Going Ancient in Luxor

Luxor is a quick one-hour flight from Cairo.  The entire Coke team in Cairo (all 5 of us!) caught a flight after work Thursday for a weekend exploring Ancient Egypt.  We arrived at the Hilton Luxor Resort, which was a welcomed escape from busy, crowded Cairo.  We enjoyed a late dinner with the team and rested up for a BIG Friday.  But first… I snuck off to take pics of the resort, which overlooks the Nile River.

We started our tour bright and early on Friday at 8am.  Our tour guide, Milad, started by explaining that Luxor, formerly known as Thebes, is divided into the East Bank and the West Bank.  Our hotel was on the East Bank, but we were headed to the West Bank for our first half of the day.

First stop: Colossi of Memnon.  These two HUGE statues of Pharaoh Amenhotep III are 3,400 years old!  They used to guard his temple, but very little of the temple remains.  One of the monuments is still a single piece of stone, but the other is cracked.

Stop #2: Deir el-Bahari.  This complex is comprised of a few temples, but its primary focus is the mortuary temple of Hatshepsut.  She was the most powerful female pharaoh!  She essentially stole the throne from her son, claiming that she was her father’s intended heir and that she was born of the god Amun (and that proves you’re meant to be king).

The artwork here is amazing — the colors are so vibrant (it’s crazy to imagine all the time and natural elements they’ve endured).  I love the stars painted on the ceilings.  Hatshepsut can be found making offerings to the gods (a common image in tombs and temples), and she looks particularly masculine.  This is apparently true for most depictions of her.

Inside the temple, there are also depictions of Hatshepsut’s journey to Punt.

 

Back to the drama with Hatshepsut’s son.  He held onto his grudge even after Hatshepsut died and he became king, and he defaced or ruined many of her reliefs and monuments.  Thankfully, he didn’t get to everything!  Check out the unique surroundings of the temple — extremely steep cliffs!

Next, we moved on to the tombs.  Milad taught us that all of the tombs are on the West Bank for three reasons:

1. As we all know, the sun rises in the East and sets in the West.  Therefore, they chose to live on the East Bank and be buried on the West Bank.
2. Being on the West side facilitated the transition to the underworld.
3. There was a natural pyramid on the West Bank.  Since pyramids signified eternity, this was a sign.

The Valley of the Kings: where the kings were laid to rest.  There are 62 known tombs in the Valley of the Kings, but only a few are open to the public.  It is absolutely incredible how deep some of these tombs are!  We were quite winded from climbing the stairs out of these.  There are no photos allowed in any of the tombs, so use your imagination!

Milad explained to us that completing a tomb took an average of 15-25 years, so a king’s first order of business was to build his tomb.  For example, Tutankhamun (King Tut / the boy king) died before his tomb was finished.  He became king at age 9 and died at age 19.

Side note: Meadows and I visited Highclere Castle in England just four months ago.  To be totally honest, we mainly went because our families love Downton Abbey, and they said the castle was really cool.  As a part of the tour, we visited the Egypt exhibit in the basement.  Before exploring the exhibit, we had no idea how there was even a connection to Egypt.  Long story short: Lord Carnarvon of Highclere Castle financed and went on many archeological expeditions in Egypt.  He financed George Carter’s excavation which resulted in the discovery of King Tut’s tomb.  It’s a crazy coincidence that we went from learning about Lord Carnarvon to standing at King Tut’s tomb!

Back to Tutankhamun!  He wasn’t a particularly important or wealthy king.  The reason we all know him is because his tomb was the only one not to be entirely robbed by tomb raiders.

Next, we visited The Valley of the Queens.  This is where kings’ wives and children were buried.  They are smaller versions of the king’s tombs, with artwork showing the pharaoh father introducing his child to the gods.  It was so sad to see the small sarcophaguses!

Before leaving the West Bank, we visited an alabaster factory and ate a delicious Egyptian lunch!

After lunch, we drove back to the East Bank and went to Karnak Temple.  This temple is massive, with 10 pylons — each king added his own.  To give you an idea of the scale, this temple is the second largest religious site in the world.

My favorite part of Karnak Temple is called Hypostyle Hall, which has 134 columns in it.  It’s like a maze of columns!

  

Last stop of the tour: Luxor Temple. It is much smaller than Karnak Temple, but we got to see it at sunset, which was so beautiful!

Inside the temple is a monument of Tutankhamun and his wife.  You can tell just how young they are!  And my fascination with columns continues 🙂  The chapel in the back of Luxor Temple (not shown) was said to have been built by Alexander the Great.

 

It was after 6 when we got back to the resort.  Needless to say, we were exhausted!  We caught the sun setting on the West Bank and ate dinner outside by the Nile.

On Saturday, we spent the day at the pool.  After one day of extreme tourism, we deserved a day of relaxation.  The view was stunning and the weather was perfect!

More Luxor facts:

• 1/3 of the world’s monuments are in Luxor
• The wealthier you were, the higher your tomb was on the mountain
• The Nile River flows north