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Published: November 6th 2007
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Early pick up at hotel for flight from Cairo to Luxor. The airport was a madhouse and we had an agent getting our boarding passes. Then hundreds of people pushed their way through the single security line to the waiting room. We were supposed to “listen” for our flight to be called and it was really just the guy at the door saying flight numbers. You had to be standing there to hear him. Buses to the plane then off to Luxor. Picked up and taken to the Ti-Yi. Many more tips along the way. It was still early and we did not have a cabin. We met our local guide, George, and he was not very helpful. All of a sudden he announced he was taking us to our first excursion to the Valley of the Kings. We had not dressed for desert touring, so we changed quickly and off we went. We were joined by 11 other English speaking passengers on the boat. They were all traveling separately as couples and one single lady. We were the only Americans. The rest were Canadian, Australian, and British. We made up a nice little group and spent a lot of time
together on the ship when not out on excursions.
At the Valley of the Kings we saw 3 tombs - Ramses III, IV, and VI. These tombs are very well preserved. There are 54 known tombs in the valley which go way into the mountain and are continually being excavated. They have a very good model at the entrance showing each of the known tombs and how far they go into the mountain. They are surprisingly wide and have high ceilings. The tombs we saw still had most of the carvings and original paintings. Unfortunately, no photos are allowed. However, it seems unlikely the tombs will stay in good condition with all the tourists going through there breathing on them every day.
We did not enter King Tut’s tomb though our Cairo guide wanted us to so we could be amazed at how small a space contained all the artifacts found there. There is nothing in Tut’s tomb except his mummy. Tut’s tomb was found under a bigger tomb built over it at a later time. At the time of his death, Tut had not reigned long so he was not one of the more well-known rulers. We
were not given any extra time at the Valley of the Kings to allow us to go into Tut’s tomb. Our guide gave us a brief overview and his instructions were so confusing half of the group thought he said one thing, the other half thought he said something else. By this time we were parched as we had not yet had any water this day and it was in the 90s there in the desert. Although I asked our guide where we could get water, he merely said we would get some.
After leaving the tombs in the Valley of the Kings we drove to the Temple of Hatchepsut found in the 1800s. A lot of restoration has been done here, and the appearance of the entire compound is very impressive in size and architecture. The temple rises in the three levels against the mountain and ramps go up to each level. The Ministry of Culture arrived in an impressive motorcade while we were here.
Back to the ship after this visit and it was quite late so we went directly down to lunch. There I learned for the first time that you have to provide all
your own water on the ship, by buying it from the ship at $3 per bottle. George insisted we would have water in our little fridges in our cabins but we never did. After lunch we each finally were assigned a cabin and could go in and freshen up. We set off again though for the Temple of Karnak.
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