{"id":15298,"date":"2019-02-14T12:51:18","date_gmt":"2019-02-14T17:51:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/?p=15298"},"modified":"2019-06-08T10:40:18","modified_gmt":"2019-06-08T14:40:18","slug":"return-to-luxor-egypt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/?p=15298","title":{"rendered":"Return to Luxor, Egypt"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thursday – February 14, 2019 \u00a0 \u00a0 Happy Valentine’s Day!<\/p>\n

We spent a quiet night aboard The Mojito<\/em>\u00a0in Luxor – the ancient capital of Thebes – on the east bank of the Nile River. Today we were scheduled to visit the huge Karnak Temple Complex. This is a vast open-air museum which is still undergoing extensive restoration.<\/p>\n

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What distinguishes Karnak from other ancient Egyptian sites and temples is the length of time it was built and used. Construction began in about 2055BC and continued until about 100AD; from the Egyptian Middle Kingdom into the Ptolemaic period. Therefore, the temple is a hodgepodge of ancient architectural designs.<\/p>\n

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According to Wikipedia, “Approximately thirty pharaohs contributed to the buildings, enabling it to reach a size, complexity, and diversity not seen elsewhere. Few of the individual features of Karnak are unique, but the size and number of features are overwhelming.”<\/em><\/p>\n

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One highlight of the complex is the Hypostyle Hall<\/em>, which is an area of 50,000 square feet which contains 134 massive columns. \u00a0The diameter of each column is more than ten feet.<\/p>\n

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The Hypostyle Hall<\/em> was begun by King Seti I (1313-1292BC) and was completed by his son Rameses II between 1292BC to 1258BC.<\/p>\n

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There are four main parts of the Karnak Complex and currently only one part is open to the public. The other sections are under continuous restoration.<\/p>\n

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Parts of the complex look like ancient ruins and other parts resemble a vast construction site. Karnak reminded me of a gigantic 3-dimensional puzzle.<\/p>\n

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Exit through the gift shops!<\/p>\n

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After a few hours of wandering around the Karnak Temple Complex, we left and continued to a papyrus workshop. \u00a0I wasn’t interested in purchasing an expensive work of art done on papyrus however I was curious how “paper” was made from the plant.<\/p>\n

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We watched a demonstration and learned the stalk of the papyrus plant is cut into pieces, soaked, pressed, and ‘woven’ into flat sheets. \u00a0Paint is then applied to the papyrus ‘paper.’ Amazing….<\/p>\n

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We returned to The Mojito<\/em> for lunch and afterwards, a small group joined Maged for a walk around Luxor. Our first stop was El Souk. <\/em>The traditional market street for local people is an important part of Egyptian culture. I love outdoor markets!!<\/p>\n

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It was joy to walk down the narrow streets lined with shops offering a huge variety of interesting goods.<\/p>\n

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It was feast for the eyes! \u00a0And sooo much fun!<\/p>\n

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Back out onto the main street, I saw the Temple of Luxor across busy modern traffic.<\/p>\n

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I quickly snapped the photo below as a delivery truck passed by loaded with grain and pulled by a mule. I think the picture ‘says it all’ about modern Egypt. \u00a0In the background there was a tourist horse & carriage below ads for modern furniture and electronics posted on modern buildings. In the foreground there was a man wearing the traditional galabeya<\/em> talking on a cellphone next to three school girls wearing backpacks and sneakers.<\/p>\n

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Our little group continued down the main street along the corniche on the Nile River. We stopped briefly at a wonderful bookstore which sold English-language books and prints.<\/p>\n

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Nearby was the famous Winter Palace Hotel where the British Egyptologist Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon stayed. In 1922, Carter discovered King Tutankhamen’s intact tomb financed by Lord Carnarvon.<\/p>\n

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We walked up the stairs which leads to the lobby to look around the public spaces. We were greeted by a man playing beautiful soft music on a reed flute. Perhaps it was the ancient instrument called a\u00a0ney.<\/em><\/p>\n

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The British mystery writer, Agatha Christie, wrote her famous story – Death on the Nile – while staying at the Winter Palace.<\/p>\n

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We went out on the terrace overlooking the river to sit and have some refreshments as the sun was reaching down over the west bank.<\/p>\n

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A few people rode a carriage back to our boat, The Mojito<\/em>. \u00a0I chose to walk along the busy corniche.<\/p>\n

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It had been another incredible day in Egypt!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thursday – February 14, 2019 \u00a0 \u00a0 Happy Valentine’s Day! We spent a quiet night aboard The Mojito\u00a0in Luxor – the ancient capital of Thebes – on the east bank of the Nile River. Today we were scheduled to visit the huge Karnak Temple Complex. This is a vast open-air museum which is still undergoing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-egypt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15298"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15298\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15484,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15298\/revisions\/15484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}