Egypt - Luxor-ious Ride down the River

December 10-11

Hello everyone!

For a civilisation to last to the end of this sentence, let alone for three thousand years, it needs a good water source. Egypt has quite a long one...

Sunset on the Nile

Jumping into Africa's - and possibly the world's - longest river

To get around Egypt, traders and workers would have sailed down the Nile. Most long rivers flow from north to south: not the Nile. Commonly known as the longest river in the world, it flows north from Rwanda or Burundi and meanders its way up to the Mediterranean Sea. They would do this in a boat called a felucca.

They have very tall sails

'I am sailing, I am sailing'

It travels in a zig-zag pattern down the river. Very slowly. So slowly that you can have a dip in the river, which is much cleaner up here than it is later in the river’s journey. A perfect way to spend an afternoon, watching the Sun dip over the west of Aswan. Well, aside from having to duck under the sturdy wooden beam holding the enormous sail as it switched sides. I had a go at that for a little while - quite boring!

We were assured that Egypt removed all crocodiles north of the dam

After spending a slightly chilly night on the stationary felucca (if you saw the monstrous cruise ships bombing along the river you’d understand why the little wooden boats stick to the sides after sunset), we got on a bus and headed up towards the middle of the kingdom.

Our sleeping space for the night - we had blankets to keep us warm

A Nile sunrise

Shortly after leaving Aswan (one a bus, I’d still be sailing if taking a felucca) we arrived at a temple complex called Kom Ombo. This temple was originally built in the New Kingdom, built around 180 BC, but reconstructed in the last 150 years. 

The entrance to Kom Ombo

The temple was built for two gods so has double
the usual number of courts, halls and other rooms

It is a spectacular homage to Sobek, the ‘crocodile’ god. There is a museum attached which has crocodiles which were mummified. Considering how long they are after being dehydrated before mummification, they must have been enormous when alive.

This is a depiction of Horus - Sobek is looking on from afar I think

Attaching what look like googly eyes to the mummy is just weird

As for the temple itself, it had lots of interesting aspects which I hadn’t noticed before. One was the tools they used for medicine and healing. Another was the calendar, which they split into three seasons of 120 days (they had figured out the lunar aspect of time so the other five were added on later).

Our guide took great pleasure in explaining how the brain is
whizzed up by a tool similar to a food mixer, before the body
is turned upside down so it pours out of the nose

Part of the Egyptian calendar, the small rectangles showing new days

From there, we drove on to the centre of the ancient world: Luxor. Also known as Thebes, this town on the river is apparently still the home of the largest temple in the world.

The entrance to Karnak

Karnak is enormous and took a long time to be so. Over 2000 years, in fact. Each pharaoh would add something to the temple to enshrine their place among the greats. We visited in the late afternoon, the result being that the soft light enhancing the magical elements inside.

Karnak covers 61 acres of land

Dates of temple parts range from 2055 BCE to 100 CE

What would they be, you ask? Pillars, for one. Not one, but well over 100, towering up to the sky, reminiscent of a Roman forum. Obelisks, including the largest in Egypt. A boulevard of spxhines stretching from Karnak across the west bank of the entire city. All built over 2000 years ago. 

Many obelisks were dedicated to Hatshephut

Full moon rising over Karnak

If this was special, the next stop on our temple trample was hauntingly beautiful. Luxor Temple, connected to Karnak by the Sphinx Boulevard, is one of the few temples you can visit after dark without suffering through a cheesy sound and light show. 

The entrance to Luxor Temple

Estimates have this temple being built in 1400 BCE

There are lights here, of course - you really wouldn’t see much otherwise, aside from the outlines of colossal statues and many, many pillars. The soft lighting that is used adds to the aura of importance. The faces on the statues - well the faces that haven’t been chiselled away by future generations - become more intimidating. 

Many pillars, though Karnak has more (134)

The preservation of the carvings is incredible

The impact of those who lived here after these Kingdoms is most noticeable by the fact that there is a mosque in the temple complex. If you look closely at the picture below, you will see the previous door to the mosque...about five metres in the air. This is because much of Luxor Temple was stuck under centuries of debris and rubble, forming a new artificial ground level where locals built.

Can you see the door? That much rubble.

I learnt that those beards...were usually fake

The two temples, Karnak and Luxor, were joined in the past by a ‘highway’ lined with sphinxes. It’s believed that thousands of statues of the creatures were placed along the three kilometre road. The temples themselves would have been on the edge of the Nile during the flooding season - how amazing would it have been to sail straight up to the entrance of these majestic temples?

A bit of simple maths will tell you there were over 1000 sphinxes

You can't walk down the sphinx highway,
which is probably the sensible decision

You would think that mental fatigue would start to set in at some point - so much information, so many incredible yet similar sights. Seeing so many historical sights in such a short space of time is draining. It is also worth powering through to learn about these marvellous structures and the stories behind them.

Karnak

Luxor Temple

These are incredible temples and monuments to history in their own right. This is just one bank of the river, however, and not the main reason people from around the world come to Luxor. The western side deserves a blog of its own…

Luxor Temple 

Chanelling my inner Ramses II

Love you all,

Matt