Well, I am battling this damn stomach bug from Cairo, and I am losing.
So I’m tripling up on the pills, eating nothing, and trying to stay hydrated while I just power through the day’s tours. Free time I am napping by the pool or in the room.
Today we are in Luxor.
Luxor was the capital of Egypt during the golden age. The most famous Kings were from this era, starting about about 1500 BC. The idea is that they stopped building pyramids, which didn’t work to get you to the afterlife (because they were plundered) and they started making tunnels isolated in the most barren, god forsaken place in the desert. It is really really hot, brown and ugly out here.
As a side note, the tour company we are with offered hot air balloon rides tomorrow morning. To see what? I wondered.
Ugh.
We took an air conditioned van to the Valley of the Kings. This place is literally honeycombed with tunnels, over fifty discovered so far. Maybe twenty are open to the public, and of those we went into three tombs.
Rameses lV
Rameses lX
Merenptah
In addition, I paid 200 each extra for the King Tut Ankh Amun tomb ( yes, that King Tut) and I paid 300 for a photo pass, good for three tombs.
The King Tut pass, well, it is a very small, unfinished tomb. The burial chamber is well preserved and vivid, and you do get to see the shriveled yet surprisingly non-stinky mummy of old Tut himself.
So is it worth the cost?
It’s a toss up.
The first three tombs got progressively longer, and it is surprising the amount of art, and how vivid it still is. It was fun to try to spot the odd things: a scarab (beetle or cockroach) holding Ra, the sun god, or the three headed, winged serpent of evil.
One tomb had cool, big snakes climbing the walls, others had boats or Horus with the hat. All were easy access, with no stopping like the pyramids.
As for Tut, he has great baboon pictures, and as for his shriveled body I can only hope I look that good when I am 3500 years old. I was surprised how small he was, but he was only 18 or 19 when he died.
We left, drove, and stopped at the Queens Temple which was impressive but had been mostly destroyed and rebuilt. You know those male dominated societies, they don’t like being told what to do by a woman even if she ruled peacefully and prosperously for 22 years, so in jealousy they chopped out her mage and razed the temple. It is called Al-Deir Al-Bahari Temple.
So there!
We stopped at an alabaster workshop. Either you are all in or all out on this stuff. You know, the Egyptian motif doesn’t fit well with American Country, so it was easy to resist.
I was saved from boredom when I discovered that they had authentic statues of the fertility god.
I wandered around counting huge, erect penises, laughing at the thought of bringing them back for...
Our last stop was at the giant Statues of Memnon, which are big but really destroyed.
We returned to the ship for lunch but I just went to sleep. A few hours later I joined Gail at the pool.
We had our laundry done and it was returned folded immaculately.
Tomorrow we pack up, drop our luggage, tour the east bank of Luxor, then go to our guesthouse before flying off to Istanbul.
I am ready to leave Egypt.