Day 3 Egypt – in which we go underground

Today was the visit to the Valley of the Kings, before the boat moved on. Tour bus took us to the entrance, full of milling crowds as usual – we fought our way through security and onto trolleys which took us to the mid point. There were multiple additional extra options which made it confusing but our tour guide gave us a brief overview and headed us out as guides were not allowed to work within the tombs due to traffic flow.

To clarify, the Valley of the Kings is the area discovered by English archeologist Howard Carter who uncovered Tutankhamen’s tomb there but subsequently more than 60 tombs have been found (unfortunately with no contents, hence the fame of Tutankhamen). Only about half have been identified, but the heiroglyphics and painting left are extraordinary. We had to choose from the open tombs 3 “free” ones and most of us also purchased tickets to Ramses 6 which we started with, and had almost entirely to ourselves. Stunning. The paint pigments have survived more than 1600 years, and the Art decorating the underground passageways is truly amazing. By the last tomb the milling crowds had developed to long queues inside every tomb and it was HOT – this area is completely in the desert, super arid. No pictures – sorry folk, I didn’t cough up the 300 Egyptian pounds extra for this as I didn’t think they’d turn out. Google “valley of the kings” and I’m sure you’ll find lots….

After that we were taken to an Alabaster factory (apparently a local trade) and then on to Queen Hapteschut’s (sp?) temple – quite an interesting story from our guide about the family intrigue played out in his presentation pulling members from our group in to represent family members of the royals. That area (on the other side of the Valley of the Kings) was also HOT so we were happy to reconvene for transport back to the boat by hired boat instead of the road, and finally back to the cruise boat which then finally sailed. Tea at 4 p.m., cocktails at 7 p.m. and we all dressed up for dinner. At least, the Brits clearly brought cruise clothes, and I pulled out my one skirt brought for mosque visits (not nearly in the same class). At least I didn’t show up in my baggy bike shorts (I took seriously the instructions to bring very baggy shorts so as not to offend the locals….). We spent some time on deck hoping to see the boat progressing through the loch however I had to give up as the URTI (cold) was making me feel miserable and crashed early. Sunset on the Nile was pretty – I heard in the morning we finally got through about 10 pm. – there was some sort of selection in the lineup of cruise boats as to who went when I guess, though I couldn’t figure it out as there were several that came in after us that seemed to pass us by?