Egypt - Day 2 Luxor to Esna
We were happy that our guide had decided to take us to Luxor Temple the night before when we saw the jam packed day we had on the second day. We went to the Karnak Temples, the Valley of the Kings, the Temple of Hatshepsut, and the colossal of Memnon, all before one pm. We learned that we had to be back to the ship by one o'clock to start our first sail down the Nile toward Esna.
We got up very early and made it to our first stop the Karnak Temples as the sun was rising, before anyone was hawking their wares, yet surrounded by hundreds of tourists. As I'm writing this blog I'm referring to guidebooks and some websites, and I'm learning a bit more about the places that we visited. Apparently Karnak is a series of temples, sanctuaries, kiosks, etc. Perhaps I wasn't listening to our guide all that well, or my brain was on information overload. Unfortunately I don't remember an awful lot about the details here, which is likely good considering how fascinating I found the Valley of the Kings and Queen Hatsheput.
Our second stop the Valley of the Kings, called so because at least 63 Pharaonic tombs are located here. The Pyramids of Giza (more to come on them later) were built 4,000 years ago by three generations of Pharaohs from the same family. Nearly 1,000 years later Pharaohs started to build their tombs in the Valley of the Kings. The pyramids and the hills of the valley have something in common, they are shaped like triangles. The ancient Egyptians believed the triangle was a holy shape. Their main god was Amun or Amun-Ra, the sun god. The triangle is in the shape of a sun ray, therefore making it a holy shape.
There are 63 known tombs in the valley, including of course the most famous of all King Tutankhamun, or King Tut. For preservation purposes there are six tombs open at any given time, as well as King Tut's tomb, which naturally you have to pay extra for. Our guide took us to three of these tombs, we had to talk about them outside as guides are not allowed in the tombs, so as to keep foot traffic flowing. The tombs have long narrow passageways leading down to chambers where the ancient sarcophagi were laid to rest, as well as what the Pharaohs would need in the afterlife. This often included wine, beer, food, perfumes, their organs in four canopic jars, jewels, gold, beds, thrones, etc .
All along the corridors the walls are carved and painted. The characters are often about 2-3 inches big, and the corridors are approximately 200-300 yards (by the way, thanks to my dad I often imagine yardage by golf hole lengths, which works well for me as I'm awful with measurements). So I think you can imagine how much time and money went into these tombs. As I was reading beforehand in my Lonely Planet guidebook, "The tombs have suffered great damage from treasure hunters, floods, and in recent years, from mass tourism: carbon dioxide, friction, and humidity produced by the average of 2.8g of sweat left by each visitor have affected the reliefs and the pigments of the wall paintings." Um, gross.
There is still excavation going on today, in fact we watched some local workers removing rocks and digging. It's unknown whether there are more tombs to be found, but how exciting if there are! The reason that King Tut's tomb is so famous, and most people seem to know his name is because when his tomb was found in 1922 by Howard Carter it was the most fully intact tomb found then, and to this day. There was a lot, I mean A LOT of wealth in each tomb, which unfortunately led to a lot of looting.
The next stop was the temple of Queen Hatshepsut, a beautiful structure. It's a two story temple carved into the side of limestone cliffs. I find Queen Hatshepsut's story very interesting. While women in ancient Egypt held far more power than other women of ancient times, they were often not in positions of power. Hatshepsut was married to her brother (not uncommon for ancient royal families) Thutmosis II, when he died she became co-regent with her young nephew and stepson Thutmosis III. However, because Thutmosis III was so young she took the role of Pharaoh for herself. She ruled Egypt for over 20 years, and ruled well. She re-established trading with foreign lands and because of the money brought in by these endeavors was able to initiate building schemes. In these buildings and sculptures Hastshepsut had herself represented as a typical male Pharaoh, with the long beard, short skirt, etc.
When her stepson Thutmosis III was old enough to rule the Queen would not step down, and because she was doing such a bang up job there weren't many objections, except of course by Thutmosis. Therefore when she died and left the power to Thutmosis III he did his best to erase her from history. In ancient Egypt this meant defacing cartouches (a protective oval surrounding the hieroglyphic name of the Pharaoh), sculptures, and temples devoted to Hatshepsut. The obelisk at Karnak is clearly two different colors, this was because Thutmosis couldn't remove it because of its size and location so he built up a wall around it. But because the builders were unable to build a ramp up to the very top because it was in the middle of a temple with walls surrounding it the top quarter was not covered.
Our next stop was at a local alabaster factory, they are dotting the road along the way from the temple. Our guide explained to us that we would go to the factory see how alabaster figurines and vases were made, we would also be offered 'hospitality', and we could use the bathroom. Though of course we were not expected to buy anything. As we drove up to the building on the side under an awning there were a group of men 'working'. What I mean by working is sitting around smoking hookah and chatting until they saw our cab and immediately got to work. They explained to us how very authentic their product was, and how it would be impossible to get such craftsmanship from a machine. Well we may have been suckers but we did indeed buy a small vase/candle holder, but it was the only thing we bought for our house. As we're paying for our vase the man who gave the presentation asks for baksheesh for the 'workers' of course. I hand over 10 Egyptian pounds and he looks like I just farted in his face and says that it's usually at least 20 Egyptian pounds, so I gave him 5 more. 'Hospitality' my right ear, this wasn't our only run in with this term, and I'll be sure to vent, I mean write more about it later.
Luckily the colossal of Memnon was a quick stop, with not a whole lot to talk about because there is not much left to see. The grounds used to be the location for the largest temple in Egypt, and now all that are left are two huge statues. The temple was once built of mud brick and because it was built on the mud plane of the Nile it was eroded.
We got up very early and made it to our first stop the Karnak Temples as the sun was rising, before anyone was hawking their wares, yet surrounded by hundreds of tourists. As I'm writing this blog I'm referring to guidebooks and some websites, and I'm learning a bit more about the places that we visited. Apparently Karnak is a series of temples, sanctuaries, kiosks, etc. Perhaps I wasn't listening to our guide all that well, or my brain was on information overload. Unfortunately I don't remember an awful lot about the details here, which is likely good considering how fascinating I found the Valley of the Kings and Queen Hatsheput.
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| This is where Patrick realized one of the James Bond movies had been filmed. |
Our second stop the Valley of the Kings, called so because at least 63 Pharaonic tombs are located here. The Pyramids of Giza (more to come on them later) were built 4,000 years ago by three generations of Pharaohs from the same family. Nearly 1,000 years later Pharaohs started to build their tombs in the Valley of the Kings. The pyramids and the hills of the valley have something in common, they are shaped like triangles. The ancient Egyptians believed the triangle was a holy shape. Their main god was Amun or Amun-Ra, the sun god. The triangle is in the shape of a sun ray, therefore making it a holy shape.
There are 63 known tombs in the valley, including of course the most famous of all King Tutankhamun, or King Tut. For preservation purposes there are six tombs open at any given time, as well as King Tut's tomb, which naturally you have to pay extra for. Our guide took us to three of these tombs, we had to talk about them outside as guides are not allowed in the tombs, so as to keep foot traffic flowing. The tombs have long narrow passageways leading down to chambers where the ancient sarcophagi were laid to rest, as well as what the Pharaohs would need in the afterlife. This often included wine, beer, food, perfumes, their organs in four canopic jars, jewels, gold, beds, thrones, etc .
All along the corridors the walls are carved and painted. The characters are often about 2-3 inches big, and the corridors are approximately 200-300 yards (by the way, thanks to my dad I often imagine yardage by golf hole lengths, which works well for me as I'm awful with measurements). So I think you can imagine how much time and money went into these tombs. As I was reading beforehand in my Lonely Planet guidebook, "The tombs have suffered great damage from treasure hunters, floods, and in recent years, from mass tourism: carbon dioxide, friction, and humidity produced by the average of 2.8g of sweat left by each visitor have affected the reliefs and the pigments of the wall paintings." Um, gross.
There is still excavation going on today, in fact we watched some local workers removing rocks and digging. It's unknown whether there are more tombs to be found, but how exciting if there are! The reason that King Tut's tomb is so famous, and most people seem to know his name is because when his tomb was found in 1922 by Howard Carter it was the most fully intact tomb found then, and to this day. There was a lot, I mean A LOT of wealth in each tomb, which unfortunately led to a lot of looting.
The next stop was the temple of Queen Hatshepsut, a beautiful structure. It's a two story temple carved into the side of limestone cliffs. I find Queen Hatshepsut's story very interesting. While women in ancient Egypt held far more power than other women of ancient times, they were often not in positions of power. Hatshepsut was married to her brother (not uncommon for ancient royal families) Thutmosis II, when he died she became co-regent with her young nephew and stepson Thutmosis III. However, because Thutmosis III was so young she took the role of Pharaoh for herself. She ruled Egypt for over 20 years, and ruled well. She re-established trading with foreign lands and because of the money brought in by these endeavors was able to initiate building schemes. In these buildings and sculptures Hastshepsut had herself represented as a typical male Pharaoh, with the long beard, short skirt, etc.
When her stepson Thutmosis III was old enough to rule the Queen would not step down, and because she was doing such a bang up job there weren't many objections, except of course by Thutmosis. Therefore when she died and left the power to Thutmosis III he did his best to erase her from history. In ancient Egypt this meant defacing cartouches (a protective oval surrounding the hieroglyphic name of the Pharaoh), sculptures, and temples devoted to Hatshepsut. The obelisk at Karnak is clearly two different colors, this was because Thutmosis couldn't remove it because of its size and location so he built up a wall around it. But because the builders were unable to build a ramp up to the very top because it was in the middle of a temple with walls surrounding it the top quarter was not covered.
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| Queen Hatshepsut |
Luckily the colossal of Memnon was a quick stop, with not a whole lot to talk about because there is not much left to see. The grounds used to be the location for the largest temple in Egypt, and now all that are left are two huge statues. The temple was once built of mud brick and because it was built on the mud plane of the Nile it was eroded.
After we got back from our long day we set sell down the Nile. It was a really beautiful cruise. We were able to enjoy the sunset from the deck and the beautiful scenery. At 5 they would have tea on the top deck, we would often sit with Colleen and Steven into the evening. Dinner would start at 8, and we were usually there right when they started serving. After our days we were often hungry and tired, so we would eat then go to our cabin. It was all very relaxing.
wow, that last picture is absolutely breath-taking!
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