Karnak Temple, Papyrus Gallery & travelling To Cairo,
The next day we awoke feeling very refreshed and satisfied from our big night of sleep. We hurried down to the breakfast buffet just after 8am & made good use of it.
After breakfast we met the rest of the tour group in the lobby, some of them were as fresh as us, while others looked like they desired nothing more than bed. Some people had elected an extra activity of a sunrise hot air balloon ride, some of those same people had stayed at the Irish pub drinking until 1am & had to be in the lobby to leave for the hot air balloon by 3am. We watched some very amusing footage of one of the girls who had fallen asleep during the ride and could be heard snoring.
Our first stop today was the Karnak temple complex, a temple built in Luxor, which was connected to the Luxor temple by the alley of sphinx's. The Karnak temple was the main place of worship during the 18th dynasty & it's main gods of worship were Amun, Mut & their son Khonso, also known as the Theban triad. The temple's construction started in the Middle Kingdom & continued right through to Ptolemaic era, a staggering 2000 years of construction with 30 pharaohs contributing. It was by far the largest & grandest complex we had been in yet & it's blatantly obvious why it is the second most visited ancient site in Egypt, following the Giza pyramids.
One part of this temple complex we will always remember is the hall of Amun-Re with its columns. The hall is approximately 5,000 square metres and is defined by 134 massive columns that vary in size. 122 columns are 10 metres tall while the remaining 12 are 21 metres in height with a diameter of 3 metres.
As well as the columns, there are giant statues, obelisks & walls of hieroglyphic writings. This temple complex is one of the most diverse, captivating & established, containing so much history from so many rulers of Egypt. The best was definitely saved till last.
After Karnak we hopped back onto the bus and made a short journey to the local papyrus factory, where we had a brief education on the making of the papyrus paper and an opportunity for the other people on our tour to purchase a painting. I was dreading this stop, absolutely terrified I would find my exact painting cheaper or done by a better artist. Thankfully that was not the case, our papyrus that we had previously brought still remained the largest, brightest & one of the best ones we saw.
After this it was time for lunch, before making our way back to Cairo, a journey of 9 hours we were not looking forward to. A journey made worse by the 2 girls sitting behind us who's flatulence was frequent and obnoxious in every way possible.
Once we got back to Cairo, we checked in to our hotel and ordered room service pizza.
It's starting to sink in that we only have 2 days left in Egypt, we couldn't have foreseen the amazing time that we would have or that Egypt would become our number 1 country so far.
- Alli
The next day we awoke feeling very refreshed and satisfied from our big night of sleep. We hurried down to the breakfast buffet just after 8am & made good use of it.
After breakfast we met the rest of the tour group in the lobby, some of them were as fresh as us, while others looked like they desired nothing more than bed. Some people had elected an extra activity of a sunrise hot air balloon ride, some of those same people had stayed at the Irish pub drinking until 1am & had to be in the lobby to leave for the hot air balloon by 3am. We watched some very amusing footage of one of the girls who had fallen asleep during the ride and could be heard snoring.
One part of this temple complex we will always remember is the hall of Amun-Re with its columns. The hall is approximately 5,000 square metres and is defined by 134 massive columns that vary in size. 122 columns are 10 metres tall while the remaining 12 are 21 metres in height with a diameter of 3 metres.
As well as the columns, there are giant statues, obelisks & walls of hieroglyphic writings. This temple complex is one of the most diverse, captivating & established, containing so much history from so many rulers of Egypt. The best was definitely saved till last.
After Karnak we hopped back onto the bus and made a short journey to the local papyrus factory, where we had a brief education on the making of the papyrus paper and an opportunity for the other people on our tour to purchase a painting. I was dreading this stop, absolutely terrified I would find my exact painting cheaper or done by a better artist. Thankfully that was not the case, our papyrus that we had previously brought still remained the largest, brightest & one of the best ones we saw.
After this it was time for lunch, before making our way back to Cairo, a journey of 9 hours we were not looking forward to. A journey made worse by the 2 girls sitting behind us who's flatulence was frequent and obnoxious in every way possible.
Once we got back to Cairo, we checked in to our hotel and ordered room service pizza.
It's starting to sink in that we only have 2 days left in Egypt, we couldn't have foreseen the amazing time that we would have or that Egypt would become our number 1 country so far.
- Alli
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