El Gezira Gardens Luxor

... Elanoire is our guide and also a third owner in the boat and business. I was dealing with Enrique who is in Paris and the other owner is also on board the vessel. Elanoire spends most of her time plying up and down the nile with the guests and guiding them to the sites. The boat is well fitted out - loads of deck space and very cool below decks.

The first day we managed to sail a little and had a chat with the Captain and Pete told him I was also a Captain! I was ...

... of cokes and a water but didnt care. Everyone loves toursits in egypt, they all hassle you and try to sell you anything they can get their hands on. One guy even wanted money for showing us the entrance to the sphinx - which was clearly marked and was in the direction we were heading. We had kfc for lunch and ate it in front of our guide who was fasting for ramadan and nearly passing out due to dehydration - they cant eat, drink or smoke between sunrise and sunset ...

... boats on it and a string of the tourist floating hotels that people travel down the Nile in luxury on. It was stinking hot, hotter than Cairo and completely saps any energy you may have had setting out from the hotel. We arranged some US dollars as we needed some for getting to Jordan and then wandered along the streets up to the Luxor museum. This museum is way smaller than Cairo but its contents are of a better quality and superb statues of gods and pharaohs made of alabaster and ...

... which I was able to read only the title and the lead of on Kristen's blackberry. After Khalid told me about everyone's excitement to see Obama, the NYTimes article argued that Obama was likely to not be well received in a country where people were suffering at the hands of the Authoritarian state. Of course that made me think about the unique perspective of Khalid. Khalid cannot in his right mind support a "fight" that could occur if those still angry at Israel ...

... found), Karnak temple...The first day was spent more or less catching up on stuff in our hotel, laundry, browsing the area for fun...our hotel has a terrasse which overlooks the Nile and the entire city, was really cool to eat up there before going to the Karnak Sound and Light Show. Its basically this 1973 (give or take a few years) pre-recorded guide through the temple at night with lights on the monuments on queue with cheesy Indiana Jones sound effects...yeah its ...

... 67 acres and is remarkably intact. There is very active restoration going on in some regions of the site. The temple was built over 132 years and was used for 100's of years to commemorate the coming of the floods and the ceremonies surrounding the river and its huge impirtance to the ancient people andtheir civilization. The temple is a massive complex in standard layout. You enter through 2 large walls into an open couryard with 20 foot diameter 80 foot tall ...

... of the temple was buried under sand. I've got some good photos from here. Rest of the day in Luxor We did a tour of Luxor, previously the ancient Egyptian city of Thebes, on the banks of the Nile River. We decided not to go inside Luxor Temple (and its many columns) as we already visited two others today, instead wandering through the markets and having a group dinner. 10 years ago today was my Bar Mitzvah, when I read the Ten ...

... reliefs and hieroglyphics amazingly are still on the stone after all this time.Mohammed showed us that the sandstone in the area has deposits of color, over ten colors, ranging from bright blue and black to different shades of yellow and red that the ancient Egyptians used as paint. He demonstrated this by sticking his finger in cracks in the rock and applying different colors on Katie’s arm for everyone to see. Every time he wanted Katie’s attention to apply a ...

... du Nil est saisissant. La présence de cette vie sur l'eau n'est pas sans rappeler les croyances, certainement d'inspiration locale, selon lesquelles la vie peut marcher sur l'eau. Le Nil accueille aussi de nombreux enfants qui s’y baignent du bout de leurs champs.

... for around 3000 years until the 9th century AD when a plague wiped out the population. The temple featured many complete statues as well as many excellently preserved carvings and paintings, so wondering around in the temple was an absolute pleasure. What was funny were the people who were "restoring" the temple, however I didn't actually see them doing any work, instead they were more interested in trying to get everyone taking photos of them ...