Cairo Luxor Yo-Yo

Outside front of Karnak Temple
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The start this morning was way too early. Our bags had to be outside our door for collection by 5:45am and us on the bus by 6:30am. This morning it is very very dusty, reminiscent of the day the dust storm blew into Brisbane. Once our luggage was tagged and us all checked in for our one hour trip to Luxor we wondered off to the gate. On the way, we noted the Air Egypt lounge and turned on our phone wifi and luckily  pickup up our email from the lounge free public wifi as we moved passed on the people mover!

Just a few of the many massive statues in Karnak Temple
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After only a short wait we boarded the plane and I found myself seated between two Egyptian strangers. Joe was luckily in an exit row and had knee room to spare. Once up in the air, you couldn’t see very much because of the amount of dust in the air. The trip went smoothly and try as I might to catch up on some sleep it just didn’t happen. After circling a number of times in the air at luxor, we started our descent, and then all of a sudden pulled up rather quickly. Murmurs went through the cabin and after a short time, the captain came on and said we had to return to Cairo because of poor visibility. This did not please the majority of passengers, and I wondered what was going to happen with our tour and us planned to board our Nile cruiser in Luxor. For the majority of the trip home, the two fellows either side of me were talking to each other animatedly, so no chance to sleep then either. The landing at Cairo was very bumpy and it actually looked like the visibility was worse there than Luxor. We were not allowed to get off the plane and it was getting very stuffy inside. After about half an hour, the captain announced that the dust had cleared enough at Luxor, and we would be leaving again shortly. Luckily my travelling companions brooded in their seats and I was able to cat-nap on the return journey. We were all happy to be off the plane finally in Luxor at midday.

Will we or won't we?..

The Avenue of Sphinxes approaching Karnak Temple
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Our tour guide Assem advised that the planned temple visit that we missed this morning would be caught up with the following morning, with a slightly earlier start (groan). We would now be going to the boat for lunch and then have a couple of hours of rest before heading out again. When we arrive at the dock, we see that the boats are moored side-by-side four or five deep, and to get to our boat, we have to cross the foyer of three other boats! Lunch was buffet style with simple salads, a couple of hot dishes and plates of fruit and gelatine sweets for desert. After our fill we headed to our cabin which has a lovely small balcony. As we unpack a little, another boat moors up on our other side so we pull our curtains as our room on the third floor is right beside their sundeck. I hit the hay and didn’t surface again until 4:15pm.

The massive carved columns of the Karnak Hypostyle Hall
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At 4.30pm we packed up and headed off in the bus with the others to Karnak temple. This was our first exposure to seeing these huge structures, massive statues and hieroglyphics carved into the massive columns and walls. Outside the front of the temple is what remains of two huge statues of Rameses II.  The temple is connected to the Luxor temple kilometres away via the Avenue of the Sphinxes – an avenue which originally had 2000 small sphinxes lining either side of a pencil-straight road. The small section that has been excavated is just amazing and makes you wonder what it would have looked like.

Andrea in front of one of the sphinxes
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As the sun set, Assem guided us around the temple and explained the different sections and what they were used for. We also got a very short lesson in hieroglyphics. It was just beautiful walking around this structure with the setting sun flooding it with red and yellow colours.

Once back on the boat it was straight to dinner, where again we were provided a buffet with salads, western hot dishes and desserts. I jumped on the tomato pasta and ate heaps of vegetables, which had been sadly lacking during our time in the US.

The papyrus demo at the papyrus shop
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It was now 9pm and I was ready to sleep once again.  These short nights and afternoon kips are really stuffing up my body clock and now I just seem tired all the time. That was it for me for the night.