Luxor, Egypt – by Anna

Luxor was packed with amazing history. When we arrived in Luxor after our overnight train, our guide, Shaima, was waiting for us. We all got in the tour bus and we drove to our accommodation. When we got there, we had an amazing typical Egyptian breakfast of omlettes, yogurt, and bread with all sorts of jams and cheeses. After breakfast, we drove to the Valley of the Kings, a world heritage site. We checked out the tombs of Ramses the 2nd, Ramses the 4th and Ramses the 12th. It was so cool to see the the carvings on the walls of the tombs. Back in the Egyptian times, as soon as a Prince would become King, the workers would start to dig the tomb and when they died they’d stop digging. The Ramses ruled during the 19th and 20th dynasty. We took a picture infront of the tomb of King Tut, who has a smaller tomb because he ruled for only 10 years. He became King at the age of 9 and he is known as the youngest King. We had heard that there is nothing much to see in Tut’s tomb, so we didn’t visit it. We also saw all the tomb’s contents in the museum a few days ago. Next, we went to Hatshepsut’s temple. Hatshepsut ruled during the 18th dynasty. She decided to build her temple directly in line of the Karnak temple. Hatshepsut was the only female King. The reason of that is because the next King in line after Hatshepsut’s father was her half brother. At the time, he was too young to rule so Hatshepsut had to married him so she could become King. While she ruled, she didn’t pay attention to her brother, so when it was time for him to rule, he erased some of the carvings in her temple. We had a quick stop to check out the traditional pottery then another to check out the Colossi of Memnon. All that remains are two giant statues of Amenhotep the 3rd. The statues used to lead to a temple but it got distroyed over the years. Then it was time for lunch. We ate a delicious shawarma with a lot of different stews. We had a pretty chill evening.

The next morning, the Easter bunny came! Everyone was so excited, especially Elise. She wrote a pretty cute note. We did a fun little hunt in our hotel room and we even got to try some delicious Egyptian candies. After breakfast, we headed to Karnak Temple of Amun. There are over 25 different temples and chapels in the complex. Karnak covers an area of over 100 hectares and approximately 30 pharaohs contributed to building it. This temple was dedicated to the God Amun. Another cool thing about Karnak is that when Napoleon and his army came to Egypt, they carved their signatures in the entrance of the temple. The sand level back then was so high that they signed near the top of the pylon (aka wall). It is such a huge temple! In front of the temple lies an avenue of ram headed lions, which is a symbol of Amun. Karnak was such an amazing temple to walk through and neither my sisters nor I were ever bored. Next we visited Luxor Temple. Once again, just like Karnak, there lies an avenue of Ram headed Sphinx but this time much longer. In the entrance used to be two obelisks but now, only one. The other one is in Paris. Weird! Near the obelisks there are six statues of Ramses the 2nd. The temple was built not only by Ramses the 2nd but by Amenhotep the 3rd and King Necatnebo the 1st who built all the Sphinx at the entrance. We wandered through the rest of the temple listening to Shaima explain everything. Lunch was at a mud brick farm house near the Nile River. We ate solar bread which is like a dough that cooks in the sun, and we dipped it in something they called “black honey” but we were all convinced it was molasses. We also had boiled eggs and cheese. It was delicious! The houses in Luxor are built with mud bricks because it never rains and they say it keeps the houses cool. The next morning, we said goodbye to Shaima and we all got on the train to go to Aswan. Oh, I love Egyptian history.