see but a long tough day, although I am not sure I could handle any more tour groups, as its low season, the winter would mean less sun but about 100 times as many people so maybe sun is better.
I saw the inside of the Luxor temple quickly back in town then jumped on a 5 hour bus ride to Hurghada where I spent the night and meet up with the others on the ferry which we took across to Dahab.
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