Luxor to Aswan...Temples, Temples and More Temples!

On our plane from Cairo to Luxor, Jeremy met a local Egyptian man who had recently applied for permanent citizenship in Canada (he noticed Jeremy's 'Canadian T-Shirt). Ironically enough, he sat right next to us on the plane and Jeremy and Mina swapped information about both Egypt and Canada (I was stone cold sick at the time and made a feeble attempt at sleeping on the plane). Mina was heading to Luxor to meet his new tour group (Mina is a local travel agent) and he ended up being not only our saviour (as he arranged tons of trips to temples and museums at essentially cost), but he is also someone we now consider our good friend. We landed in Luxor and he insisted that his driver take us to the hotel but en-route, he treated us to some local Egyptian food called Koshery (which is a mixture of lentils, rice and noodles with tomato sauce – very delicious). We checked into our hotel, crawled into our beds and slept. We slept so long that we actually did not wake until 11:30am the next day – a solid 12 hours of sleep. Since we had missed out on the continental breakfast, we munched on some old meat and cheese from Cairo (luckily we did not get sick).

We phoned Mina with some questions and he ended up organizing our whole day and even arranged a driver named Abraham to pick us up from the hotel. He suggested we spend day one in Luxor visiting some of the not so 'touristy' monuments and temples (places we had not even heard of). We started at the Madinet HabouTemple – it was a fairly intact and intricate temple and because it was our first, we were very impressed. I hate to admit this, but what impressed me even more was the bit of construction work that was ongoing adjacent to the temple entrance. There was a small construction crew that was hand digging (I can't emphasize enough the word HAND) a trench that was at least 20ft deep. As I stood there, I could not help but notice the lack of hard hats (basically all of the PPE) and the meagre attempt at shoring – danger was written everywhere (and I don't think any of the workers even knew it).

We then visited the Tombs of the Nobles where we we greeted by what we thought was a 'nice' Egyptian man. He steered us in a direction then told us we had to pay him 40 L.E.(~8 bucks) to guide us to the open tombs. We told him, “thanks, but no thanks”. It turned out that the reason we were having so much trouble finding any of the open tombs was because this local man had taken us to the back location where there were no signs. We ended up getting help from a local girl who was really sweet but unfortunately we could not tip her for her efforts as she had disappeared in our last tomb visit.

We checked out the Workman's Village where there were more than 70 houses which were occupied in the Pharonic ages by the workers and their families who created the royal tombs – all we can say it what a HUGE difference from their homes to the Pharaohs TOMBS.

From there we headed to the great Ramsseuum temple built by the great Ramses II which was part of his funerary complex. Unfortunately for him, his work at this temple had not survived the times very well unlike his temples at Karnak and Abu Simbel (or so we were told as they were still on our list of things to see).

We headed back to the East bank and took in the Luxor Museum. As we were entering the museum, we met some locals who informed us that the museum was very short and somewhat disappointing. Two hours later we couldn't have disagreed with them more.

As a side note, we saw very few tourists at any of these monuments but rather locals. And...similar to what we experienced at the Pyramids at Giza, we had all of the locals (from young kids to old men) ask to take our pictures. This got so excessive that at times, we had to refuse as we were on a very tight time line and the pictures were detracting from out temple touring – who would have thought???

After a full 6 hours of sightseeing, Abraham welcomed us to his house for some Koshery and tea. Here we met his mother, aunt, wife and adorable 2 year old son named Martin. There was a huge communication barrier between us and so for the better part of the time we just smiled at each other and laughed at how cute Martin was. At one point, Martin was trying to get his hands in the sugar bowl, his mother came and slapped his hands only to then spoon feed him 2 heaping piles of sugar – Jeremy and I laughed so hard and we could not believe they were actually spoon feeding sugar to their already hyper 2 year old son right before his bedtime.

Tip #21 ) Egyptians love their sugar. I cant stress this fact to you...they absolutely love it! Egyptian tea is found everywhere from restaurants and hotels to tiny souq shops and train terminals. They offer it to you free of charge (i.e. it is their welcome drink) as it part of their customs. They always ask how many spoonfuls, we laugh and tell them none and they look at us like we are crazy. Abraham was the worst for this as he used 5 heaping spoonfuls for his small glass of tea – hello cavities!

After saying goodbye to the family, we made our way back to our hotel but first, Abraham wanted to stop for some Stella's. I thought this was strange but hey, “When in Rome – right???” Abraham explained to us that this (i.e. drinking while driving) was acceptable in Egypt, we explained that this was definitely not acceptable in Canada – he was very confused. He then proceeded to chuck his empty beer can and his empty pack of cigarettes out the window onto the street – this whole littering thing is still something that Jeremy and I haven't grasped. It could all be prevented if people just cleaned up after themselves.

We said our goodbye's near the hotel and Abraham wanted a picture of us...turned out he only wanted a picture of me and this was his was of getting a 'feel' as he causally put his hand on my butt then squeezed it for as many times as he could before I jumped out of the way. I did not see this coming and was horrified!!!

The next morning, we headed for a hot air balloon ride over the West Bank of Luxor. We owe our thanks again to Mina as he organized the whole thing and had saved us $25 US per person just by booking it himself. We assumed we would be in the balloon by our selves but soon learned otherwise. There were a total of 20 of us split into 4 compartments...a bit squishy but what an amazing view. We were hoping to head over the Valley of the Kings but because of the winds direction, we floated over all of the monuments we had visited the day before – also a very cool experience. As a side note, we could not believe how hot it was in the balloon and at one point, we both had to feel the top of our heads to make sure we still had hair. The landing was also an unforgettable experience – our pilot attempted to land in a farmers field but aborted that plan when the local farmer was running at us screaming at the top of his lungs that he would kill us if we landed on his crops. We settled on the farmers field next to the crazy one – luckily our pilot picked a patch of sugar cane that was already harvested (and luckily, this farmer didn't care).

After the air balloon ride, we aimlessly walked around Luxor looking for a certain restaurant that was recommended to us by our hotel. When we found it, we had great difficulty explaining what we were wanting. The workers ended up letting us come into the kitchen to make our food for a small small price. All they wanted was a picture of me...it was very very creepy but I agreed because I was more creped out about the sanitization of the workers – I mean everybody was coughing into their hands and were handling the already very dirty money (plus, most restaurants do not have toilet paper and soap is considered a luxury item...so you can imagine how unsanitary it can get). We paid 10 L.E. for our lunch which is a little less than $2 – crazy to think!

After lunch we drove the 60km to Dandera where we visited this beautiful and very intact museum. This temple was built at the very end of the Pharonic period and had tons of 'nooks and crannies' to go exploring in (Jeremy and I felt like Indiana Jones). Our favourite part was probably the windy and endless staircase that was covered in hieroglyphics which led us to the top of the temple for an overall spectacular view.

We finished off the day by visiting the Mummification Museum. The art of mummification is very interesting and it seems like the ancient people mastered their technique through what must have only been countless 'trial and error' experiments. In the mummification process, all organs are removed except for the kidneys (which were hard to reach) and the heart (the heart was considered the source of intelligence and not the brain...but the brain was whisked into a liquid which could then be easily drained – yuck!). Then, the body and its separate organs are covered in salt and left out to dry for 40 days, after which they were washed, purified and covered with oils, spices and resins. All where then wrapped in layers of linen. Each internal organ was placed in one of four canopic jars and placed inside the coffin with the mummified body. At the museum, we were able to see a mummified priest, crocodile, cat, tiny fish, monkey and a leg of a goat.

For supper, we met Mina at McDonald's where we treated to him to a McArabia (so good, too bad we don't have them back home) then had a drink with him on his cruise ship. Mina again came to our rescue by phoning our travel agency for our cruise ship and obtained our itinerary (we had phoned them several times but because of the communication barrier, we could never express what exactly we were wanting). They emailed Mina our plan and also informed us that our driver and tour guide would be picking us up at our hotel at 8am the following day (useful information we were glad we had received prior to the morning).

The next day was “CRUISE” day. We were very excited and really looking forward to a bit of relaxation as Egypt has been very very exhausting. Our guide picked us up and we immediately headed over to the West Bank to visit the Valley of the Kings. Now, at some point between when we were picked up and when we arrived at the Valley of Kings we must have done something to horribly offend and/or piss of our guide as he was very very rude to us and rushed us through everything. We informed him that we had student cards (which saves you 50% off of all antiquity prices) and that the savings should be returned to us (as our cruise included all sights en route). He at first did not agree but when we threatened involving the travel agency, he grumbled under his breath and told us we would receive it back at the end of the cruise.

Valley of the Kings was very impressive and we toured inside three tombs (Ramses I, VI and IX). The tombs have suffered great damage from treasure hunters, floods and most recently tourism (in the form of sweat). We then paid the extra entrance fee to tour the famous tomb of King Tutankhamen. As many of you are aware, the tomb of King Tut was discovered in 1922 by Howard Carter. Interestingly enough, we had learnt that Carter was on his last year of his 5 year permit and although his close colleague had since returned home, he was adamant about locating what he believed was to be the untouched tomb. King Tut's tomb was not as eccentric as the others but this is largely believed to be because it was rushed to completion. King Tut had died unexpectedly and although the cause of his death is unknown, many believe it was from an infection after breaking his leg.

Our next stop was the Temple of Hatshepsut (also known as Deir al-Bahri) located on the opposite side of the VOK. This temple had an almost modern looking design to it and it blended in beautifully with the massive cliffs that surrounded it. Had there not been a thousand plus tourists, I think we would have found paradise. The temple was heavily vandalized through out the centuries from a combination of: the Queen's stepson, who was jealous of her reign (Tuthnmosis III), and thus removed his stepmothers name and face whenever he could; Akhenaten, who removed all references to the Sun God Amun; and the Christians who turned the temple into a monastery and defaced many of the wall relief's. I had asked our guide if we could walk to the temple instead of waiting for the tram as the view leading up was unbelievable. He rudely told me “NO” (despite the fact that there were many tourists walking). I was pissed but Jeremy calmed me down and told me to forget about it.

From here we headed back to the East Bank but first our guide stopped at what must have only been his friends Alabaster Workshop. We were warned in our travel books to watch out for the tour guides who take you to stores, encourage you to buy what they call 'priceless' souvenirs and then benefit by commission. We did not fall for his trick which was unfortunate because it only angered him all the more.

We checked in to our fabulous cruise, ate an awesome lunch and headed to the Famous Karnack Temple. Karnack Temple is a complex of temples, sanctuaries and obelisks dedicated to the Theban Gods and the Pharaohs. The site covers over 2 sq km – our biggest site yet. The temple was built, added to, dismantled, restored, enlarged and decorated over a period of 1500 years (and despite all of this, the majority of it is still standing). Karnak was the most important place of worship in Egypt during the New Kingdom. Our guide talked a mile a minute (yes...even faster than I talk) and the only thing I really gathered from him was that the scarab beetles are considered good luck (thank goodness for our brief summaries in our lonely planet guide book). We found a scarab statue and noticed lots of tourists walking around it in circles. We asked the significance and were told, “3 times around brings you good luck, 4 times brings marriage and 5 brings the kids”. We thought about stopping on 4 but we thought what the hell, might as well go the whole way – right?!?

Our last stop for the evening was the Luxor Temple built by both Amenhotep III and the Great Ramses II. The temple is situated in the heart of the town on the East Bank (right next to a McDonald's). The temple was vandalized by both the Christians (who even went as far as plastering and painting over the hieroglyphic walls) and then later by the Muslims who built their houses and a Mosque over the buried temples. When the temple was later discovered and excavated, all houses were torn down except for the Mosque which just sits their looking oddly out of place. A cool thing to mention is that Luxor and Karnack were once connected by a 3km roadway lined with Sphinxes. Majority of the Sphinxes are no longer present but it gives you a nice idea how the temples would have once looked back in ancient times.

Once we were back on our boat and settled in our room, we did not feel like doing any kind of exploring – we were so happy that we had a satellite TV in our room and felt like it was time to catch up on some movies.

The next morning (Day 2) Jeremy helped me take out my braids (very sweet of him) while we watched a couple of movies. After lunch (and after meeting these 2 very cool English couples who were sitting at our food table) we ventured to the top deck for some sun. It was so relaxing cruising down the Nile and the scenery was amazing...I mean on one side of the bank you have the desert...and the other side you have lush greenery. I caught up on some blog writing then made the mistake of looking at some new face book photos of baby Jaxson and my family (and their recent outing to Dim Sum). I started crying (and believe me, I am not a crier let alone a public crier). I must have made an impression on multiple people as the following day I had strangers approach me and inquire if everything was alright. I laughed and explained my situation, they were very kind.

Later on that evening (while our boat was parked near the Esna Locking station) there was out of the blue intense yelling and pandemonium – locals on tiny row boats had surrounded our boat and were throwing souvenirs to people on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and top deck floors – their aim was perfect and it was a spectacle to see. Jeremy was so excited (I mean really excited) and before I knew it, he had ran down to our cabin (as fast as he could) to get some money. He was thrown a Dahibaya and it was like he had won the lottery...he really really wanted it. Although I thought it was hideous (both on him and the garmet itself), who am I to say what he could and could not buy especially when I felt like I had just seen a glimpse of Jeremy as a child on Christmas morning. After the sale was over (and we threw the money back down to the locals in the boat) we continued to watch until all boats had left. We then ran around and talked to all passengers in our vicinity of the events that had just taken place.

On Day 3 we had to be up and ready for 8 am (some kind of holiday huh?!?) but when we went to the lobby, we could not see our guide. It turned out that our guide arranged someone else to pick us up. He did not even have the decency to let us know even though he had our phone number. We continued to have different guides for every temple but we took this as a blessing in disguise as all the guides turned out to be much better than him. This time we visited the Edfu temple which was quite nice and we actually learned something from our guide.

We were back on the boat by 10 am and continued on our sail. We sat in the sun for the better part of the day. This time, Jeremy caught up on some blog writing and our new English friends could not believe we were still writing...but those of you who read this can understand just how much writing (or verbal diarrhoea) we do. In the evening we met a new guide and toured the temple of Komombo. At this point, we really missed our old camera as the night pics at this temple did not turn out.

At supper, we socialized with our English friends and we found out that they are both farmers back home in England. There was bubbly and charismatic Linda and her sports fanatic husband Ant and sweet and quiet Kris and her equally sports fanatic husband John. John and Ant were friends from preschool and they insisted that if we ever head to England, we must stay with them. They had a very cool guide named Hassam and together, they offered us to join their group as they felt bad about the current issues we were facing with our guide. We were tempted to join them on their trip to Abu Simbel as they had a private coach but decided to stick with our program instead. It worked out for the best as their coach (aka mini bus) had broken down the night before and they were unable to go. But...if you are reading this Linda or Chris, we made sure to take extra pictures of Abu Simbel for you (and you were all in our minds...and yes, waking up at 2:30am for the bus really sucked!!!).

On Day 4 in Aswan, we met another new guide at 8am and headed to the high damn. This was very interesting and a highlight of our trip. The damn took 8 years to build and houses 24 turbines which produces a total of 175 MW of electricity. But the most important part of this is that is now controls the Nile and prevents the annual flooding. As a result of this dam, multiple monuments had to be relocated (and keep in mind that these are the monuments that were discovered. I am sure there are many more yet to be uncovered but now remain totally submerged in Lake Nasser). From here we took a motor boat to the temple of Phila which was one of the monuments relocated. This was thus far our most beautiful temple – not because of its architecture but because of its gorgeous natural surroundings. Our last stop was at the Unfinished Obelisk. This proved to be equally exciting to us as the dam. Here we learned how the workers acquired, carved and transported their raw material (unlike blocks used in the construction of a temple, it was imperative that the Obelisk be a free standing piece of granite). It is a very interesting and brilliant process. They first used a very heavy rock (10x heavier than granite) called Diorite to chisel away knobs in the granite block around the perimeter of their desired shape. They would then fill the knobs with wood and then soak the wood. The wood would expand causing stress on the rock and it would crack as a result (a controlled crack). They would do this to all 4 sides with the bottom side being done last. They would then excavate tunnels below the granite rock from the location to the Nile. Once the Nile flooded in the high season, they would push/slide the rock through the tunnels to the Nile with the use of mud. Unfortunately for this obelisk, it had cracked in two different locations and was thus abandoned but had it not, it would have been the largest Obelisk weighing 190 tons (intended for Queen Hatsheput).

In the early afternoon, we meet up with Mina and tagged along on a Felucca ride down the Nile with his tour group. Although the group was from France and only spoke French, we felt very welcomed. One of the drivers of the Felucca was Nubian and sang for us a traditional Nubian song while playing the drums and then after we sang a ton of French songs that we hadn't sang since we were in kindergarten such as 'Fre rejocka'. Soon after we had finished our song a tiny little boat with two children, paddling with their hands, had latched onto our Felucca boat. They were told that the boat had Canadians so they started singing “row, row, row your boat” and once they heard that the boat also had French people on-board they aborted the English songs and gave us another round of the same French songs we had just been singing (French people must be better tipers than English).

We spent the remainder of the afternoon and evening socializing with our new English friends and Hassam and consumed very expensive (considering you could buy a 1 L water for 50 cents) beer. It was a great way to end our trip and we wished it could have only lasted longer. I was not feeling great so I had to go to bed but Jeremy joined the english group to a Nubian dance session on the boat and then a nightcap with the english couple.

On Day 5 we checked out of our mini paradise and, thanks again to Mina, were picked up from the hotel and headed to the Kalapsha Temple. The thing we loved best about this ordinary temple was that their were maybe 5 tourists on the island at the time of viewing. We did not have to fight with others to get a clear/free shot of any parts of the temple. We were asked by one of the guards if we wanted to go to the top of temple to get some pictures. We knew there would be baksheesh involved but we thought it would be neat and worth it. It was a great view from up top. We took many pics and then organized our money to see how much we had for baksheesh. We were able to put together five Egyptian pounds or so we thought. It turned out that some of our coins were Kenyan and the workers, after looking through our offering, unabashedly told us that the coins were not Egyptian and asked us for more. Unfortunately, we did not have any small change but after apologizing for our error they just asked if they could keep the Kenyan Shillings as a souvenir.

Our next stop was the Nubian museum which opened our eyes to a new side of Egyptian history but at the same time thoroughly confused us. There is so much history here that the little tid bits they give you in the museum are hard to categorize with everything else you learn. We will need to read a good book when we get home to sort out all of the confusion...either that or just ask Sophie Mills.


The afternoon consisted of a nice meal at a Nubian restaurant followed by a motor boat ride on the Nile to a Nubian village where we hopped on Camels and were escorted to centre of the village. The camel ride was nice but I feared that I was going to fall of the entire time or at least lose my sandals. When the camel tips to sit down it is as if you are riding a bucking bronco. At the village we were offered more food (home-made Nubian bread with liver, molasses and egg over cheese for dipping). On top of that our guide was told to bring Kosheri along for us to eat. We had to turn down a lot of food but accepted some Hibiscus tea which Jeremy was a fan of and drank three glasses while I got some Henna done. After Jeremy had figured he had asked our Nubian guide Hamada enough questions we decided that it was time that we leave and see some more sights. We thanked our host who was a cheerful and beautiful Nubian mother of three. We then toured around an old Locking Station (Dad...you would have loved seeing this) and then cruised up and down the Nile. It was nice to just sit on the top deck and watch all of the scenery as well as the locals just playing around in the water. We headed to another beach where we could go for a swim. We were a bit leary about swimming in the Nile as much of the Nile in Cairo and Luxor was absolutely disgusting with garbage everywhere. Hamada told us that the people here drink from the Nile because it is not polluted by the downstream city centers and is fast moving. We accepted and while being watched by a group of people trying to sell us more Souvenirs (there are people everywhere, I mean everywhere, trying to sell stuff to tourists) we stripped down to our bathing suites and went for a swim. Had the sun still been up it would have been great but without the sun to warm us up we didn't last more than one dive into the water. On the return trip we got to watch the sunset from the top of the Felucca.


That evening we had hoped in all earnest to watch movie after movie in our room but we kept getting horrible cartoon movie after cartoon movie. We just prepared to sleep for the next morning's journey which was scheduled to begin at 2:30 am to take us to Abu Simbel.


2:30 am came early. Mina had told us to take our hotel pillows which was a saviour. Although, I tried to inform someone else in the hotel to take their pillow they did not and we were the only ones who seemed able to sleep on the three hour drive through the desert in the dark. At around 7:30 am we arrived at Abu Simbel to be greeted by what seemed like a million other tourists. After entering the site we didn't care because the temple was incredible. Abu Simbel made the pyramids look like a cakewalk in terms of construction. The statues of Ramses II towered over the entrance and it was something to marvel at as we entered the temple. In the first section of the temple another set of incredibly large statues loomed over us. The hieroglyphics on the wall were in incredibly good shape although it was difficult to stop and enjoy them for any extended period of time because there was too many tourists.

We were given two hours to look around the temple before our police escorted convoy was to head back to Aswan. This was the perfect amount of time to visit the massive mountain temple of Ramses II and the smaller but also very enthralling temple of Hathor. From a birds eye view it was awe inspiring as these would have made for good James Bond hideouts because from above they would have appeared as regular mountains but were in fact very intricately carved temples. What is more amazing is that because of the construction of the High Dam in Aswan they had to relocate the temple to higher locations so they would not become submerged under Lake Nasser.


Jeremy managed to sleep on the way back to Aswan while I began typing up our blog (i.e. this one you are reading now). We had gotten very behind over the last couple of months which is why there has been such an uploading as of recently. After we arrived back in Aswan we painfully made our way to the post office to send Mustafa enough money so he could buy his bus ticket to Sinai where we were planning to do our desert Safari. He was so thankful when he received our payment that he went immediately to the bus station and purchased his ticket.

We killed some time before our evening carriage ride around Aswan. Our trip was guided but it was definitely not needed because he didn't really explain anything he just sat across from us facing us for the entire trip (can you say awkward???). It was nice to have him in the mosque where he explained some of the traditions and showed Jeremy how the Muslim people wash before the worship. By the time Jeremy had finished washing himself, he was soaked from head to toe. After our guide did the usual and took us to his cousins shop where Jeremy tried to buy a Sheesha (but after calling Mustafa to inquire about the price) he came to his senses and decided not to buy it. I bailed out early and headed back to the hotel for a conference call with my new nephew Jaxson, Amanda and Nadia while Jeremy joined Ahmed for Sheesha at the café where he later told me he was taught the rules of football. Another successful Mina tour arrangement (despite the guide on our 'romantic'carriage ride – oh well).