We got back on the bus and drove the short distance back to the Luxor Temple. At the entrance to the temple are two huge seated statues of Ramses II and only a part of one of the four standing statues remains here. This is the remaining obelisk of a pair, the second was given to France and erected on the Place de la Concorde in Paris. The entrance walls depict Ramses II's defeat of the Hittites. Inside is Hatshepsut's boat garage and a mosque built on top of the walls of an old temple.
Entrance to the Temple of Luxor with two statues of Ramses II and an obelisk
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Abu-el-Haggag mosque over a pharonic temple |
Hatshepsut's boat garage
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Statues of Ramses II - he sits on the throne of a united Egypt engraved with a lotus flower (north) and papyrus (south) held together.
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Ramses II
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Hieroglyph representing the throne of united Egypt |
King Tut and his sister/wife
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Amenophis III's colonnade and courtyard |
Papyrus columns of the Hypostyle hall
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Christian modifications to the site
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Christian modifications to the site
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One of the inner chapels was plastered over and painted with Christian scenes (maybe the Last Supper). The paint indicates it came from the fourth or sixth c. AD.
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Animal offerings in the Chapel of Alexander the Great
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Roman murals |
Links for the Temple of Luxor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luxor_Temple http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=Temple+of+luxor&qpvt=Temple+of+luxor&FORM=IGRE
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We were back on the boat after 2 PM and were greeted with apple juice and then buffet lunch. To fill in the time on the boat today, the chef gave a "cooking demonstration" up on the open top deck. He made Egyptian donut holes and soaked them in honey mixed with water and orange juice and sprinkled with cinnamon or sugar. They were light and sweet.
We feel very lucky that we got to see Luxor and Karnak today and hope the political scene stays calm until we fly out of Egypt.
This morning on our way to Luxor airport we did a quick tour at the Valley of the Kings. The Valley of the Kings is a sterile, barren rock hillside. There is nothing green and no birds or anything. If the exterior is barren, the interiors of the tombs are spectacular. Beautiful tiles and painting - breathtaking.
Mountains of the Valley of the Kings |
Local transportation
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Of the 62 tombs found so far in the valley, we were allowed into three with our prepaid ticket and could add King Tut's tomb for 100 EP (about $17).
We were not allowed to take pictures - could not even carry a camera into the site. We will have to buy a book of pictures.
We entered the tunnel and chambers of KV2, the tomb of Ramses IV. There was some Christian graffiti with plaster and paint over the Egyptian decorations. The walls have scenes and hieroglyphs in beautiful bright colors. The huge sarcophagus is still in the burial chamber.
Next we walked down into KV6, tomb of Ramses IX. These tunnel walls were protected by plexiglas. The ceiling was mostly blue with stars. The last tomb we entered was KV16, for Ramses I. The sacred boats painted on the walls each contained a god and the opening of the mouth ceremony was on the burial chamber wall. The walls depicted enemies as human figures upside down, beheaded or bent backwards. Everything was in vivid colors.
Links for the Valley of the Kings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valley_of_the_Kings http://www.crystalinks.com/valleykings.html
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On the way from the Valley of the Kings to the airport (we did not have time for the Colossi of Memnon or Queen Hatshepsut's Temple), we stopped for 10 minutes at an alabaster shop. Three men sat outside working the stone into bowls or vases and demonstrated the process for us. Inside the shop the walls were full of local alabaster, onyx, and basalt items. We broke down and bought a $15 alabaster scarab - for good luck.
Wall mural |
Making alabaster items for sale
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We arrived at the airport only to find out that we are not allowed into the departure terminal. There are too many people stuffed in the terminal. Mohamed and the Swiss Uniworld rep are trying to get us a charter flight to Cairo. In the meantime we are going back to the boat for lunch.
The River Tosca crew put on a wonderful, impromptu meal for us. We only hope we weren't eating their last meals before being laid off due to the demonstrations and cancelled tours.
We finally boarded an AMC charter flight around 5:30 PM and flew to Cairo, arriving around 6:30. Seven of the nine of our Canadian contingent opted for an evacuation flight out of Egypt tonight. We opted to keep our original flights to Rome and then Casablanca instead of taking a US evacuation flight to "somewhere" in Europe.
Uniworld changed our hotel from the Cairo Marriott, which is down near all of the protests and demonstrations in Tahrir Square, and booked us into the Radisson near the airport. Our tour bus (Spring Tours operated by Uniworld) was permitted to drive during the curfew. We were stopped several times at road blocks and an army man came on the bus and walked to the back seat looking for who knows what. The unrest is not directed at us (tourists) and people and guards have been pleasant and friendly. Even airport security has been easily managed.
Tues., 2/1/11 - Cairo - inside the Radisson Hotel in Heliopolis
This morning we had breakfast at the hotel buffet (included) and then got help from the hotel Director of Sales and Marketing, Ahmed Refaat, and an assistant in canceling our Cairo Marriott reservations, contacting Alitalia about our flight, verifying shuttle times to the airport (midnight!) and answering all of our questions. We were amazed that they sat down with us, made calls that went though, and got all of the answers we needed at the time. (I naively thought the Uniworld rep, Ehab, was going to do all this for us.)
Our flight on Thursday is now scheduled to leave at 1 PM instead of 5 AM. When we get to Rome, we will have to make new connections to Casablanca.
We spent the day inside the hotel. We went for light lunch ("free" with the room) in the executive lounge, read, learned how to type this journal into our new IPad, and wandered around the hotel. Boring, but safe.
Dinner was the free salads, chicken and rice, breads and desserts with free wine or beer in the executive/business lounge. We spent some time with Louise and Mandy, two women from Australia who were on our Egypt tour and also stuck in the Radisson. The socializing made the day go a little faster. The hotel is nearly empty as most tourist activity has been cancelled and people are able to leave, once they figure out when their flights may depart.
Wed., 2/2/11 - Cairo - Radisson Hotel
This was an up and down day with too many versions of when we could leave Egypt and how we could connect to Casablanca to bother writing it all down. This morning the internet finally came back up (it had been turned off for nine days) and we could for the first time send e-mails to folks in the USA saying we were safe and waiting our turn to fly out to Rome.
At 11 PM we took our luggage and shuttled to the airport just in case our original flight was going to get out. The Alitalia office was closed, but it posted their schedule of which one of their two normal flights would fly in and out tomorrow – ours was not THE ONE. Marge had to ask a stranger to use his mobile phone to call the hotel so we could be shuttled back to the Radisson. The shuttle service was provided as a courtesy and they were very nice about driving us back and forth.
The road to the airport included several roadblocks with no nonsense tanks and semiautomatic weapons. All of the cars were stopped and searched and questioned because of the curfew, but the hotel bus was allowed through since we were obviously going to and from the airport and were tourists trying to leave. The five-minute ride probably took us 20 minutes because of the roadblocks.
We got back to the hotel and returned to our room to sleep until our next opportunity for a flight. We had checked out of the hotel at 11 PM but they held our room until 4 AM so that we could use it for another day if we did not get on a plane. It was very accommodating of them. Everyone at the hotel had been helpful.
Thurs., Cairo to Rome
We could not get any information about flights we could take or when they might by flying, so Marge contacted her sister Pat, who lives in Minnesota, and she saved the day for us. Pat was able to make the right calls (to Alitalia) and got us confirmed tickets to Rome today and to Casablanca on Friday. She also got us a hotel room at the Hilton Garden near the Rome airport. It was interesting dealing with the eight-hour time difference from Egypt to Minnesota. Our conversations and e-mails took place between 4:30 and 6:30 in the morning.
We went to the Cairo airport at 10 AM. The shuttle over there took us nearly an hour as the traffic was impossible. The airport was in almost total chaos. We were finally able to get in the door and go to the Alitalia office to get our e-tickets. After we got in the door of the airport, everyone was helpful, cheerful, and accommodating. We got our tickets, a nice porter took our luggage in hand and got us checked in, the passport control line wasn’t too long, and we were in the boarding area in plenty of time for our flight. The flight left around 2 PM and we arrived in Rome around 6:30.
Anyway, we are now in Rome at a very nice new hotel and will fly on to Casablanca tomorrow. We are so glad that we are here, but feel very sad for the demonstrating Egyptians. They have some understandable political and economic complaints. We hope they sort it out.
One thing that we have learned from this experience is that we need to carry a cell phone that works internationally. Many of our tour group were able to fairly easily make arrangements and obtain information from friends, relatives, and travel agents at home. You certainly could not get anything done from within Cairo.
All-in-all, the trip was a huge success. Egypt is a wonderful place to visit - a little (actually a lot) dirty but so filled with wonderfully preserved history that we are already planning to return - when things settle down a bit. If you haven't been, you should plan to go - but never in July or August - you will melt into a grease spot.
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