We flew from Los Angeles to London, and then the next day flew into Luxor, much further south and up the river Nile than Cairo. On the very next day we got to tour our first temple at Karnak. This was an incredibly impressive experience, not only because the famous hall of columns at Karnak has featured in many movies, and books, such as Agatha Christie’s Death on the Nile; but also because it was our first taste of the sheer scope and size of the Egyptian monuments.

Karnak is huge! We spent a few hours there and only covered about a fifth of it. Looking up at the immense pharaohnic statues and columns, and at the wonderfully preserved wall carvings and hieroglyphs, it was hard to believe that Karnak is over 3000 years old. We could even see some original colour on the wall paintings. Our tour group was 24 people, a nice small size, and our guide, Hassan, was a very knowledgeable and learned Egyptologist. We learned more about ancient Egypt, the people, their religion, gods and architecture than we could ever hope to remember.

Here’s a selection of our Karnak Photos

Saturday, March 28th, 2009 at 4:36 pm : Travel, Egypt.
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