Luxor, Valley of the Kings, and the Nile

I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert.
Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
'My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains.
Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

- Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ozymandias, referring to a statue of Ramses II (Ozymandias is the Greek name for him).


Mrs. Eckert, my third grade teacher, encouraged me in my strange obsession at the time for memorizing poetry, and had me learn Ozymandias. She then explained that it was about Ramses II and the temples of Egypt. From then on, I dreamed of someday seeing what Shelley was talking about. Thank you, Mrs. Eckert.

Well, on Tuesday off we went from the ship again for our last overnight for a while, this time to Luxor. Our first day was devoted to Luxor Temple in the morning and Valley of the Kings in the afternoon. This turned out to be wise timing—the above-ground activity in the not-as-hot morning, and the more underground-oriented exploration in the heat of the afternoon. And Egyptian afternoon heat is, well, let’s just say impressive.

The temple at Luxor was built later than the pyramids—c. 1390 BC. It was started by Amenhotep III, and added to over the years by various other pharaohs, including Alexander the Great (who apparently styled himself as a pharaoh once he reached Egypt). Eventually, the village of Luxor had been built over it, but was later removed and the temple revealed. The avenue of sphinxes leads up to it—that avenue used to lead all the way to Karnak, 2 miles north. Inside the temple are what I thought at the time to be a dizzying array of statues and carvings (this was before I saw Karnak the next day).

In the Valley of the Kings, we concentrated on the royal necropoli—the tombs of a number of pharaohs. We went into four of the tombs: Ramses II, Ramses V/VI, Amenhotep II, and Siptah. Each had an entryway with elaborate carvings, a hallway sloping downward (at various degrees of steepness) with colored hieroglyphics and cartouches—many of them quite beautiful—on either side, colorful ceilings, and a sarcophagus at the end, most with still well-preserved figures of the pharaoh in question. Photos were not allowed inside, to protect the fragile antiquities, but no picture would have done justice to it.

Because of the prevalence of grave robbing, remains were often moved around. In 1881, archaeologists found a communal grave of 40 pharaohs, including some whose own tombs’ locations are known. The latest tomb discovery was in 1995 by the American archaeologist Kent Weeks. The tomb is known simply as KV5. It has more than 100 rooms, and is believed to be the tomb for 50 of Ramses II’s sons (he had more than 100). All we saw of it was a locked gate—the work on that one is still ongoing.

From there, we moved on to Hatshepsut’s Temple. Hatshepsut was Egypt’s only female pharaoh (Cleopatra was a queen, not a pharaoh). The daughter of Thutmose I, and married to his half brother Thutmose II who died young and left her as stepmother and regent for Thutmose III, she declared herself Pharaoh and ruled Egypt as a man for something like 40 years. The figures of her outside the temple show her as a man—those long pieces under the face that you see on statues of pharaohs are beards, connoting a man. If the beard is straight, it is the pharaoh in life. If the beard is curved, it is the pharaoh in death.

We then proceeded to the Colossi at Memnon. These huge statues are more or less just alongside the road. They are two figures of Amenhotep III, each carved from a single piece of stone and each 59 feet tall. In early days, one of the Colossi made a noise in the morning when the sun hit it, and was said to have cried tears. It was believed by the Greeks to be the god Memnon greeting his mother, Eos, the dawn goddess. Today it’s believed that the sound and moisture were caused by the passage of air through the stone’s pores caused by the warming from the sun. The noise and tears stopped in 170 AD when Roman Emperor Septimus Severus restored the Colossi. The Colossi used to guard a now-gone temple that likely was larger than Karnak. The temple disappeared to plunder, earthquakes and floods.

From there, we checked into our hotel and, as in Cairo, got there just in time to see the sun set over the Nile from our balcony. This was in many ways even more beautiful than in Cairo—instead of skyscrapers across the river, we were looking at lush greenery.

That evening held a special and truly spectacular surprise. A dinner for the 86 of us on the full cruise had been arranged inside the Habu Temple, the funerary temple of Ramses III. Arriving after dark, we entered the temple by torchlight to the strains of a trio playing the famous aria from Aida, with men dressed as ancient Egyptian guards standing attention along the way. Once we were in the main temple and seated, the temple was lit just enough to provide a breathtaking view of the temple in shadow relief. As we ate (okay, the food was all but inedible, but in that setting they could have served dog food and I’d still have been enraptured), the full moon rose over the open top of the temple. Such a sense of peace and awe!

The next morning ‘s view across the Nile was peppered by a couple dozen hot air balloons over the lush greenery and against the background of arid mountains. As we were watching the balloons at dawn, we gradually came to realize that we also were looking at Hatshepsut’s Temple from across the river.

Off we went then for a morning at the Temples of Karnak. Believed to be the largest temple complex ever built, it grew in stages over an astonishing period of 1500 years, and covers 247 acres. We entered past rows of rams and other statues, and spent two hours exploring this amazing complex. Perhaps most impressive was the Great Hypostyle Hall, which has 134 columns each of which take 6 adults to stretch arms around. Fifty men could comfortably stand on top.

We then boarded our bus for the three-hour drive back to the ship in Safaga. Much of the drive was along the Nile. It was fascinating to watch life along the Nile: farming, water carrying, donkey carts, laundry, etc. Much of the terrain was lovely. The homes were generally made either of mud or brownish brick, and a few were painted bright colors. Some had no roofs or just straw on the top. We were told that, as long as there’s not a roof the house could be considered unfinished for tax purposes.

The terrain became ugly as we drove past miles of phosphate mines. The port at Safaga is the center for the export of phosphates and, once a year, for embarkation for the hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca).

When we arrived at the ship, we saw much of the crew lined up in front of the ship. As we got off our buses, they broke into song and impromptu dancing (led by the Captain, who proved himself quite the ham). Perhaps the funniest was their rendition of “Dance Like an Egyptian.” About half of this very international staff knew the little dance that goes with it—the other half just looked at them in amazement. It was one of those fun little moments.

After our return was a scheduled 3 days at sea. That’s what’s given me the time to catch up on this blog. Our next scheduled stop is tomorrow at Salalah, Oman. Unfortunately, we had to make an unscheduled stop at Aden, Yemen, in the wee hours of this morning to evacuate a passenger with a medical emergency. The captain advises that word from the hospital in Aden is that the gentleman is doing well and is in stable condition, which is a relief. It does give us only a short time in Salalah, so have had to cancel our excursion to see Job’s Tomb and tap a frankincense tree. I’d been looking forward to that (strange, I know, but I loved the idea of tapping that tree), but I’m glad that the cruise line takes no chances with a passenger’s health.