Blogyagi

It depends on whether you’re considering compass direction or fow. But I’m off on the overnight train to Aswan in a couple of hours. From there I will be doing/seeing:

• Abu Simbel/Lake Nasser
• A 3 dy, 2 night Felucca trip north from Aswan towards Luxor
• Seeing the Valley of the Kings and Valley of the Queens on the West bank at Luxor
• Seeing Karnak on the East Bank at Luxor

and then I’ll be getting another train up her to Cairo where I’ll be off to see some of the things I missed this week and to go back to the Museum. I don’t know what sort of internet access I’ll have while I’m away but I should be twittering away happily.

So after I came down from the roof it was time to head over to the sound and light show. I was pretty tired by now, but I’d had my expectations suitable lowered by my guide book and other travellers. But low enough for guys in Egyptian headdresses playing bagpipes badly? Tough call. But it happened, and it happened for nearly half an hour while they waited for it to get dark enough to begin the show. I’m afraid I was too overwhelmed by WTF to get any photos of that dismal performance.

The light show however when it started was a little more impressive.

Pyramid Light Show Crowd

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You know how I told you about the dodgy tour and driver. Well Memphis was one of the places he raved about. Turns out it was because he wanted to drag me to a dodgy kebab joint where I paid 60 quid for a bad kebab and 20 quid each for beers.

Before that ripoff, we went to Memphis, once the capital of the Egyptian Empire, now a tatty museum where all the pieces not good enough to be in the British or Egyptian Museum are. Except for a huge reclining statue of Ramses II. That was ok.

Ramses II Statue from the feet

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South of Giza, just outside of Memphis is the vast necropolis of Saqqara, with many pyramids and mastabas and other ancient bits of rock. My driver was intent on just showing me the step pyramid but I was onto him by now and decided to have a good look around.

Having stayed outside at Giza, I was keen to crawl around inside the odd pyramid, and Saqqara offered a great chance to do this. I started off being accosted by an “Egyptologist” who wanted to show me around inside a couple of tombs. I took him up on his offer as he seemed quite knowledgable, unlike my horse guide at Giza who told me that the Great Pyramid was 500 metres tall.

So we wandered off and round a corner to this locked mastaba. A very desert looking guy shuffled up, produced a key and let us in. Turns out this was the tomb of twin noblemen, who’s high status was ensured because they were the King’s manicurists, as well as scribes and some other stuff, but the drawings and hieroglyphics on the wall were dominated by hands with neatly trimmed fingernails.

They must have gotten on ok as they were buried next to each other. You’re not meant to take photos but I grabbed a couple anyway since I knew I’d be paying for it in tips anyway.

Egyptian Nobles Tomb Painting

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