Blogs from Middle Egypt, Egypt, Africa - page 3

After a another day of being over loaded with amazing history and scenery, we followed this up with another day of overwhelming history and more beautiful scenery. I went ahead here and combined two major tours. The first is of the Valley of the Kings, and the second is of a temple placed in the middle of the Nile. The Valley of the Kings was another amazing place. This was built for the passed Pharoes, after the great pyramids in Cairo. There is a reason why they did not build such large and imposing structures such as the pyramids, and this is because the pyramids were a huge beacon to any and all grave robbers. However, putting tombs into enclosed and completely covered tombs in this valley kept them safe until the modern day. What's interesting ... read more

Cairo-AsyutTom Griffithurl='/Videos/2634.html' onclick='dialog("/Videos/2634.html?popped=1","tbvideo",600,600);return false;'Taxi music... Thanks to the anti-government Islamist uprising that happened in this part of the world in the 1990s, Middle Egypt is a largely unexplored section of the country. There hasn't been a major attack on tourists since the awful massacre at Hatshepsut's temple in 1997, and the insurgency against Hosni Mubarak's one-party regime has largely died down, but the authorities aren't taking any chances. They warn tourists off any of the towns between Cairo and Luxor, and in El-Minya, the heart of resistance, any foreigners who dare get off the train are trailed around town by armed police until they leave. Asyut isn't that bad - or so I was told. Yesterday I spent the day getting aro... read more