Paris and Cairo

01/25/2018 Another early morning.  Wake up call at 3:45 a.m. and luggage out by 4:00 a.m.  We had breakfast in a bag, and driven to the Luxor airport for a flight to back to Cairo at 7:30.  The flight was delayed 1 hour, and the traffic in Cairo and Giza was very bad.  We stopped at the Pyramid Restaurant in Giza for lunch--another awful Egyptian meal. We arrived at the Mena House Hotel at 3:30 p.m. (another 11 hour traveling day).  We were both spent.  Tom fell asleep, I had a hot bath and caught up on my emails and log book.  We went to the restaurant for dinner and had another bad meal, and called it quits for tonight. 01/26/2018 Wake up call at 6:15.  Breakfast at 6:30, and bus left at 7:00 for the Citadel and the Mosque in Cairo.  I was about a 1/2 hour drive.  The complex was very large and my legs would not move.  Tom and I both stayed on the bus.  Here a two pictures of the Citadel and the view of Ca...

1/23/18 We docked in Luxor during the night.  We had a wake up call at 6:30 for a boat ride to the west bank.  These motorboats on the Nile are very busy.  Here is a picture of the motorboat. motorboat on the Nile On the west bank, we got on a bus toward the Valley of the Kings, where there are 62 tombs of kings and nobles.  Before we got there, we stopped at the Colossi of Memnon.  These are two huge ruined statues, around 56 feet tall.  They once stood at the entrance gate of the temple of Amenhotep III.  Very little remains of the temple behind them.  They were cut from two massive granite blocks, brought from quarries near Cairo. The Colossi of Memnon In the hills behind them, you can see other structures and tombs. Hills behind Colossi of Memnon We arrived at the Valley of the Kings.  This is where the tomb of  King Tutankhamun was discovered in 1922.  We visited 3 tombs, Merenptah, Rameses IX, and...

1/21/18 Another early morning wake up call at 3:45 a.m. for a bus ride to the Aswan Dam and Abu Simbel, a monument built into a manmade mountain.  The bus ride to the dam promised to be about 3 hours, more walking around a temple and another 3 hour bus ride back.  I just couldn't do it. My legs wouldn't carry me.  Tom went on the tour and I stayed back and rested.  So sorry, but no pictures.  Here is a picture from one of my books of Abu Simbel. Abu Simbel This monument is in the far south of Egypt, almost to Sudan.  It was built by the Great Rameses.  After weather erosion almost destroyed the monument, the Department of Antiquities decided to move it away from the original mountain.  They built a man-made mountain and moved the monument to its current location in order to protect it. At 3:00 p.m. Tom and I took a motorboat tour to the Nubian Village.  We rode south (against the flow of the river) for about 1 1/2 hours. ...