No pleasure is worth giving up for the sake of two more years in a geriatric home.
— Kingsley Amis
EpisodeThe pain woke me, but I didn’t realise that at first. I lay there in the dark of the night, sensing something wrong but unable to place it. The alarm clock said 02:00. Not time to get up. I listened, but the night was very still. I sniffed, but there was no smoke and no scent of a stranger.
That was when the pain finally registered. It was a malignant colic directly beneath my sternum, the most amazing pain imaginable, gripping my chest in a vice-like grip. It was like my worst migraine, transplanted to my chest.
It must be wind. I straightened up and stretched my belly and massaged it to move the gas along. But it didn’t move. So I got out of bed and did some gentle stretches on the floor, again without effect. But the motion told me my bladder was full, so I walked into the bathroom and dug a couple of asprin tablets out of the bathroom cabinet, then sat on the toilet in a futile attempt to move my bowels while I chewed the pills.
Heart? But I was able to move around freely enough. The pain robbed me of some strength and made my hands shake and made breathing harder, but not much so. Heart attacks are supposed to be disabling.
I went back to my bed and lay down to wait for the asprin to kick in, surprised that I was panting and sweating after such minor exertion. I had been having problems with arm and chest pain and tiredness after mild exertion all week, but it had always gone away quickly when I sat down before. This was much worse.
The pain never moved. It got no worse — hardly possible anyway — but it got no better. It reached along my arms, jangling in my elbows and wrists to the rhythm of my pounding heart. So after fifteen or twenty minutes I conceded the point.
Sweating and gasping, I got up and fumbled my way into the living room, turning on the light on the way. I was dizzy and shaky. I picked up the phone and dialled 000. When Emergency Services answered, I said — quite calmly, or so I thought at the time, “Please send an ambulance. I think I’m having a heart attack.”
After the call, I struggled into loose, comfortable clothes. I grabbed some things — my wallet, my iPaq, my Passport — and put them in my pockets. I went to the door and set it ajar, just in case. Then I collapsed onto the couch and waited for the ambulance, wondering if I was going to die before it arrived — and, if so, whether they would be able to revive me.
I felt no fear over dying, but I was sad that I would miss the solar eclipse. So I turned my mind from fatalism towards survival.
OutboundFive months after my heart attack, I boarded a plane.
It had been an eventful interim. In hospital that first afternoon, I watched TV monitors as doctors poked a tube from my groin to my heart, used opaque dye to locate the blockage, and placed a tube, a “stent”, in the clotted branch of my coronary artery to open it up. I knew when the stent went into position because just like that the pain, which had repeatedly forced its way through massive doses of morphine for almost twelve hours, was gone.
I lay in hospital for several days, then practically forced them to release me. The rate of my recovery was extraordinary. My heartbeat was almost normal — very little permanent damage. After months of feeling flabby and unfit, I suddenly had (comparatively) boundless energy. It was very obvious to me that what I had been thinking was lack of fitness — despite daily exercise — was literal lack of “ticker”. Once my heart was fixed, my relative youth and underlying fitness combined to put me back on my feet. On a sunny afternoon I strode out of the hospital, walked out to the road, and waved down a taxi.
Nevertheless, my life had changed. I would be taking prescribed medicines every day for the rest of my life. I could no longer throw myself recklessly at hills. Life insurance would cost more. Losing weight and changing my diet were no longer things to be put off.
But it went further. I had gazed into the face of eternity and had realised that I wasn’t ready to die yet, in my 40s, with so many plans left incomplete. But now I knew I was mortal. Death could take me at any time. Not soon, I thought, but inevitably. If I was to be ready when it came, then I could no longer afford the luxury of putting things off. I had to stop wasting time on things that didn’t matter to me and concentrate on the things that did.
Other things had also changed. I could not contact my mother during my time in hospital, and I discovered that it was because three years after my father died, she had found a boyfriend and was planning on selling the family home and moving in with him — so the single longest stable point of my life was going to be cast adrift. My job, located in South Yarra for more than six years, had moved into Melbourne’s CBD while I was recovering. And my career was effectively over anyway: I had lost my passion for it. Today, to lose your focus on hanging onto your job is a slow kiss of death. The process would be slow, as I had been well thought of, but the end was certain.
So I had good reason to welcome my long-planned holiday in Egypt as a way of putting off these cares for a while. As I stepped out of my door at 16:29 and took the traditional “on the doorstep” photo of my luggage, I wore a big grin.
Normally I would have called a taxi to take me to the airport, but today I decided to take a tram to the city. I shouldered my bags — just eleven kg of luggage including the clothes I was wearing — and walked into Bridge Road.
Standing in the bright sunshine watching the tram approach, it was hard to believe that in less than a week I would watch the sun go out and darkness fall at midday.
Until my heart attack, I had been planning to call this trip Beneath the Crescent Sun, but since then a new title had chosen itself: Dark of the Sun. There was too much anticlimax in the original title, too much dwelling on the gradual occlusion of the Sun’s disc. I was impatient of such peripherals now: my focus was on Totality, on getting to the heart of the eclipse. Mere twilight was no longer enough, I needed the darkness.
The city centre was a nightmare, and the taxi rank had been relocated for the Commonwealth Games. On my way up to check the Collins St rank, I finally flagged down a cab in Exhibition St. By the time the taxi negotiated the traffic to the airport, my savings from catching it in town had been swallowed up by waiting for lights. On top of the Met ticket, I spent as much as or more than if I’d booked a taxi from home.
By 17:50 I was at the airport, queuing to check in. I had more than 2.5 hrs before departure, but the queue was already a mile long and it took most of that time to get through.
My last half hour was spent sitting at Gate 10 watching the big orange sun set over the wing of the waiting 777-300. I wanted to use the toilets, but they were permanently occupied. I bought a book (Darwin Awards III) and some lollies. Changed $50 into د.إ100 and some shrapnel. Changed some coins into a $5 note at the ANZ booth and shoved my leftover $1.05 in coins into a Samaritan’s donation box. Took my Lipitor, rearranged my wallet. Exciting stuff.
Note on currencies: in this trip report, “$” on its own is always Australian dollars (aud), “us$” is US dollars (usd), “د.إ” is UAE dirhams (aed), and “£” is always Egyptian pounds (egp). Unless otherwise noted, all my currency conversions use the 2006 rates. Thus in 2006, the Australian dollar rate for Egyptian pounds was about $1 = £4.15, whereas today it’s about $1 = £31.
By midnight, I was ten kilometres above the Great Sandy Desert. Four hours into my flight, and I still hadn’t even left Australia! Broome was still hundreds of kilometres ahead, off the port bow. It was another half hour before we crossed the coast near Derby. Three hours to Singapore.
AlexandriaAt Singapore, the plane docked a very short travelator ride from the transit hotel, so even though the escalators up to the hotel weren’t working, I managed a quick shower while changing planes. There was a free internet connection in the boarding lounge, and I used my iPaq to send a very brief email.
We crossed the Suez Canal at 11:00 Egyptian time. I saw Port Taofik through my window. Fifteen minutes later, I saw the Pyramids from the air as we passed above Cairo. Twenty minutes after that, the plane was on the ground at Alexandria’s Borg el-Arab airport. I have a photo taken at 13:15 on Bus 555 from Borg el-Arab into town, and at 14:00 as the bus passed the new Library of Alexandria.
The bus dropped me in Midan Saad Zaghloul at the corner of Sharia El-Nabi Daniel (the one-time Street of the Soma). The Caesarium, built by Cleopatra for Mark Antony, may have been here. By 14:21, I was booked in at Alexandria’s Windsor Palace Hotel, and ready for adventures.
I spent two decadent days in Alexandria, just roaming the city and exploring the back alleys. Lovely people. Very poor, but full of smiles and if they took advantage of my unfamiliarity with prices, it was so mild that I doubt I paid much over the local rates.
I spent the first afternoon exploring the backstreets. Until I came down to the Corniche by the Library, I was in a wonderful daze, never actually lost but never quite sure where I was. Along the way I started to accumulate the makings for my Eclipse provisions — and a few other meals besides. I stopped in at the Kadmar office, which turned out to be a hole in the wall on the first floor of an older building. I also passed by the excavated Roman houses near Kom al-Dikka, but didn’t go in; I planned to come back there the next day.
By the time I got back to the hotel, I was buggered. I tried to stay awake — it wasn’t even 19:00 yet — but it was 04:00 in Melbourne, and time slipped away as I “rested” on the bed. Suddenly it was 21:00, so I gave up and just went to sleep.
I woke up several times in the night, but by the time my watch alarm went off at 06:00, I was completely rested and relaxed. When it came to early starts, jet lag was in my favour — it was already 15:00 in Melbourne.
I had only two main things planned for Sunday — the Roman Theatre and Villa of the Birds, and part of the Library. I did the former, but the latter — which I tackled after lunch — was so obviously infested by tours that I didn’t bother going in. I figured I’d see it tomorrow anyway when I joined the Eclipse tour. If the tour missed the Antiquities Museum in the basement, I hoped to catch it when I come back at the end of the trip.
I spent most of the day with maps of the ancient city and of the modern city in hand, overlaying them, trying to identify the old streets by walking along the new ones. The street plan was surprisingly persistent, but of course, few actually ancient building survived in use. They were all either buried (save those few that have been excavated) or had been demolished. At the Greco-Roman Museum, my hopes were raised by seeing an open door, but in fact the place was still closed to the likes of me.
Joining the Eclipse TourI got out early on Monday and had a look around El-Tahrir before the day officially started. Joining the Tour was a comedy, as they’d left Cairo very late. Eventually a tour guide came to pick me up from my hotel, where I’d been cooling my heels for two hours since 11:16. Achmed from Kadmar hailed a cab and we headed off to join the Tour at the National Museum. It took us more that 20 minutes to get there due to Alexandria’s crazy traffic. I could have walked the distance in that time, but couldn’t get that message through the language barrier. They were not used to the vagaries of the independent tourist.
The tour was already running at least an hour behind, and the schedule kept slipping as the day wore on, but I didn’t care. I’d linked up with the tour: the rest was simple.
I’d missed some of the tour, but we took in some stelae, some broken statuary, some canopic jars oozing pitch, a mummy casing exhibit showing how the various cases fitted together like a Matroshka Doll, a statue of some factotum carrying a staff, a very busty Ptolomaic queen, Caracalla in pharaonic head-dress, 3-D models of Fayoum faces, salvage from the drowned palace, Akhenaton, the buxom shabti, and more.
By 13:44 we were all on the bus, headed for Kom Shoqqafa, then to lunch, then to the Library, then to the tour hotel, the Ramada (now Hilton) Alexandria Corniche near Masjid Sidi Bishr.
I was now trapped in the very bowels of five-star logic. Although opposed to the exorbitant pricing of hotel minibars, I decided some peanuts and mints would be a nice addition to my munchies. The price was £10, but as I filled out the docket, I saw a note on the bottom of the form that there was also 10 percent sales tax. I goggled over the thought of paying 10 percent on top of already-inflated house prices, but I was committed — I had already marked up the items.
On TourI was up by 6:00 on Tuesday, and took a healthy pre-breakfast walk around the hotel and along Sidi Bisher Beach. I don’t remember breakfast.
When I presented my minibar docket at checkout, I gave them £20, and received £7 in change. After some debate another pound was reluctantly handed over, but I persisted, because the docket said “10” percent. It seemed that if you paid cash it was 10 percent, but if you put it on your room tab the tax was the 27 percent that applied to the room rate — and the girl had put it on my room. I pointed out that I had in fact paid cash and that if they had entered it on my room instead, that was not my problem.
Eventually I got the remaining pound that was due to me. It was a hassle over about 20 cents, and in fact the hotel argued that after all it was a very small amount — but of course, that was a convenient argument for them, as the error was in their favour. If the amount really was so inconsequential, why did I have to argue so hard to get the legitimate price?
Around 10:00, we headed from Alexandria to Marsa Matrouh by way of the very famous site of El Alamein, a turning point for WW II. The museum was interesting, despite the odd inclusion of a German motorcycle rider in the “British” hall. There was a presentation on a big table that detailed the course of the battle.
We got in to Marsa Matrouh — or at least, Etap Resort, which is 75 km short of the town — about 16:30, and almost immediately had a briefing on the tour’s plans for the eclipse based on the latest information. As a result of the news, which basically amounted to a high likelihood the plateau would be closed early due to crowds and security, we didn’t get to sleep in our nice paid-for beds but instead headed off for As-Salloum at about 20:45. We stopped in at Salloum to buy a few goodies, and arrived at the site in a series of fits and starts (checkpoints and assorted military bumf) at about 02:35. I have a photo of the “Welcome to Salloum” sign taken at 01:34, so the last 20 km took an hour.
I did not, unfortunately, record the GPS coordinates of the site. It was located in what appeared to be a truck stop; new asphalt ran roughly N/S, in a loop. Entry and exit was to the north. There were a few permanent structures on the east side: a mosque, an eatery (with a lit sign that translates as “Hadaba Restaurant and Cafetaria”), and a long building, “The sturdy building of God”, with 9 or 10 blue roller doors facing west onto the road, apparently storerooms. I have looked in Google Maps, but Street View is disabled for Egypt and I have been unable to locate an appropriate modern configuration of buildings and roads.
All my times below are based on my watch and camera, which agreed with each other, but are up to 2 minutes earlier than the announced official times. No idea why, as I tried to set them accurately against local time.
It was bloody cold and very foggy when we arrived. My fingers kept getting cold — I needed to wrap them around cups of hot tea! The weather forecast was promising, so hopefully the fog would burn off once the sun got up. The eclipse was due to start at about 11:20, with totality at 12:38.
My word of the day was “surreal”. Between sleep deprivation, the cold, the fog and the eerie blue environment of the huge tent shared by several groups, the early part of the morning was decidedly weird.
We’d been led to expect spartan facilities, probably a patch of desert with some drop-toilets. In fact, we found a very comfortable tent, with chairs and tables, with carpets for a floor. Very bedouin. They had even rigged up a “throne” toilet. There was hot tea from the cafetaria (in addition to the breakfast and lunch boxes provided by the tour), and free internet at the “Press Center”. LUXURY!
Well, I never expected to be doing this but it turns out that there's free internet set up for the press at the site and we lucky people can use it too!
It's … [checks watch] … 4:07 AM as I type this at the eclipse site. We lucked out on our site — we're in a plum spot, sharing with the official Egyptian scientific observation team and just a short cooee from where President M himself will be seated. Turns out our tour company has Connections. :)
Early on, security, though present, was easy-going, but as the moment — or the President — approached, it tightened up dramatically. We were no longer allowed to wander in and out of our tent without passing through the scanner. A row of soldiers came to stand along the Area boundary. Four hours on their feet in the blazing sun, with only a 4-minute patch of shade in the middle.
Around 10:00, the fog lifted and rolled off to the west. Security ramped up again as a big motorcade rolled up the the Presidential kiosk. Later, the smiling US Ambassador strolled casually by, hands in pockets, accompanied by a couple of dour secret-servicemen. Even he had to go through the security gate to get into Area P.
11:21. My feeble camera couldn’t yet see it, but my eye could see a fingernail bite out of the edge of the Sun. Eclipse goggles suddenly became the height of haute couture.
11:26. My camera could now see the dent in the Sun.
At 12:21, an hour into the eclipse, the Sun was down to a thin crescent, but the light around us seemed normal. By 12:29, the quality of the light was definitely changing. Shadows were less intense, and the Sun no longer glared. A couple of minutes later, my camera automatically started taking longer exposures.
Suddenly the light took on a sunset quality, and silence fell around us. Everyone stopped talking. I checked my watch: still a minute to go. The tiniest sliver of Sun remained.
12:36. Totality! Sunset around the horizon. My camera flash fired! Had I a cat’s hearing, I would have heard neck bones crackling for hundreds of metres around as everyone craned at once, attempting to take it all in.
12:38. Two minutes in. The Sun was a black disk, surrounded by a winged corona. The sunset effect crept down toward the horizon, as though the Sun was literally setting.
There was a weird, sourceless chill in the air. I tried to nail it down. The sand still reflected heat up at me, table tops still felt hot to my fingers. I hadn’t noticed a breeze before, but I felt a slight one now, coming from the east, but it was neither warm nor cool. I can only guess that it was the absence of the Sun’s direct heat that made the air feel cool.
I recalled my heart operation, where the moment the stent went in, all pain vanished. My body, wracked for hours by pain, was actually still sore, cramped, and contorted, waiting for the next wave of pain; but in that moment, the aftermath of great pain felt like no pain at all. In this dark of the Sun there was no cold, just the absence of anticipated heat.
12:40. The Sun came out, and light flowed back into the world. The eclipse was over. A wave of sound rolled over the area — suddenly everyone had something to say!
12:56. I went into the tent. Wherever the sun peeped through a loophole or gap in the tent, a tiny crescent was projected on the carpet beneath. The eclipse was over? The eclipse was still going on, and would be until almost 14:00!
13:31. The eclipse might still be in progress, but the event was over and the official party swarmed away. The soldiers, who had been standing easy, snapped to rigid attention as the convoy passed, then marched off. We commoners were forbidden to leave yet, but suddenly everyone was packing up their gear. Soldiers in fatigues were already breaking down the Presidential Kiosk, stacking the brass planters and plush chairs.
14:32. We were now free to leave, already crammed aboard our buses and 4WDs, engines revving, and the exodus began.
By 14:57, we were at the edge of the plateau and beginning the long descent into as-Salloum town. We zoomed past the long line of vehicles containing frustrated eclipse chasers who’d left their arrival just a little too late and found themselves on the wrong side of the lock-down. Not to worry — the path of totality had swept over them, too. They lost no more than a second or two.
At 15:11 we zipped past the Police post, where the sign on this side said “GOOD BYE”. There was no delay for inspections here now.
I meant to go to the late dinner & show that night, but I lay down to rest at about 19:00 and dozed completely off. The other guy in my chalet, Brandon, said he tried to wake me about 21:00 but I was out of it. I did wake up about 21:15, but by then the bus had gone.
I woke up again sometime in the night, when Brendan’s dinner made its noisy way back up his esophagus. Something he ate had disagreed violently.
Gas pressure woke me at about 05:40. I took care of business and then realised I felt fine. The sleep was obviously exactly what I needed. I unfairly repaid Brendan for his midnight dyspepsia by banging around opening shutters and windows and moving the laundry rack outside because my freshly hand-washed clothes had not dried overnight.
We hit the road about 9:30. The run to Cairo was routine. We went by way of the Moni Agiou Bishou Coptic Monastery at Wadi Natrun.
Moni Agiou Bishou was an attractive white building with a tall bell tower. However, I noted that the outer doors were all massively built, steel reinforced, with huge bolts. The only way into the inner building — “the Ancient Fortress” — was via a wooden aerial bridge. A pulley above the inner door to the fort and a hook on the bridge flooring suggested that at need the occupants could simultaneously pull up the footing and reinforce the entrance.
Our guide was a monk. He explained the history of the monastery and showed off its features. he pointed out a new church that was being built outside the main walls, with tall glass windows and multiple entrances. I noticed a group of monks standing on a lower level, and wondered if the locals might prefer the old church with its massive walls. There was another moastery a short distance away, walled similarly to the one I was in.
We left the fort and visited the main chapel, a relatively spartan place that contained the casket of Saint Bishou, who founded the monastery. The roof of the chapel let in a sunbeam that was, IIRC, supposed to fall on a special spot at a special time of year, but if so I have forgotten the details.
The PyramidsIn Giza, about 17:10, I was dropped at the door of and checked into decadent luxury at, Mena House, at the feet of the pyramids. Half an hour later, I was relaxing by the swimming pool. I normally avoid expensive places, but not on this trip, and Mena House is legendary amongst pyramid hunters. I had not lost all sense: I did not pay to have the pyramids (a “Pyramid View”) in my 3rd floor annex room window; I settled for a “Garden View”. But just by walking out on the fire stair at the end of the corridor, I could rest my eyes on them until the heat drove me back to my air-conditioned cave.
Mena did the nasty trick of drip-feeding room taxes into the room rates. The total was cumulative, such that as each additional tax was added to the total, you were also being taxed on the taxes already in the total.
That night I had a lesson in supply and demand.
21:54 Mena House annex, room 491. I have some notes: “Eclipse photos. Paper hunt. Mena House. Drinnan. Drinks by the pool. Walk to S&L. S&L. Ripped off (OK, not).”
I have no recollections about the paper hunt, or Drinnan (I’m guessing we chatted at the poolside). But people arranging to go to the sound and light show from the hotel paid £120, being £60 for the show and £60 return for the taxi. When I walked out into Pyramids Road about 19:00, I was offered a return taxi ride for £40. A hundred metres down the road the price had dropped to £30. It was almost exactly a 20 minute walk for me (less than 2 kilometres) to the show site, and a fair-enough return fair would be no more than £20 — being 5 each way and 10 for waiting. But you wouldn’t book a return taxi: half the taxis in Cairo hung around hoping for fares after the sound and light shows.
I paid £60 for the show and zip for taxis, and had a quite safe and educational walk through the back streets of Cairo, enjoying the sight of people in the streets, kids, mothers, donkeys, cats, dogs, horses, camels, all out in the mild evening, mixing in sublime chaos. My show started at 19:30 and ran for about an hour. By 21:00 I was back at the hotel. (I also paid £20 for a glass of wine, £150 for a Sound and Light CD, and £2.50 for a kebab for dinner. But who’s counting.)
The next day was all for the pyramids. I didn’t go into any of them this time — I did that in 2002, didn’t feel like paying the high prices this time — just took a long, thorough walk around the site. But first I checked that my half-rate day use arrangement for the room was still good.
By 08:00 I was walking up toward the ticket office, shaking off a very persistent tout who tried to lure me aside into the stables by telling me his was the official way in, and when I sneered at that he switched to dire warnings about how the ticket office would gouge me (“is only for tour groubs, zey will tcharche you 200 bounds”). I bit back the obvious retort, that if I followed him I’d have to pay his charges as well, and just waved him away and walked on.
Just as well, too. The tours had “discovered” the early morning start. In 2002, several tour buses beat me up the hill: this year a dozen behemoths were squatting outside the ticket office and the tour guides were queued up ten deep outside the ticket office, clutching huge wads of cash and shouting.
The ticket seller picked out the independent tourists in the mob and beckoned them forward for preferential treatment, so in the end I didn’t have a long wait, but by the time I got into the site the queue outside the pyramid ticket office was also huge. I would possibly still have got a ticket, unless they were all guides with 40-person buses to feed, but I had no intention of hanging around in the sun for the privilege of buying an overpriced ticket. I passed on by and never regretted it.
The entry price was, of course, £40 as expected, and since the insides of the pyramids and the solar boat were not on my agenda this time, that nine bucks was all the day’s sightseeing cost me. A real bargain! In 2002 I poked into the two open pyramids and the Solar Boat, but then the heat got me before I could explore everything that interested me outside. So this was the year for externals.
I circled the big pyramid. I noticed that partway up one side, the stone blocks suddenly changed in several long rowss. They were a different colour and texture, and much less worn than the blocks above and below them. Evidence of harder stone from a different source? Analysis of this could provide insight on how the pyramid was built.
I walked around, peering at the Queens and Noble tombs (some open; I paid £1 baksheesh and went into one for “Khufu’s daughter”, but it was not exciting), Hmm-ing at false doors, dogged by camel men, when there were no Tourist Police at hand to shoo them off. At the edge of the site, I looked down on Nazlat as-Samaan village. Almost every house had heaped rubble and rubbish on the roof. The presence of satellite dishes proved that these were not derelict buildings. Most of the dirt would be deliberate, for heat proofing.
By 09:11, I was resting in a patch of shade in front of Chephren’s pyramid. As good a place as any to muse upon eternity. People still scrawled graffiti on these ancient monuments. The removal of the limestone casing by medieval mosque-builders probably cost us a treasury of Greco-Roman comments. But most grafitti is so low-effort that how much have we lost, really? What would it be worth to us to preserve “MARCVS ❤️ Κλεο, DCCXXV AVC”?
Menkaure’s was the smallest of the three big byramids, the most human-sized. At its base I found a large patch of facing-stones stil in place, some finished, some with their handling knobs still on them. At one point the level of the facing changed, from smooth and flat to lumpy, possibly marking the point where the men working on smoothing the stones after the knobs were removed, downed tools. The finished stones were smooth in general, but not squared off like bricks: the joints had no gaps between them, and ran diagonally.
I walked out into the sand and climbed a hill, looking for a special spot. I think I found it: the location where a lot of postcard pictures of the pyramids were taken. Alas, my camera had overheated and most of my shots from that spot are blurred.
Looking down a hole, I noticed rubbish inside the tomb at the bottom. I took a pic. When editing photos, I often notice details I missed at the time. I sometimes wonder how I would feel if I suddenly noticed something valuable in one of them. Nothing to be done about it, whatever I might see was months ago and far away; but a photo is always now.
I found myself at the entrance to the Sphinx’s enclosure, and since I hadn’t entered in 2002, this time I went in. Close up, it was really noticeable just how much of the statue below the neck is reconstructions and repairs.
I finished my round by walking back up to the big one. With Menkaure fresh in my mind, I took a second look at a spot where this one still had some facing stones. There were no unfinished stones here, and the remaining stones were squared.
By 11:45 I was back on Pyramids Road, but I wasn't done for the day. I went down to a crossroads in Nazlat as-Samaan and found places for a takeaway lunch and to buy groceries for my coming train journey.
16:32 The Oasis resaurant at Mena House. Pricy, but what the heck. Mushroom soup, Caesar salad, orange juice, coffee, £110. It was my only healthy food all day: everything else I ate was junk food and water. I don’t really expect the train to offer anything impressive.
Aswan22:15. Bedtime on the the overnight sleeper train to Aswan. I have a cosy little nest all to myself, although I am not at all sure about the crosswise orientation of the bed on a rocking platform.
Aswan. What a tourist trap! It’s a pity that it’s the logical jumping-off point for Philae and Abu Simbel. But for those two stellar items, Aswan could safely be ignored. It should be ignored. If the locals aren’t in the process of ripping you off, they’re dreaming up ways of ripping you off. But I’m ahead of my tale again.
I woke around 5:20, rolling and swaying through a weird landscape where everything was either being built or is falling apart — or both at the same time. After a pre-dawn stop at Qena, I watched the sun rise about 5:45 over a landscape that could have been taken whole from Pharaonic times, except for some transmission towers peering at me across the fields. Beyond the still invisible Nile to the west, the Escarpment loomed in the distance like a cloud.
We stopped briefly at a smallish town, possibly Al Jiziriyyah, about 06:00, then moved on into the antique landscape.
Half an hour later we pulled into Luxor. The Kadmar group got off here, so I was on my own again. I watched a guy in uniform doing something to an empty, round goldfish bowl in his lap. Never figured it out.
07:00 heralded another town, a large one by an irrigation canal that took us nearly 15 minutes to pass through.
08:00 was Edfu. Fifteen minutes later, I saw a stocky little paddle steamer chugging the Nile. A ferry, I think. I hadn’t been tempted by the brick-shaped cruise ships, but a ride upriver in something like that would have tempted me!
09:26 brought me to Aswan at last. I walked down from the station to the Nile Corniche, stopped, and breathed it in. Rotting vegetation, stagnant water and … yep, human shit. This was Egypt!
I had a bad moment on arrival at the “Pyramisa Isis Corniche” — or, as it actually labels itself, the “Isis”, when they told me they didn’t have my reservation. I could see the €132 already debited from my card by “Wired Destinations” flitting away.
After a futile turn up and down the block in search of an internet place, I realised that there was unlikely to be a response from them in time to help me. Calling Malaysia was an option, but instead I went back to the Isis and asked them to check again. This time they called their Cairo office and behold! The reservation did exist, it just hadn’t been forwarded to Aswan.
Once I was safely checked in, I went forth to explore. Aswan felt quiet and sedate after Cairo and Alexandria, but was still unmistakeably Egyptian. I was soon approached by a number of the usual suspects muttering “taxi”, “hotel”, “felucca” and “sister”.
I took a brief look through the Fatimid Cemtery, a wasteland of tumbled stone with a few ruinous structures, then went on to the Northern Quarry, which had even more tumbled stone but was decidedly less ruinous. Some of the stone looked almost ready to use, just needing to be broken loose from the cliff face. That, of course, was the trick. Rows of little pock-marks along edges where stone had been removed revealed man-centuries of back-breaking effort. The piece de resistance was the famous Unfinished Obelisk. If it had not cracked and had been finished and rasised, it might have been the tallest obelisk in Egypt. They had tried to salvage it by chopping off the cracked part, but eventually gave up.
Feeling lucky, I took a sunset felucca cruise. My “twenty pound” bargain-rate cruise quickly became “thirty pounds” once we were out on the water. My bargaining position had weakened as the shore receded. It was belatedly explained to me that the offered rate was actually £20 per half hour. Since the government-set price was £25 per hour, this was clearly not a bargain at all. I considered myself lucky to get them down to an only moderately extortionate £30 per hour.
The cruise lasted an hour and a half, but due to the mid-river price renegotiation, they blandly charged me for two hours, putting the total back to their £20/half hour rate. I regained a little pride by giving them only £20 baksheesh to split three ways, an amount they evidently considered rather less than fulsome, but which reduced my cost to about what I'd expected to pay in the first place. I smiled and shook Captain Mahmoud's hand as I handed it over. For my $20, I did get a very pleasant sunset ride around Elephantine, and a cup of tea.
I also got a little perverse revenge by opening negotiations for a cruise to Edfu for 6 — me and 5 nebulous friends who were coming to Aswan by cruise ship, loosely modelled in my head on the Kadmar tour group. I wasn’t exactly kidding him along, but my actual group would have been picked up here in Aswan, and no way was I going with him. But my long-held felucca plans were looking very dodgy anyway, as I’d picked up a mild dose of giardia. I was still functioning, but I didn’t really want to risk my tender bowels on the river. I also didn’t want to go with someone as shifty as Captain Mahmoud had proven himself to be. His boat looked OK, but he was far too clever at jacking up prices while delivering short value.
I promised him if “my friends” agreed we’d do it with him in return for his “best price”. I did not tell him I secretly thought that “my friends” would not agree as, having cruised upriver “they” would have decided against a felucca downriver, too bad. It looked like I’d have to do Edfu and Kom Ombo by train.
I had a successful afternoon in other ways, despite my Abu Simbel arrangements with Kadmar falling apart. Kadmar couldn’t get me on a Monday flight. In the end I was able to book Sunday directly with Egyptair, and it worked out cheaper than Kadmar. Kadmar agreed to refund my money in Alex on the 21st.
Now I only needed to work out how I was going to get to Aswan airport an hour before my 08:55 flight.
Sunday dawned clear and fresh, as seen through my window overlooking the Nile. My stomach problems were not pressing this morning. I solved my transport problem by throwing £25 at a taxi driver. The £2.50 airport entry fee was extra. A taxi from and to Abu Simbel airport at the other end cost me £80, plus a voluntary £5 in baksheesh because Achmed of taxi #8281 didn’t try to renegotiate the deal later. Abu Simbel entry was £55, plus £8 “guide fee” plus £2 “Municipal fee”.
It was a glorious morning. The plane flew right over the site, giving everyone aboard a good look. I tried to get the jump on the tour bus crowd by throwing money at a taxi to take me out, wait, and bring me back. By 9:40 I was approaching the site on foot from behind the hill. I was tempted by a service entrance, and by the beaten tracks leading up from it to the top of the hill and around a shoulder, but there was no access for tourists. Understandable, or the top of the hill would’ve been lined with gogglers! So I followed the legal track around the hill, passing some inscriptions. Then the smaller temple came into view. Then a profile-view of the big statues.
My effort to beat the tours was in vain: a tour group had taken that forbidden short cut over the hill and was going to beat me there. Was my taxi ride wasted money? No. They clumped up for the guide’s pep talk!
I admired some stele on the side of the hill, then walked out and stood in front of the main event, the four gigantic statues of Ramses II. Three arrogant faces gazed over my head; the fourth lay tumbled on the ground. When they moved the site here, they put everything back just as they found it. Repairs were not on the agenda. Beside his massive shins stood Ramses’ wives and children, less than knee height.
Inside, I walked down a double row of eight standing giant Ramses to a small chamber at the back, where deified Ramses sat in state with several gods. On the way back out I admired some excellent reliefs on the walls, apparently recounting the Battle of Kadesh on one side and Ramesses and Nefertari paying homage to their gods on the other. Unfortunately photos were forbidden, and the tour group chose this moment to crowd in and yammer loudly, so I left without exploring the side chambers at the back.
Back outside, I admired some carvings of Hapy blessing Ramses’ cartouched. Both were covered with often deeply incised grafitti. A row of Nubian prisoners, elbows tied together. Considering that the population of upper Egypt is now heavily “Nubian”, I'd say the Nubians won in the end …
In an alcove, I found some stairs leading up. To nowhere. It wasn't clear to me if this was just a platform, or if there had once been more.
The main temple was getting pretty busy now, so I moved over to the smaller temple. Gods standing in niches along the front. Even the female gods originally had beards. In panels, life and health were offered to Ramses.
And … that was it. Time to run the gantlet of the souvenir sellers! By 10:40 I was back in taxi #8281, headed back to the airport.
12:19 On the aircraft transfer bus for the flight back to Aswan.
I stuffed myself up by promising to meet the felucca captain at 15:00. Now I can’t stop off at Philae on the way back into town, and it closes at 16:00. A largely wasted afternoon, good only for seeing Elephantine.
After a brief siesta, I decided to brave the blazing sun and cross to see Elephanine. The Nubian Village was picturesque, an had a well worn Pharaonic-style statue bust just lying in the main street. The Aswan Museum was small but interesting, although Room II — “Old Kingdom” — Featured a Christian cross in one of the displays. I circled the grounds before continuing. The Ptolemaic “Satet” Temple was obviously heavily restored. Satet was the wife of Khnum. The partially-restored ruins of Abu (Yebu) village. They had to be restored; it was hard to believe mud-brick could have survived so long. Maybe the bricks were coarse rock?
At the Nilometer, another Aussie tourist and I were gathered up by a galabiyya man, who told us we could not wander the site on our own but must be accompanied by an official — himself. When he had demonstrated his ignorance of the site and then tried to shake us down for baksheesh, we left him poor and went our own ways.
I saw an engraved block showing part of a ceremony on the Nile. Near as I could tell it was imploring prosperity or safety for some man on a journey. There was no cartouche, or it was not on this block, but Khnum's ram's head encroached on the left.
Galabiyya man had showed us a measure on the Nilometer. He told us it was Pharaonic — but we quickly noticed that the numerals on it were Arabic! In fact, this Nilometer only dated from the late Ptolemaic period and had been restored in Islamic times.
Further along, I found a Nilometer of the late Khnum Temple. This one was Pharaonic, built under Dynasty XXVI, with the southern balustrade of the terrace of the temple behind it. It was an evocative spot, where the past pressed up clearly through the cloak of time and I really felt that I was walking in the shadow of a distant past.
In niches in the back wall of the temple, a pharaoh wearing the crown of Upper Egypt offered something to a goddess, possibly Satet but her crown was missing so I couldn't be sure. A pharaoh wearing the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt offered to a god, probably Osiris. A pharaoh wearing the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt offered to a god, probably Sobek.
I found a column base and statue footing. The cartouches had the hedge and bee on either side, i.e. king of Upper and Lower Egypt. On the left, ra-wsr-?-stp-ra-n. On the right, amun-mr-ra-thoth?-mos. Near as I could tell it was our old friend Ramses II.
A gigantic gate, reminiscent of the Portara of Lygdamis on Naxos, or the door to the Hundred-Column Hall at Persepolis. Hieroglyphs on the gateway had cartouches with Amenhotep's birth and throne names.
I looked down on a restored compound (Sanctuary of Heqa-Ib). Tried to get in, but it was closed. On the way round I schmoozed some local cats, without luck.
Walking through the back streets of the Nubian Village was like stepping through the veil of the past and into the very place. Mud bricks in patterns as old as time. Low, thatched rooves. Dusty palm trunks and a plain brown crockery pot in a dead end. And then I came face to face with a decidedly modern mural praising Mubarak, and two boys in t-shirts came out to say “hello hello”, and ask for baksheesh.
And that was my day. I watched the sunset, then went to find dinner. I was not sure I wanted the half breast of chicken and herpes. Instead, I went for salad niçoise, beef curry, orange juice, and a capucchino.
I got out early for my Philae experience. I took a taxi down to the motorboat landing-come-ticket-office. The fare was a very reasonable £15 for the 7.5 km run. I bought my Philae ticket (£35, government-mandated), then went through a gate and bought my motorboat tickets. The motorboat concession had a nice grift going. Motorboat pricing was free range and today’s rate was £60 return and a 90 minute visit. There was no other way for tourists to get out to the island, so you paid the sharks or you had bought your Philae entry ticket for nothing. I sucked it up and decided to enjoy the ride. By 7:55 I was on my way. At least they didn’t try to renegotiate it mid-journey as so often happened in Egypt.
The Nile lake was serene today, and I was fascinated by the slow approach of some odd brown sugar cubes on an island ahead. We were coming in from the sanctuary end of the temple; the two huge pylons peered at me over the lower, longer walls of the main body. The “beaches” around the temple were rock and rubble; the slow rise of the lake had long ago drowned any good flat land there may have been. Also, this was not the original island for Philae. Like Abu Simbel, it had been relocated, piece by piece. It used to be on Bigeh Island nearby; its new home was Agilkia Island. There are still structures on Bigeh, but it was out of scope for my visit this year.
As we rounded the island, I could make out the beautifully preserved reliefs on the First Pylon. Then the long, less well preserved forecourt of the temple came into view.
The boat landing was a spidery contraption set out from the shore. You climbed some steps, and the forecourt opened before you. Hall of Nectanebo at left, Hathor gazing at you from column capitals beyond, Kiosk of Trajan, with apparently plain capitals, off to the right.
I went left, as the Hall of Nectanebo was the tradional way in. I soon found Isis and Khnum hanging out on a wall. A Vulture on a column, possibly Nekhbet, though the crown looked like that of Osiris. Isis and someone wearing the double crown, probably a pharaoh. A Pharaoh looking like he was performing proskynesis to Isis, who had her back to him. A stack of prone food offerings, which I thought were pigs until I noticed the severed head beside each that identified it as a different variety of goat or antelope.
Looking down the wide promenade between the columnade, I could see the First Pylon. At the far end were two sets of steps: a steep set at left, and a wider, shallower set at right. You could line up hob-nobs on the steep steps, while the visitors climbed the shallow steps. The steps seemed to be separated by a ramp.
I climbed the steep steps and veered left, walking down a passage that ran alongside the Temple of Isis. It was lit by small square windows, just gaps in the stone walls. Flat slabs of stone, resting directly on top of the walls, formed a low ceiling. Brutalist architecture. I soon reached a landing, the walls of which were made of rough-carved stones, their centres bulging. Did the builders just not bother to finish it, or did the money run out? Steps led down here, supposedly to an ancient Nilometer, but the bottom looked flooded, so I didn’t descend.
Past the Second Pylon, I reached Hadrian's Gate. A rubble ramp led up from the landing to a wide flat area behind the temple. At the top, looking across, I could see the Gate of Diocletian in the distance, beyond the Temple of Augustus.
The Gate of Diocletian was a compact, solid structure with a small, domed roof. Beyond it I found steps down to the Roman-era landing. The Landing was flooded. Looking back through the Diocletian’s Gate, I could see the Temple of Augustus.
The Temple of Augustus was less well preserved than the Gate. The standing columns were clearly reconstructed, as they had steel reinforcing rods sticking out their tops. From the temple floor I had a good view to the rear of the Temple of Isis, well decorated with gods and goddesses.
I went left again, heading over toward the Hathor Temple, with the Kiosk of Trajan beyond it. On a wall inside, between two columns, Hathor received an offering from a Pharaoh. On the left column, an ape played a lyre. On the right column, Bes played a harp. On two other columns, Bes played a harp and a tambourine to Sekhmet. He was obviously musically talented. On another wall, Hathor received what appeared to the Aten, but was probably her hat. Behind her, a woman bundled papyrus.
I went down a passage from Hathor’s Temple towards the shoreline. Like the passage earlier, it was roofed by slabs of stone and had small square windows along its length to light it. At the end, there was nothing of interest, so I turned my focus toward the Kiosk of Trajan.
The Kiosk was a blocky structure with stubby papyrus columns and capitals, with plain extended sections above them. A terrace to the side of the kiosk gave good views ovefr the Nile lake. On a finished panel inside, Osiris and Isis received something from a Pharaoh. Other panels were unfinished, and the figures were unrecognisable.
“L.ZUCCHI ☥ 1854 ☥”. Who was he? Nobody. This may be the only mark he left on the world. And yet, this insignificant insect, whose only fame is to have defaced something old and grand, has left more of a mark on the world than I have.
“John Fuller, N Pearce, 1819. Five months from Addwar in Abyfsinia, after being in that Country 14 Years in the service of the EARL of Mountnorris & H. SALT, Esq. MARCH XXX1 MDCCCXIX.” Pearce scratched this 187 years and 3 days before I read it. Not satisfied with leaving just his name, he included a potted biography. In this case we can even find out more at Internet Archive, as a guy named Hall wrote a book from Nathaniel Pearce’s journals. Turns out John Fuller, and a third companion, Rev. Jowett, were just travel companions with Pearce on the Nile journey. Frustratingly, Volume II ends at Esna, during his Nile journey up from Cairo, four weeks too soon: “In the morning of March 2nd, we left Esneh”. However, pp. 223–227 of Fuller’s account more than fills the gap. They tied up at Philae on the evening of the 30th March. But Fuller omits any mention of carving grafitti into the magnificent edifice he so admired.
I now went over to the Temple of Isis. On the front of the First Pylon, Pharaoh was smiting his foes. Nearby, a missing section of a wall exposed a staircase. Given a few minutes unobserved, I could … but there were too many eyes. Instead, passing some steps with lion statues, I went to the main entrance, flanked on the walls both sides by Isis and Horus. Someone had spent effort trying to efface the Isis on the left. Looking through, I could see the Birth House.
I tried to make sense of some of the cartouchs. “?-wa-ru-ma-y-s-ankh-t-shin-j-??”. “Nu-p-wsr-nu-t-?-p-t-?-stp-ir-maa-n-??”. The first one was a birth name, so I guessed it was probably something like "Ptolemy, living forever". A big stele beat me. I admired the stacked vultures above a doorway, and the “Life and Power” decoration within it. Isis sat beside a young Pharaoh, who still wore his Horus lock. A Pharaoh with his face chiselled out made offerings. Hator with her cow head on.
I was almost at the inner sanctuary of the temple when — a tour group beat me to it. So I went left and right, looking out at Hadrian's Gate on one side and a door on the other. Galabiyya Man's Revenge: I found a padlocked door, with worn steps leading to the top of a pylon beyond. No key grip to be seen.
The Sanctuary was now free. Inside, a small altar, apparently Ptolomiac and thus not original, comprised the entire furnishings except for a modern wooden floor. On the wall, an Isis with her face hacked out breast fed a young Pharaoh, who did not, and an Osiris with his face and an Isis without, offered a faceless Pharaoh the was, a symbol of power.
There were more defaced reliefs on all sides. The Egyptians blame Byzantine iconoclasts — and in this case it may even be true. Neither religion has a history of kindness to pagan imagery, but whoever went for the faces often hit the divine but skipped the mortal. Muslims abhor both.
Around here, I got lost for a while. I saw nice friezes of figures carrying the Solar Boat, and of gods and Pharaohs doing things with lions frolicing around their feet. I also saw the tour groups building up in the forecourt. I went through the temples of Imhotep and of Arensnuphis.
By 9:25 I was on the boat on my way back to the shore. That 90 minutes went by so fast! Just after 9:30, I was on the mainland, walking up from the dock. I walked all the way back into town, including a 10-minute detour to look at the dam. I decided not to cross. It was an interesting walk, if sometimes petrol-fumed. By 11:20 I was in Feryal Gardens, named after a princess born in 1938, enjoying the shade and vegetation. Ten minutes later, I was sitting under a tree. My core Aswan itinerary was complete.
12:37 Coffee shop near the station. Finally, some tea with bite! They tried to take it away — perhaps they think all foreigners prefer weak tea?
Checked out the bus and train options for Kom Ombo and Edfu. Basically, it came down to getting on the 6 or 8 am train (buy ticket on board) and getting off at KO. Then taxi or service taxi (£5) to Edfu, but microbus best (£5). Then train to Luxor. They were dismissive of the bus — not an option — and taxis, of course, must go in the convoy.
Later: From the zenith to the nadir of health in four hours.
When I got back to the hotel, I admired the towels arranged in the shape of languid swans that room service had left on my bed. The £5 I was leaving on my pillow each morning was obviously appreciated.
I lay down to cool off for a bit before setting out to seek the Tombs of the Nobles. While lying there, I casually picked at an annoying flake in my nose, which had been crusting over in the dry air. Dislodging the flake opened the geyser — and my nose bled copiously for the next four hours.
Nothing stopped the bleeding for long. Although it clotted well enough around my nose, it refused to clot at the broken vein. If I stood over a basin it dripped 100 drops per minute into the basin. If I lay down, it ran down my throat, making me cough and feel queasy. I hot and cold showered. I wadded the nostril with toilet paper. I squeezed below the bridge of the the nose — the most effective action, but I couldn’t keep the pressure on the right spot for long enough. It was the blood thinners, of course, doing their job of stopping clots.
Eventually as I bent over the handbasin watching the drops fall, I suddenly felt weak and dizzy, and on the verge of passing out, so I rushed to lie down. But it wasn’t (just) loss of blood, it was my stomach preparing to rid itself of the black pool of blood that was poisoning it. I staggered up and just made it to the toilet bowl in time to deposit the load there in several all-consuming heaves.
That effort exhausted the geyser at last, because as I knelt before the blood-splattered throne, trying to mister the strength to get back to the bed, the drips slowed, then stopped. The delirious racking of my body also stopped with the ejection of the accumulated blood.
Six hours from the first drop, I was lying on my bed, totally exhausted, with crusted nostrils and a stomach that was simultaneously demanding food and threatening new protests when I so much as drank some Tang. I needed to wash some clothes and get packed for tomorrow’s planned early start, but I simply didn’t have the energy. Lying in bed I felt alert and well, it was when I get up that my real weakness showed itself.
It was the worst nosebleed I’d had since 1982, when Lyn McConchie rushed me to hospital after a bloody marathon.
I had some corn flakes in (reconstituted) milk with sugar — I was not up to going out to buy a proper dinner, and besides, this bland breakfast mixture was just about all my body could handle right now. It tasted delicious.
I started doing laundry, but ran out of puff, leaving socks and underpants drying, t-shirt and pants sitting in the empty basin awaiting a second attempt at hanging them up. I completed the task later, on my second attempt.
I woke up at 04:41, 21 minutes late. I had forgotten to turn my clock alarm on. I checked myself — I felt OK, so I hustled to get packed, and checked out just on 05:00. Not bad. To cut my baggage a bit, I Left “Darwin III” on the TV as a present to the housekeper. Forgot to leave a last £5 tip in it, damn!
But yesterday’s crisis lingered. I nearly ran out of puff just climbing up to the Corniche. I steadied once I was up on the level, but then blew myself apart again by doing a Houdini trick to get my jacket off without putting my luggage down. Hopefully my energy would pick up as my body called up more reserves. I’d bounced back a long way overnight. But I lost a lot of blood yesterday: that sort of thing was hard for the body to make up.
There was a ship moored near the hotel that played music on and endless loop: usually an interminable tweedling flute to a “donk donk ... donk donk” beat. Logically I should be resting today, but I just couldn’t bear another night of that music!
Kom Ombo and EdfuAt the “Coffee Shop — Quick Eats” near the train station where I had a liquid lunch yesterday (tea, coffee, orange juice — all liquid), I ordered coffee and sandwiches. By 05:47 I was sitting on the train.
That breakfast was just right. Two bread rolls stuffed with assorted veg (spinach, lettuce etc), chips, carrots and leeks. A combination of quick and slow energy, greens for iron, plus Turkish coffee for a quick pick-up without getting too much caffeine. All for £10, about $2.30. I would barely get the coffee for that price in Oz. I even made it to the train without getting puffy this time. At 06:01 the train pulled out, right on time.
I took my medicines, including the Lipitor I skipped last night. I was tempted to skip them today, to help ensure my nose stayed sealed, but in fact now was a dangerous moment, precisely because I had that massive clot in my nose. It was easier for new clots to form if anything broke off inside.
The train pulled into Kom Ombo around 6:40, and by 6:55 I was at the Temple of Haroeris and Sobek. I had met up with a Chinese tourist, Jenny, who also got off the same train. We caught a covered pickup, which delivered us to the gate for £5 each. Well, he did go out of his way (normally runs to the river 800m from the Temple) and it was cheaper than a £20 taxi. Getting back would be the fun part!
At the ticket office, a woman tried to push in between us and I stopped her with a hand on the arm. “Don’t touch me!” exploded this princess. I made the obvious retort, “then don’t push in”. I was in no mood for cultural sensitivity this morning. I had enough trouble just standing up without people jostling me — she had hit me hard enough to make me stagger.
We climbed some steps. I took it slow and easy. At the top, stupendous architecture exploded in my face. Remember, at this stage I had not seen Luxor; Philae was my only comparison, and this was on a much grander scale. Soon I was admiring “Life and Power” on a column. Horus and Isis on a wall — the Isis had very Greek features. Gorgeous colored vultures on the ceiling. Traces of paint elsewhere: blue along arms and legs, red onsun disks and Pharaoh’s crowns. Philae once had visible paint, back in the 1800s, but time on its flood-prone old site after the building of the dam had robbed it of colour. So this was new for me. There was a secret priest hole between the twin Sanctuaries: access was via a tunnel now covered by a grating.
I worked on trying to read hieroglyphs. Birth name “p-t-wa-ru-maa-y-s ankh-djet” (living forever) “ptah-mr”. One of the Ptolemies, but not the same one I failed to read at Philae (the throne name differed). The detail and the quality astounded me. The Greeks had brought their unique touch to ancient Egyptian wall art, and the fusion blew me away. Further on, I found a truncated column in full colour.
On the way out, around 7:30, a man in a suit standing at the top of the steps hitched his arm uncomfortably to relieve some weight, revealing the gun he was carrying tucked beneath his jacket flap. Secret Police.
We caught the 8:40 (the 8:00 from Aswan) to get to Edfu. I got the police to hail us a taxi to the station, though Jenny was apalled by my willingness to pay £20 for the ride. For me it was less than $5, and it saved my meagre reserves of energy. I offered to pay £15, but she insisted on paying half.
Still, I was sweaty and puffed by the time I had navigated the overpass and got to just the right spot on the platform. There was a souk in the road just by the end of the platform. I’d bought some bagels, water and four oranges as provisions for the rest of the journey. After Aswan, the prices were refreshing! Much more reasonable than Aswan. Luxor would probably be Aswan all over again, but at least I knew I could get around that on foot except where I used a short taxi ride to save time and energy, or crossed the Nile.
I could probably make tomorrow a light day in Luxor itself. Today’s mini-Odyssey put me two days ahead — the felucca would have delivered me there from Edfu by bus or taxi on the afternoon of the 6th — so I had time in hand.
We had no luck on the microbus to Edfu — the message seemed to be that the Police would pick us up. Hence the train. We should be able to catch pretty much any train from Edfu, I hoped, though the Rough Guide said getting out of Edfu could be a hassle due to the Police.
The train left only a couple of minutes late, and I did some calculations. 45 km Aswan-KO, 65 km KO-Edfu, suggested roughly 55-60 minutes, so call it 9:40 give or take a few minutes. From memory of the ride up from Cairo, Edfu had platform signs with English lettering, so it should be easy enough to spot.
I needed to find something salty at Edfu — my blood salt was well down and what I’d eaten had little salt in it. The water I drank last night meant I maintained my fluid levels, but the red blood cells and other goodies represented a huge loss that my body was now struggling to make good. No wonder I was buggered after any effort!
I caught myself picking crusty red flakes from an itchy left nostril. Stupid! Leave it alone! Let it heal.
More timeless scenes from the train to Edfu: stonewalled fields, with a goat crouched on one wall while a man on foot carried a roll of something along the track beyond the wall. A man surrounded by grazing donkeys, pumping water using a wooden contraption with a long crooked handle. Eternal green fields and a green river.
I missed recording our arrival, but my estimate must have been good, because at 9:46 I snapped a group of tourists standing beside a minibus, with obvious tourist stalls beyond them and the pylon of the Temple of Horus looming over the rooftops.
Rounding the Birth House, the temple had Horus and Isis flanking the entrance, and a Pharaoh smiting his enemies. Pharaoh wore the crown of Upper Egypt; the gods wore the double crown.
The girth of the columns in the main court was astonishing. Unlike Kom Ombo, the paint was either lost, or buried in centuries of soot. I was jostled along by the tide of tourists washing me toward the Sanctuaries. Some wall reliefs seemed to be gold-plated.
The stairs to the top of the pylon were open here, so I just had to go up. I nearly didn’t make it. The views were good, but mostly I stood and tried to recover the energy I’d just expended.
Back in the Sanctuaries, I found Horus’ barque. Horus was on every wall, mostly doing things with Pharaoh. My Rough Guide said it was in a room owned by Osiris, but my eyes disagreed. Maybe it had been moved since the book went to press.
Out in the courtyard, I found a section of ceiling over a colonnade that still had paint. Then I was outside, headed for the Birth House.
A faceless Isis suckled a young Pharaoh. An Isis shook a sistrum and a rattle, each with Hathor's face on the handle. An emasculated young Pharaoh stood in front of her. Another young Pharaoh shook a Hathor rattle; this Pharaoh had kept some of his junk. A faceless Isis breast fed a faceless young Pharaoh with his tackle intact.
I had lost contact with Jenny in the temple, and at 10:45 I caught a caleche back to the station, having bargained the guy down from his orginal absurd £100 demand to a merely outrageous £30 and no baksheesh. It got my “caleche” experience over and done with relatively cheaply, making it easy to ignore the touts in Luxor.
By 13:15 I was in Luxor, walking into town from the station along a street that was being simultaneously torn down and built. The Escarpment peered over the rooftops. Then Pharaonic pylons appeared above some trees. Fifteen minutes later, I was on a ferry across to the left bank town of Gezira.
I walked up an anonymous street until I reached Gezira Gardens. There I turned back (with a quick backhander to the Gezira Gardens guy who put me straight) and soon saw the Gezira Hotel sign that I had somehow walked past earlier. Turned right down a side street where I saw a sign for the Gezira Hotel. Within minutes, I was checked in, the aircon was on, and I was standing under the shower. By 14:30 I was lying flat on the bed.
Aircon. Fan. Shower. Toilet. Mosquito screens. 5 nights, £60 per. I hoped it would be as as good as it seemed. Seeing the temples at Kom Ombo and Edfu while changing my digs was exhausting, but now I was in Luxor with two days in hand: I could see more and take my time instead of rushing.
After 20 minutes, I pulled on clean clothes and stepped out to see the local area and buy a bottle of water. Then I went back and thought nothing for three hours.
Around 18:00, I ventured forth again for the Sound & Light Show at the Karnak Temple. It started around 19:45 with an after-dark tour of the Temple. The seating, reached around 20:25, was near the Sacred Pool. The light show itself only lasted half an hour; the tour counted as part of it. I remember nothing of it, except the usual glowing, talking statue heads. By 21:00 I was on my way home, making my way back through the temple, and by 21:55 I was on the ferry.
LuxorSlow start this morning — in my weakened state, last night’s walk to Karnak and back for the sound and light left me buggered. Still, I had more puff than yesterday morning, so my body was coming right. The magnitude of its effort was evidenced by the myriad little scrapes and bruises that I was accumulating because my body was concentrating its resources on making new blood instead of fixing up minor nuisances. Normally these would heal right up. And okay, yeah, because I was still a little wobbly and tended to bang into thngs.
Nevertheless, by 8:45 I was walking in through the First Pylon of Luxor Temple. A single obelisk stood here — the slightly shorter twin to the one now in Place de la Concorde, Paris. Beside it stood a couple of medium size Ramses II statues, and best of all, the head from a third statue. I snapped four pics of this — quarter left, quarter right, full on, right profile. Came in handy years later when I wnted to check some facial reconstructions that were making the rounds! At this point in my 2006, I hadn’t yet maxed out my exposure to the guy. Luxor Temple pushed me a long way along that path, however. Although it already existed when he came to the throne, he impressed himself on it so definitively that it would not be false to call the front half “Ramses’s Temple”.
The first peristyle was built by Ramses II. He was everywhere here, on the columns, between them, on the walls. Two more seated statues, much bigger than those outside the gate, flanked the way into the next section of the temple. There was also a mosque perched atop some columns, which the locals would not allow the archaeologosts to demolish. While the statue of Neferatri standing beside the leg of a seated statue outside had lost its face, there was an exceptionally fine one here, her face intact. Just as outside, Hapi bound the two lands together on the side of the giant seated figures here.
Further along, there were smaller, more personal statues of the royal couple, nearer life size, and an extensive section devoted to a festive occasion, dwelling on preparation of the food, and entertainment by female acrobats.
Next was the Court of Amenhotep III. Beyond that was the Hypostyle hall. The columns here were more standard, multi-stalked papyrus sheafs instead of Ramses’ bulbous lotus stalks. Beyond that were the Sanctuaries, one with a Greco-Roman-styled half-domed apse that showed traces of paintings and had a Corinthian column either side,from the reign of Diocletian, when a legion was stationed here.
In the inner sanctuaries, I identified a shrine of the barque, probably for Amun; at least, he was aboard the barque in the depiction on the wall. On another wall, Sekhmet presented Amenhotep III to Amun so that Amun knew whom to thank. I also noticed that the inner shrines originally had a sort of stage that extended from wall to wall, embracing the bases of the columns. I guessed that the statues of the gods would be on that stage, raised above mortal visitors, possibly kept in portable shrines. A relief of Amun stood here, his rigid member showing his appreciation. The real Amun statue got to use his own member every spring when he was ceremoniously floated upstream from Karnak to Luxor for a reunion with Mut.
I found Rimbaud’s famous grafitti.
And then I was looking at the back of the temple, where a row of three doors provided access.
Heading out, I came across Sekhmet and Isis embracing Amenhotet III, probably part of his Birth Room.
I passed by walls full of Ramses’ bombast on the way out, but did stop to admire the curiously delicate Temple of Tuthmosis III, built in against the back of the pylon in the Court of Ramses.
I exited the temple at 9:45 and noticed a small chapel to Serapis on my right. Inside was a headless Greco-Roman statue.
I headed off down the Avenue of Sphinxes. They were all human-faced here, all slightly different, some well proportioned, some not so much. I eventually reached the new excavations. I wandered around to the entrance of the diggings and there they not only refused me entrance (fair enough), but forbade me to take pictures. I laughed and showed them that I already had a good set, taken from beyond their dominion, making a nonsense of their prohibition. After that, I paralleled the line of the Avenue of Sphinxes along Sharia El-Karnak, until it met the continuation of the thing itself. Most of the surviving Sphinxes in this section, all human faced, were either badly damaged, or showed signs of heavy restoration.
I saw an odd bend ahead, but my analysis was hampered by two boys yelling “Baksheesh, baksheesh!” Unlike a family I encountered earlier, these boys weren’t adorable, they were pests, jumping into my frames, distracting me and refusing to go away.
Eventually, at 10:28, ahah! I found the Temple of Mut (closed for excavation). A caretaker appeared and offered to let me into Mut (presumably for generous baksheesh), but I elected not to do that. Now I understood. The Avenue forked, with the arm I’d followed linking up with an avenue between karnak and Mut. They had excavated the bend but not the section that continued straight on to Karnak.
I headed along the avenue between Karnak and Mut. Here the Sphinxes became the ram-headed Amun varety. At 10:35 I reached the monumental but ruinous Mut Gate of Karnak, looking in along the secondary axis of the Temple of Amun. I had trouble with the scale until I saw a tiny Galabiyya Man sitting in the shade to one side of a statue base against a ruined pylon. The base alone was twice his height, and each foot was the size of a small elephant.
Alas, this gate, too, was locked and there was no easy way around the walls. I had to retrace my steps towards Mut before swinging round to my right to get back on track for another Karnak entrance. Soon I saw a row of Sphinxes, with a pylon in the distance, and thought I recognised it as a spot I’d passed last night en route to the sound and light show.
Gateway of Ptolemy III Euergetes, with Temple of Khonsu behind it and temple of Opet at left of that. This was how the Mut Gate would have looked: a monumental gate set in a curtain wall, with a pylon looming behind it. But this gate Was also locked. I looked right along the wall … towards Mut gate. The ruinous wall might aflter all be accessible.
In the shade of a lamp post, a scrawny donkey dozed, in the only shade he could find. I also noticed that this stretch of wall emulated the sinuous curve of the Nile.
Back near the Mut Gate, there were too many unhelpful eyes, so I decided to reverse course and head for the main gate.
When I got there just after 11:00, the gate was open, and was the gate I remembered seeing last night by moonlight.
In the courtyard past the First Pylon, I saw the battered brown front of the Temple of Seti I at left, the Temple of Ramses III at right, and the Great Hypostyle Hall of Seti I ahead. Ramses had a giant statue here, with a knee-high Nefertari between his massive calves. There was also a much smaller, heavily restored statue of Amun.
The Hypostyle Hall was as impressive as expected. I got dissy looking up at the paintings on the underside of the rafters. At the end I found the obelisks of Hatshepsut and her fater Tuthmosis I, survivors of at least 4 that stood here (two each). Hatshepsut’s was distinctive for the remains of the wall built around it by her son, Thutmosis III. The bottom ⅔ of Hatspesut’s, the taller by ⅓, had a single column of Hieroglyphs, whereas Thutmosis I’s had a triple column of glyphs.
I found statues of Amun and his consort Amunet, and in a courtyard of their own, an interesting little cluster of six standing figures, carved from two stacked blocks, female-presenting, with four back-to-back in pairs and the others on the ends, all holding hands. The heads are missing. There are other group statues, here and elsewhere, but they generally all face the same directon.
Nearby I found the Sanctuary of the Barque and the pedestal of Amun's barque. The barque itself sailed long ago. The ceiling was set with five-pointed stars. At the entrance, four steps led from the recessed main floor.
Through the foot in the Fifth Pylon, I saw Tuthmosis III’s Festival hall across a courtyard. Statues included Tuthmosis III as Osiris, and a badly damaged group of three. The base was engraved with the hieroglyphs for Life, prosperity, and power. The only surviving cartouche, at upper left, was that of Tuthmosis III.
Inside the Hall, many columns still had their colour. On one column someone had painted a Christian saint, easily spotted due to the halo. The ochre paint of the saint's body proved less durable than the two blue lines it have been painted over. The ceiling of the passge outside was solid with paint.
I found a headless statue with breasts, dressed in nemes and shendyt. The cartouche had been obliterated. Hatshepsut?
After a fruitless effort to find the Sanctuary of Amun (I thought I found it, but when editing my photos realised that it was not aligned right) I headed over to the East Gate. Somewhere very near here, I climbed an “enclosure wall” and got some excellent high views over the site. I'm not sure exactly where I climbed, but the angle of the temple of Ramses II when I looked back towards the obelisks suggests that I climbed the wall on the north and then the south sides of the gate itself.
I clambered back down, then walked south along the back wall of Ramses’ temple, a long panel showing gods and Pharaohs doing ceremonial things. to the north I saw what had been a line of standing statues, but only the lower legs and sometimes lower bodies were left.
The Sacred Lake and the Nilometer marked the stationery part of last night’s Sound & Light Show. The Lake stank. Nearby I found the top part of Hatshepsut's fallen 2nd obelisk.
From this spot I went looking for the secondary axis. I soon found the Eighth Pylon, with evidence that Ramses II was ’ere, and then the Ninth Pylon, and then I was looking at the Mut Gate from the inside. In the distance I could see the Khonsu temple in profile, over by the Gateway of Ptolemy III Euergetes. Between Mut and the Ninth Pylon I found the compact Festival Temple of Amenhotep II.
The Mut Gate was flanked either side by headless statues. One had a cartouche at its belt, unfortunately illegible. Soon I was looking out where I had looked in earlier.
I walked across to the Gate of Ptolemy III Euergetes, which had some very nice carvings but sadly faceless on it, then on to Khonsu Temple. Hidden in the shadows I found a little faceless Pharoah sitting on a block of stone, and a baboon who’d lost both feet and one leg, but retained the nub of his penis. I watched a tour group stand patiently as their guide pontificated on the baboon. I saw a Byzantine cross, and saw Amun being worshipped on a wall, but the cartouches were blank and all the faces were chiselled off. Nearby, a couple of Pharaohs, Ramses perhaps, tying the two lands together.
Next stop, the Temple of Opet, from which I had a good view of the sinuous wall I'd walked along earlier.
By now I was approaching the Hypostyle Hall from the south, closing my loop around the site. I stopped in a quiet nook to empty my camera. It was now 13:00 and the day had been hard on its capacity.
I left Karnak and made my way to a place that claimed to burn memory cards to CD, but they couldn’t help me. Every attempt resulted in a coaster. After £10 in wasted CDs, I gave up. Instead, I dug out my guidebook and found a place it recommended.
16:02 Burning photos to CD. I thought I finally had enough memory to last a trip, but lo and behold, the space nemesis has reared its head less than two weeks into the trip. Rainbow Computers. They seem a nice enough lot.
Six CDs later, I had freed up the necessary card space. I had also hit it off with Yasser of Rainbow Computers. He invited me to meet his fiance and family at a get-together as his home village on Saturday. I accepted.
My last stop of the day was the Luxor Museum. No photos allowed, but it had some excellent staues in as-new condition, and a reconstructed wall from Akhenaton’s demolished temple at Karnak. The bricks had been used as fill in the Ninth Pylon. The chubby scribe Amenhotep, son of Hapu, was a highlight. But someone had stolen his tablet. Apparently the Museum also had the mummies of Ahmose I and ramese I, but I don’t recall seeing those. Perhaps I missed the annex they were in: it had been a long day.
I watched the sun set over the Nile, then took the ferry across and spent £10 at an internet joint writing an email, then hit the pillow. I had an early start planned tomorrow.
Tombs of the West BankThe alley outside the hotel was dark at 4:57. Sunrise was expected at 5:35, and I had 3 km to cover by then. Better pick up the pace! The realm of the dead awaited.
A dog barked off in the darkness, growing nearer. I whipped out my camera and flashed it. A ragged reddish mongrol with demon eyes. The flash daunted it, and it veered off, growling.
Hot air balloons began to grow in the fields on both sides of the road, each a giant mushroom until it cast loose. At 5:24 I stepped off the road myself, and craned forward. I could see a huge, dark figure waiting for me up ahead.
I was accosted by a Galabiyya Man on a bike. He offered to be my guide. I declined, but he kept orbiting me as I walked on, riding ahead, crossing, riding back the other side, riding up past me again.
5:32. I checked the horizon. Still no sun, but it was getting bright out, and my destination seemed absurdly far ahead.
5:33. Whoops, there came the sun. Where was Memnon? There. Close.
5:35. I could see half the Sun’s disk. But now I was also face to face with Memnon, the statue of Amenhotep III that had borne that name for so many years. I decided it was close enough.
Long ago, the northern one of two colossal statues of Amenhotep III here broke. And after that time, it would “sing” at dawn. People came from far and wide to listen. Until Septimius Severus repaired the statue, after which it sang no more.
The faces of both statues are wrecked, but we have other statues of Amenhotep III that are very similar.
Standing in the field beside Memnon, surrounded by balloons and pigeons, looking up at the Escarpment glowing by dawn light, it seemed a good omen for the day. What a grand landscape. I was utterly happy: one of those rare moments when I was exactly where I wanted to be, exactly when I wanted to be here. This dawn walk from the Nile to the necropolis was one of the “musts” of my trip. It was planned over a year ago, and it happened just as I imagined … only better, because now I was really here, not just dreaming about it.
I moved on. By 5:53 I was at the main ticket office. I looked at the prices. 20, 20, 20 … 12, 12, 10, 10. Watch out for those £12 tombs, because the guy wouldn't admit to having any change. Al-Khauka, Ramesseum, Nakht and Mena, Rekhmire and Sennofer, Rahmose, Khonsu and Userhat and Benia, Merenptah, that’ll be £122 and no change from £125.
I had forgotten to book a ride to the Valley of the Kings. Fortunately, a covered pick-up truck “taxi” was right there, and another £20 quickly changed hands. The driver pointed out Carter's House and Stoppelaer House as we zipped by them. Ten minutes later I was standing in the parking lot at the Valley of the Kings, watching my ride career back the way we came.
Five minutes after that, I had my tickets for KV entry — £55 covering any three tombs except Tut’s — and my £70 Tut ticket. “look at the glory of the ancient” enthused a bilingual sign by the road. While I sympathised with the sales pitch, it was just a little late — I was already here!
KV 16, Tomb of Ramses I. I checked my shortlist, and there it was. One down. KV 9, Ramses VI … closed for renovation. But KV 14, Tawrosret/Sethnakt, first on my secondary list, was open, so I did that one instead. Last on my shortlist, KV 34, Tuthmosis III. Tuthmosis III, the great conqueror … who was under his mama's thumb for the first half of his rule.
“Tomb of Tuthmoses III, XVIIIth (18th) Dynasty, discovered and cleared by the Antiquities service in February-March MDCCCXCVIII” That’s 1898 in English usage, guys. Don’t ask me why the fascination with Roman numerals.
Time to climb out ofthe valley. I could see the souvenir sellers lining the skyline, waiting for me. The donkey path out of the valley was not well signposted: nobody would stop you (it wasn’t illegal, or even immoral), but you got the sense that they’d rather people didn’t go this way. The guard took no notice of me — though he probably would have if I'd been coming the other way.
Looking back, I could see tour groups arriving. The tour population was building up — but coming early had paid off. All my tombs were either deserted or had only one or two other independent tourists in them.
Somewhere around here I realised that I had an unused KV ticket in my portfolio. KV 62, Tutankhamun! I decided climbing down then up again would be too hard, so that was £70 ($16) wasted. I felt no need otherwise to go back to the Valley tomorrow, so there was no recouping the loss by trying to use the ticket tomorrow. Looked like I had bought myself an expensive souvenir for a tomb visit I didn’t make.
The cliff across the way was sheer, and looked like that white-and-ochre striped brickwork the Romans used. But it was natural.
At a crossroads, I could turn right, up and over the top … or left, which was nice and flat. I was alreay puffed and shaky. No contest! I was passing souvenir sellers now. “(Puff) NO (puff) THANKS (puffpuff).” How did they get their stuff up here? Ah, over there. Donkeys resting.
The views kept opening up, getting wider and better. I had a lot of time to admire them while resting standing up. My body was resenting this exercise; it had not yet replaced all the lost blood yet!
I was lost in the wilderness, surrounded by an overabundance of tempting little paths. I aimed for the edge of the world. But then I hit the donkey path used by the sellers.
At the edge of the world, I looked directly down on the roof of Hatshepsut’s mortuary temple. This was another of those shiver-up-the-spine moments when a dream comes true. Next to Hatshepsut’s was Mentuhotep II’s Mortuary temple. Further off was the Tomb of Montemhat, governor of Thebes, and the carpark. In the distance, the Nile was a slim silver ribbon, almost lost in the haze. Everything ran away into distance and mystery.
Near at hand, a rockfall ran down a cliff. Green flecks … plastic bottles and other trash.
I was suddenly dizzy. I spotted a nice rock pile and went and sat on it. It was a good spot for a rest.
08:32 Perched on a ledge on a spur of the donkey trail from the Valley of the Kings. Below me lies Hatshepsut’s Temple, looking just like a postcard. Before me the valley of the Nile stretches away into hazy antiquity, the river itself no more than a strand running through. A man chants in arabic: a donkey brays: the tourist “train” grumbles as it ferries soft tourists from their buses to the causeway of Hatshepsut’s Temple.
The other nearby monuments are undefined, still awaiting me. I shall get to them. But for now, I am where I should be, when I should be. No matter what the future holds, this moment is mine forever.
I was feeling very mellow and very much “with nothing I need to do” — except to get down off this mountain alive, in this blazing sun, with steep falls to one side and then the other. That could wait. Looking out, I could see the Ramesseum in the middle distance. To the right, further off … yes. The Colossi of Memnon. And a hot air balloon.
Time to move on. Another fork in the road. Left was easier, right looked more interesting. In the end, it made no difference; the paths converged by the drop-off that led down to the car park.
Everywhere around me were caves. Some were tombs, with steel grates sealing them off. And then I was down. 08:55. After the steep descent, the flat land felt like I was climbing.
Soon I was approaching Hatshepsut’s Temple — Djeser Djeseru, Splendour of Splendours. A friendly dog trotted over, eyes half cosed, tongue drooping. He looked how I felt. Holes in the ground announced that they had once held myrrh trees brought back from Punt by Hatshepsut. Entry was £21.
At the First Terrace I ignore the First Colonnade and climbed the First Causeway, slowly. Crossed the Second Terrace. An energetic youg lad was running up and down the Second Causway, grinning. I ignored him and pushed my way up.
At the top, Hatshepsut was waiting for her guests at the Second Colonnade. High cheeks (painted red), large eyes, acquiline nose, a small but definite mouth, a delicate chin behind the false beard. The statue was idealised; nevertheless this image suggested that in her youth Hatshepsut must have been both beautiful and charismatic. How long she lived is uncertain, but she probably died aged around 50. So she never grew old.
I went up to the topmost, Third Terrace, which was open and which I had looked down into from the clifftop. A large courtyard was flanked by two smaller ones. The smaller ones were Sanctuaries — on the north, to the Aten, the the south, to Hatshepsut. A Sanctuary of Amun was set into the cliff at the back. The sanctuary was closed. Damn! A snapped-off head of Hatshepsut smiled knowlingly from atop a short pillar. In a niche, a guy in a white crown of Upper Egypt did something. On a wall of another room, Hatshepsut suckled from Hathor's udder. Hapy fetched Life, Prosperity and Power.
I went back down to the Second Colonnade, a two-level arrangement. The north end had the Chapel of Anubis. A tour guide discoursed beneath a panel of offerings to Anubis. A niche had a blue starry sky with five-pointed stars. Anubis was there. On a wall, on the right, the Horus Name, Throne Name and Birth Name of Tuthmosis III; on the left, Hatshepsut’s names had been obliterated. Peering into the sanctuary of the Chapel of Anubis; rocks on the floor.
Hathor’s face on a column, and then the brightly painted Chapel of Hathor. A procession. Men bearing fronds lined the riverbank, and a barque sailed the river. Tuthmosis II fed Hathor. Hathor in cow form. A Pharaoh suckled from Hathor’s udder. The cartouche had been erased, so this Pharaoh was probably Hatshepsut.
On the lower level, Hatshepsut made an offering: her face was her own, but the body was male. Servants brought cloth. Ships hoisted sail. Huts on stilts, palm trees. Arriving in Punt. And there it was, the famous image of the king and queen of Punt greeting their visitors. Shivers down my spine.
Birth Colonnade of Hatshepsut. Lion symbol on a balustrade. Amun displayed his passion. A Pharaoh did the heb-sed. A boat Rowing on the Nile.
Done. It was 9:55. Also, I was done in. So I rode the dinky little tourist train out to the car park, just another soft tourist, then went and hid from the sun in the Tomb of Montemhat, military governor of Thebes and upper Egypt.
Feeling better, I walked across the ruinous landscape, pocked with tombs, broken statues and other obstructions. A cow mooed at me. A cute white puppy tied in the sun wagged his tail hopefully. More tombs, but I was feeling a bit burned-out.
I tossed a guy in a galabiyya a pound in baksheesh, and he opened up Khokha Theban Tomb 178, Nefer-ronpet, aka Kenro, 19th dynasty. “Discovered by R Mond 1915, Rasmessid, married Murtemwia, treasury scribe in estate of Amun-Re. Tomb in courtyard with three others (295-296-365), two rooms. Outer door lintel has Ramses II cartouche. Door middle, deceased and wife adore Re. Ceiling has geometric and floral designs. Friezes represent faces of Hathor and Anubis. Scenes from the Book of Gates. Drinking from a pool; weighing of the heart, etc.” The guy offered to let me flash up the tomb with my camera, for a fiver. I foolishly decided against it. Actually my budget records £3, “Baksheesh x 3 at Khokha”, but I have no recollection of what doors the other £2 opened unless they were the other two el-Khoka Tombs. I actually had a ticket for this (as “Al-Khauka”) but somehow the guys couldn’t understand that the doors needed to be opened til I’d waved different paper at them.
An oasis! The Ramesseum Rest House, with an attractive terrace. Conveniently located next to my next target, the Ramesseum. What to do: see or eat? It was 10:50, and I was walking dead. Time to eat.
I had an early luch at the Ramesseum Resthouse. It was expensive by the standards of my Egyptian means, but although my cornflake breakfast had served me well, it was nearly seven hours ago and my body had put in a lot of miles since then.
The legacy of the bloody nose was still noticeable — I ran out of steam too quickly when climbing — but was much less than it had been, and it only slowed me down a little. Much of today’s walking was downhill, flat, or gently undulating — no hassle. Climbing out of the Valley was the hardest part, but I took that slowly, with several rests where I let my breathing and heartbeat return to normal before continuing. The splendid views more than repaid the effort, although those sweating their way across now would have a clearer view since the morning haze had burnt off.
The Ramesseum had lost its outer walls, and the First Pylon and First Court were badly damaged. I avoided them on the way in, my first good glimpse being the colossal Osirid statues at the back of the Second Court.
Before hitting the big one, I decided to take a wander around more neglected parts of the complex — such as the warehousing and administrative complex on the east side. Here and there, massive slabs of intricately-carved temple wall were propped up against humble mud-brick walls of those appointed to maintain the monument to ego represented by those slabs. The modest Temple of Tuya on the north side had been reduced to a few column bases. However, some storerooms survived, with massive arched roofs.
In the east corner I found a long, double-columned hall; purpose unclear, given that no rooms open onto it. In Merneptah’s Temple (visited later) a similar room was labelled a “treasury”. At the back of the building (inside the rings of storerooms), stumps showed where a hypostyle hall led to the Sanctuaries. Some of the column bases were monoliths but others were made by joining halves with massive metal clips.
At the very back, I found some sort of shrine, a short ramp leading up to a small platform, with a badly-damaged superstructure built against the back wall. One book I read speculated that it’s a birth-house. But why put it here? Nearby I found an altar-top lying on the ground. To either side, small doors with sturdy doorsteps led from a crosswise passage into small rooms against the back wall.
Many walls were gone, but some new ones had appeared, mud brick and looking ancient, but not shown on the maps I was using. One overlapped a row of colun bases.
At a key intersection deep in the heart of the structure, I found a square room with four column bases.
The Sanctuaries that survive now effectively formed a separate structure. I spent little time there; it was where the tour groups dallied.
In the west, I found an ornate room with a double portico and rooms with a well, an oven, and and other mod cons. The “Royal Palace” might have been accomodation for high officials, or it might have been a utility area for cooking offerings, ritual bathing before worship, and the like.
To one side of the Osirid statues, I found the crumbling shards of a colossal statue, and found myself reciting Ozymandias. As you do. But Shelley was over the top. There was actually quite a lot left, and the sands did not, boundless and bare, sweep far away. On the contrary, the sands around here were all full of ruins. The upper part of the statue he referred to is now in the British Museum, but there was still plenty of colossus left at the Ramessium: there were up to four colossi, all broken and toppled, including a faceless head on which no frown of command remained, a bodiless head with its nose broken off, and a huge lap with hands on it that unfortunately lay on its side, otherwise I would have sat in it. The legs of another had been stood upright, and it was clearly a different colossus as its lap was present but its hands were broken. It may also have been a bit smaller.
Wall reliefs. Amun and a long-haired, balding, breastless figure in female garb used styli to inscribe Ramses’ Throne Name on egg-shaped ovals (possibly clay tablets). Behind the androgyne, Thoth engraved Ramses' Birth name on another egg. Ramses himself sat in the shade of an elaborate tree and wore the Atef crown, a symbol of Osiris. All faces had been obliterated; the Ramesium had an afterlife as a church. Tiny figures supported Amun's throne and feet. Osiris, Amun and Sekhmet hobnobbing with Ramses: Amun held the ankh to Ramses' nose, granting him life. Hathor, Amun and Mut wth Ramses: Amun handing Ramses the palm and the sword, symbols of rule. Hedge and been announced a cartouch, Usermaatra-setepenra, “The Justice of Ra is powerful, chosen by Ra”; Ramses’ Throne Name. Sekhmet stood behind a beared figure on a throne. A flaw in the wall made it look like a beam of light was coming from the throned figure’s eyes.
A group of men took a barque for a walk. Part of this relief was lost due to later occupants needed an arched door through that wall.
Further along, Ramses-meryamun, “Ra has formed him, beloved of Amun”; Ramses’ Birth Name. Interestingly, a z was used for the terminal sign. Elsewhere a su was used. Ramsz. Ramssu. Perhaps indicative of a regional accent?
Vermin tracks. “A:L:Corry 1818”. Captain of the Osprey, Armar Lowrie Corry, R. N., whom I last encountered at the Kiosk of Trajan at Philae. IAS MANGLES CLIRBY, 1817; F.Bonfils; HETLEY; BELZONI; E G Geddes; SALT. Hmmm. Same Salt from Philae? Same style. Henry Salt? And Belzoni! How these guys got around, busy chisels in hand.
Back out in the Second Court, Ramses got in the last word, declaiming from a ruinous doorframe. But now I was into the thick of the Noble Tombs opened by those tickets I had purchased at the main ticket office earlier.
Tomb of Userhet (No. 51). “This tomb was prepared for Userhet, the first prophet of the royal spirit of Tuthmosis I in the time of King Sety I (13?3-1290 B.C.). The tomb is one of the most beautiful tomb in Thebes because of its vivid colours. The east wall is decorated with a very charming scenes representing the deceased’s wife and mother sitting under a fig tree with three birds on its branches while their spirits in shape of birds with human heads hodering on the tree. Tree-goddess pours water from a golden vessel and offers honey and figs to eat. The sub-scene is double-scene represent Abydos pilgrimage, with the deceased and his wife before Anubis and Osiris. Userhet adoring different dieties while being purified by eight priests. Deceased with wife and son pour ointment on offerings before different gods. Judgement weighing of heart. Funeral procession and deceased before western goddess in front of the pyramid tomb. Scenes of female mourners in different movement and the royal statue black with fanbearer should be observed.”
Tomb of Khonsu (no. 343). “This tomb was prepared for Khonsu first prophet of Tuthmose III in the tme of Ramesses II. It is decorated with beautiful scenes represent the festival of Monthu arrival of the bark which is carried and received by priests to the Temple of Maonthu in Armant. Deceased and family are seen burning incense, offering flowers and playing sistrums. Judgement weighing of the heart with Maat, funeral procession with mourners before mummies at pyramid tomb. Scene of two kneeling persons praying under tree shuld be observed. The interence of the inner room bears a nice decoration with spreading wings ducks, nests with new born birds and eggs. The inner niche is decorated with scenes represent the deceased offering the bouquet of Amun Ra to the king Montuhotep II (Nebhepetra) XI Dyn.”
Tomb of Benia called Pahekmen (no. 343). “18th Dyn. This tomb was prepared for Benia, called Pahekmen, overseer of works and child of the royal nursery in 18th Dyn. It is decorated with different beautiful scenes represent the deceased sitting and holding a stick while inspecting weighing and recording ebony, ivory, silver, gold rings and treasures. Benia receives offering bringers with cattle, fishes, birds and flowers. A rich offering table with food and vegetables is represented infront of him. the left room wall is decorated with a banquet seene with musicians consist of a harpist, three clapping, and flautist in the presense of the deceased, his parents and guests. The south wall is decorated with a false door painted to imitate red granita. The nothern one is decorated with stela. The niche contains the statue of the deceased between his parents.”
Tomb of Menna (no. 69). “The scribe of the fields of Tuthmosis IV ‘the lord of the two lands’. This tomb is of the most beautiful ones due to its beautiful scenes and wonderful colours.” The tomb is cross-shaped. Chamber (at the cross), Long Passage (the thickened “handle”), niche (the small knob at the top of the handle).
Tomb of Rehkmire (no. 100). “(18th Dynasty).”
Tomb of Ramose (no. 55), had a friendly custodian — on the hunt for baksheesh. After my miserly offerings of a pound or two had been met with scowls of disbelief at every other tomb, I amused myself here by disproving the myth that it’s impossible to give enough baksheesh. I tipped this guy £15 and his mate who took me down and showed me “Ramose skull” (doubtful) £5. They were so happy that if I’d expressed a desire to take one of the walls with me, they’d probably have helped me carry it. Fortunately for future visitors, I was happy enough just to take some photos. In one, Ramose and his wife had inticately detailed hair but lacked eyes. In another, they had heavily outlined eyes. He was from the time of Akhenaton, whose image had been erased from a wall with an Aten. I found a very famous mourning scene. A cat played with a bird beneath a chair. A bullock was sacrficed in preparation for a feast; the head, tongue lolling, was being offered.
Near some structures outside the back wall of the Ramesseum, I encountered a well-hung donkey.
I had been looking forward to this one, an accessible but slightly unusual structure at a road intersection near the main ticket office. Most tours skipped this; it was too difficult to explain briefly, and was unspectatular, lacking the massive columns or statues to be found in other temples so near at hand. I had it mostly to myself.
Merneptah or Merenptah, born about 1283, died 1203, succeeded Ramses II in 1213 and was succeeded by Seti II in 1203. He was Ramses II’s 13th and oldest surviving son, and the first royal-born (born in the Purple, as the Byzantines would put it) Pharaoh since Tutankhamun. However, Ramses had lingered so long that if Merenptah was born in 1283, he came to the throne aged 70. He had been Overseer of the Army since about 1258, and Crown Prince and Prince Regent since about 1224, so he had a good deal of experience running things.
As Pharaoh, he chalked up victories in Libya, in which he collected 6,000 hands and penises, and Canaan, in which he declared that he had wiped out the seed of Israel. He moved the capital from Pi-Ramses back to Memphis. His reign was otherwise unremarkable. His children and grand-children experienced the fall of the 19th Dynasty.
His temple was much smaller than his father’s, perhaps 120 x 100 metres, but laid out similarly, complete with a “Palace” in the south corner and a “Treasury” in the north. There were workshops in the west corner. I wished I had come here first, as it would have made the Ramesseum more comprehensible.
I entered from the south-west, through the low remains of the First Pylon. Much of the material for Merneptah's temple was filched from the nearby ruins of Amenhotep III’s temple. So nearby that I could see the looming back of the Colossi that stood on the far side of it. This was as near as anyone could really get to that temple today, given the scanty remains on the original site. In fact, the two temples were both ruined in floods, which seems to be appropriate.
The pylons had collapsed, so I looked across the open First Courtyard to a ramp directly up to the level of the Second Courtyard. In the far left corer of the First Courtyard I found a stele to Amun, densely covered with hieroglyphics. This was a copy of the famous “”Israel Stele“”.
I went up the ramp to the Second Courtyard, with massive rectanguar bases around the edges that probably once supported rows of Osirid Merneptahs. Due to the loss of the Second Pylon, I could make out the top of the other side of the stele to Amun.
I walked over to the sacred pool in the south-west. The main square part of the pool was grass-grown. A structure led down from the main temple into the pool, suggesting a sluice, perhaps representing the Nile.
North of the pool was a roofed area, with items found in the temple. The remains of a Spinx, and of a large dog, and other beaties.
In the middle of a courtyard I found a compass placed there by the Istitut Suisse, 1971–2002. 25°43'49"N, 32°36'37" E. Well, now I knew where I was. Except, according to Google, that was 900m away, in the middle of the Tombs of the Nobles. I was at 25°43'30"N, 32°36'23"E. Even in this timeless place, seconds count!
Up a second ramp to the First Hypostyle Hall. After this point, everything was down to flat traces of foundations. I watched a tour bus cruise by on the road beyond. There was very little ghost left here to be conjured! Just a floor plan.
On the roadside I found a sign with distances. East, 1.3 km to the Ramesseum, 4 km to Hatshepsut, 6.6 km to the Valley of the Kings. West, 700 m to Medinat Habu, 800 m to Deir el medina, 1.3 km to the Valley of the Quens.
I turned for home. Down past the flat remains of Amenhotep III, a nod to Memnon as I went by at 15:30, a moment of excitement for some local kids who were riding the front of a midget diesel engine.
17:23 Well, I’ve counted the cost of going silly with baksheesh when I ran out of small notes, and the cost is high. Somewhere I lost (or gave as baksheesh, thinking it was £1) a £50 note. But much worse, I lost my us$30 ready reserve. I still had it at Ramose, so I must have dropped it somewhere after that. No point going back to look: by now some undeserving infidel is very happy.
I’ll need to go over to Luxor tonight and hit up an ATM for a couple of thousand pounds. Then find a way to get a lavish new supply of small change for tomorrow.
I blew £40 at the “Africa” Restaurant for dinner around 20:00. I did go to the bank, but have no recollection of the bank or the restaurant; it’s pretty clear that when my head hit the pillow after dinner, I went out like a light.
Next morning I was back at the Colossi by 7:30. It was hotter today, but I was determined to finish the West Bank.
At the end of the long road that went past the Colossi, I turned left and soon came to Medinat Habu, funerary temple of Ramses III. As I approached a temple, I watched a white cat and a black dog circling each other. After a tense moment, the dog backed down. By 08:00 I was being scanned by the machine at the site’s security checkpoint.
Medinat Habu was much better preserved than the Ramesseum or the Temple of Merneptah. Inside, its massive pylons dominated everything. The First Pylon was once even larger than that of Karnak. On it, Horus and Amun watched approvingly as Pharaoh, wearing the crown of Upper Egypt for Amun on the south side and that of Lower Egypt for Horus on the north, smote the invaders. On the Second Pylon, from the colonnaded First Court, deified Ramses expostulated at Amun and some other god.
The gateway through the Second Pylon still had its gloriousy painted vulture ceiling in blue and red, with a circular pivot on one corner for a long-vanished door.
The Second Court also had a colonnade, with fragmentary Osirid statues on the side leading to the Hypostyle Halls. The sides of the rectangular pillars holding the statues were gorgeously painted.
The bulbous pillars of Hall itself, alas, cut off about head height. At the end, on one side, Mr. & Mrs. Ramses III greeted guests. Alas, he had lost his head and she had lost her face. On the other side, Isis and, probably, Amun faced them. He too had lost his head and she her face.
In a Sanctuary, Amun displayed his erection to Ramses, who held a stick and showed every evidence of intending to measure the godly member. A locked rooom had two empty niches at the back, and a blue patch on the ceiling that had probably been a starry sky. Another Sancuary had a ruinous statue of Ramses III, according to the cartouchs on the base. One statue got to stay in its cubicle, but I couldn't figure out whom itrepresented. Some walls here retained their paint, notably one with the Solar Barque.
I looked up as I passed through the First Pylon on the way back. The blue paint here had faded to green, but the red was strong. The hole for the door postw as badly damaged, suggesting that the last time the door opened, it was involuntary.
Inside, Ramses III was shown counting right hands after a battle. Hapy offered something. I found a splendidly decorated double-height niche.
I walked around the side of the Pylon, to what would logically be the “Palace”. Sure enough. The enemy again took a hammering on the lintel of the door back to the temple. One wall here was a calendar.
The workshops were in very poor condition; if I hadn’t already seen the Ramesseum, I wouldn’t have known what I was looking at.
At the back wall I saw a curious structure of four shortish columns surrounding a square pillar, and surrounded by parts of fallen columns. On a wall on the way back up the other side, Ramses III the archer rode his chariot over a carpet of dead foes. Christian era bricks covered a patch of ground. On the wall, Ramses III went hunting lions.
Finally I was back at the Pylon, where I found a Nilometer. The Sacred Lake was dry dirt. The Small Temple had an odd frontage: one wall stood straight, while beside it the other slanted back like a pylon. It was clearly deliberate. Inside the Small Temple, I found an alter in good shape, and a barel-valuted Sanctuary.
At the Prolemaic pylon, green vultures flew across the ceiling. I heard loud voices and turned, in time to see a hassled tourist waving off an importunistic Galabiyya Man. I found an elaborate False Door. I paid my respects to the battered Sekhmet by the gate on the way out at 9:20.
At 9:40, I was walking into the carpark at the Valley of the Queens. My first stop and main reason for eing here was the Tomb of Queen Nefertari, wife of Ramses II. It looked like it was open, but it wasn’t. Bah. After that I only peeked into a few tombs, typically spending only a minute or two in those I did enter. I recall nothing of any of them; all I retain is the photos I took outside each. I did not even enter all the ones that I photographed.
By 10:24 I was at Deir el Medina, a compact oval of head-high walls, with the villagers’ tombs spreading up the hillside nearby. There wasn’t a lot for me to investigate here, but it was fun and odd to walk up the main street of an ancient town that was so consequential to the building of the pyramids, yet was plunged into historical obscurity because it was inhabited only by commoners.
The Ptolemaic Temple of Maat and Hathor still had colour on the walls. Nearby was a beautiful wave wall like that I’d seen at Karnak.
And then I headed on. By 11:38 I was at the Ramesseum Resthouse for lunch. I had done everything on today’s itinerary except the Temple of Seti I. But it was hotter than yesterday. I decided to hire a taxi to get to Seti, if I could get one for £20 or less.
Apart from a lingering soreness in my feet and lower legs, I survived yesterday’s epic well. Even more satisfying, today’s climbing had caused me little distress — meaning no more than usual — which told me that my body had made good the losses from the nose bleed.
I can stop stuffing my face for raw material and go back to trying to lose weight. Right after lunch, that is. No point in wasting good food, eh.
Not that I was being gluttonous. Here are my two lunches at the Rest house:
Ramesseum Salad, coffee, iced tea x2, water, £1 tip, £29 ($7).
Ramesseum Salad, coffee, iced tea x2, £25 ($6).
A “Ramesseum” Salad was sliced tomatoes, sliced cucumber, chips (fries), and a couple of fried patties, with a wicker bowl of bread fingers. It was a simple meal, but filling. I was taking a small risk with the water the tomatoes and cucumbers had been washed in, but I got away with it.
I did get a taxi to Seti I’s Temple. It was a 25 minute walk in the hottest part of the day, or a breezy 5 minute ride.
The ceiling of the First Pylon alternated blue Vultures with brown cartouchs. I couldn't make out the names in the cartouchs.
Inside, Seti I made an offering to a stylised ram-headed Amun. Ramses worshipped an erect Amun; but some wowser had chiselled out Amun’s member.
The Sanctuaries were bare and empty. I found some devotional stelae with an uncanny resemblance to tombstones.
Everywhere I found unfinished or badly finished work. Seti I died prematurely, and it was left to Ramses II to finish the temple. He grabbed the best workmen, leaving Seti the dross.
I grabbed a second taxi to Gezira. By 14:15 my laundry was done and hanging in the shower, and I settled in for a siesta.
Later I went across the river to burn some CDs. I took the chance to take some pics of Luxor Temple, and of the evening parade of caleches bringing cruise boat passengers to the Sound & Light Show.
17:58 Digital Image, burning 3 cards to CD. £30 each, 2 copies, this will set me back a cool £180 ($45).
Two hours later, I had my six CDs.
My Luxor itinerary was finished and tomorrow was a rest day, with just the visit to Yasser’s home town for lunch, so the next morning I slept in. Glorious sloth!
21:14 Had lunch at Yasser’s village on the West Bank south of Luxor. I was careful about the water (took my own) and the veggies, and avoided salad, but obviously not careful enough — I now have a mild (so far) dose of the shits. Ah, well, it was a lovely meal and memorable experience, and I got a glimpse of how ordinary Egyptians lived in the villages along the Nile. The family had a small mud-brick house, with old but good wuality carpets on the floor and walls painted red a long time ago and since subjected to the ravages of a growing family.
I had breakfast at a hotel restaurant on the wrong side of the road from the Corniche. Egyptian cities have magnificent corniches, but they are under-utilised. Almost anywhere else they would be crammed with cafés and eateries: here they were a footpath isolated on the wrong side of a road dangerous for pedestrians to cross. Put eateries on the corniche, have hungry people crossing the road in numbers too big to ignore, solve two probablems at once.
I had my bus ticket. The bus would leave the new bus station out by the airport at 20:30, according to the ticket seller at the old station behind Luxor Temple. There was a £5 shuttle that left the old station at 20:00, and the guy wanted me to be there for the shuttle at 19:30. They won no awards for customer service.
I decided to take a last look at Luxor Temple. At the Gezira ferry terminal, I watched the morning parade of Nile cruise ships setting out.
By 10:30 I was at the First Pylon, with its obelisk and two seated statues of Ramses. This time I decided to work around the edges of the site, which gave a different aspect, as it was here that the curators stashed all the things they couldn’t find places for.
I looked behind the columns in the Court of Ramses II. Statues, crudely whittled off at the waist, stood in a courtyard. Ramses presented a feast to a stylised Amun icon. Oh wait, was that a Sun disk? To Ra, then. Nefertari, or a graceful priestess of Amun in a translucent wrap dedicated an offering in Ramses' name.
I poked into alcoves in the Temple of Tuthmosis III. I found a fragmentary false door, complete with roller-blind, embedded in a heavily reconstructed wall. Pigeons looked down on me from tiny arched niches that were just pigeon-sized, original purpose unclear but not an original part of the wall they were set in. Early Christian?
I poked through the Roman fortress. Not a lot to see here; just an amusing contrast between the slender Roman columns and the fat Egyptian ones around them.
I found Hapy binding the two lands together. To no surprise, I fond that it was on the side of yet another gigantic Ramses. A moment later I passed through a row of giant columns and found myself in the Hypostyle Hall. Continuing through, steps led down from a side door and I found ledges on the foundations at the edge of the temple. They were in a nice patch of morning shade, making a good place for a loafer to hitch their bum, but I doubt the builders were catering to loafers, so the purpose of the ledges was unclear to me. I found a false door blocking further progress down a passage, but perhaps it was not originally a false door.
Ramses got chummy with a very happy Amun. As always, Amun's member was smudged by centuries of dirty fingers. It seemed more likely the fingers would have worn away the stone, so perhaps people were rubbing it with spices or oil?
I found the Rimbaud grafitti again. This time I tried to put myself in his context to try to figure why he chose this spot. It was a bland reconstructed wall, a Pharaoh doing something ceremonial before an erect Amun, with a vulture flying overhead. Meh.
I found myself looking up a retaining wall to the modern roadway that ran alongside the temple, an indication of how much crap had built up around the temple since it was built.
In a corner, someone had collected headless Roman statues, battered lions, and broken seated statues, mingled in careless disarray. The scrap-heap of history.
I had been seeing large raised platforms here and there holding ruins. Near the sanctuaries, I found a sign explaining that the carved pieces on the platforms came out of excavations of walls and the Avenue of Sphinxes, and the damp-proofed platforms kept them away from damaging groundwater, in the hope that someday they could be raised back into place or at least be properly signed and exhibited.
On the back of seated statues, cartouchs clustered. On the throne of a colossus, Thoth and Seshat measured something. Seshat wore a panther-skin slip and a translucent sheath that clung to her knees and flared around her ankles and looked most elegant.
I finally connected some of those images of Pharoahs wearing what appeared to be the crown of Upper Egypt with actually being Osirid Pharaohs. Soehow I had kept these two concepts entirely separate in my head for weeks! Now some of those Elphantine scenes made more sense.
I found a reconstructed wall strewn with five-pointed stars and cartouchs. There were at least two varieties of cartouch, but I could not make out enough detail. Just below the starry panel, disembodied feet walked along a path strew with hieroglyphs. I instantly dubbed it “The footsteps of night”. In all likelihood the starry section was originally the ceiling of whatever room I was in.
A minute later, I found a great disembodied foot. Wait, what?
By 11:30 I was taking a rest in the shade of a small grove of date palms to one side of the Avenue of Sphinxes. The palms had hand- and foot-holds carved up their trunks, presumably to help in harvesting the dates.
It was a moment of peace. I had worked off my nervous energy and planned a quiet afternoon in my room. I did not expect to get much sleep tonight.
I had a quiet final dinner at “Africa”, then crossed the Nile and subjected myself to the £5 shuttle out to the New Bus Station. With a toot on the horn, we were away right on time.
21:37 An hour on the way, punctuated by horn toots and some fakir droning the Koran nasally from the loud speaker just above my head. Thank Ghu I put the sound-reduction headset in my day pack just in case I wanted some music. With the volume up at 30 they do a pretty good job of drowning out the sermon. Do Egyptians really enjoy that sort of noise pollution?
HurghadaHurghada. I’m sure it will be a great town when they finish building it. Right now? Well, I’m paying £80 per night for a room with an aircon unit but no aircon, a TV but no remote to work it, and a bathroom without water. Hurghada pumps its water from the Nile Valley, and the supply is so undependable that it runs dry for hours almost every day. The gardens of the big resorts look nice and green, but are on the nose: they’re watered with sewage.
My trip hit a speed hump this morning.
I zoomed down overnight from Luxor to the Red Sea resort town of Hurghada, intending to take the fast ferry (hydrofoil catamaran) to Sham El-Sheikh in Sinai, but when I got here, behold, it was “too windy” and the ferry was cancelled. The general concensus of experienced would-be passengers was that there weren’t enough bookings.
Just as I was wrenching myself loose from six nights in Luxor, I suddenly had another night to kill. Actually two nights, as due to the way hotels calculate their rates, I had to pay two nights for the privilege of booking into a hotel at 5 AM this morning and booking out tomorrow morning at 3:30 AM.
Not that I was worried, as all this did is finally use up the days I’d gained by not taking the felucca ride, and put myself back on my original schedule — provided tomorrow’s ferry sailed.
I took this delay calmly because my bowel trouble turned out to be giardia. I bought a wad of pills today, so hopefully I could knock it on the head before I had to confront the daunting task of ascending Mount Sinai for the sunrise. Otherwise, unlike Moses, the only commandment I would be likely to receive at the top was the siren call of the tuneful bottom.
I’d felt like I was bleeding cash yesterday and this morning, but when I added it up — I had plenty of time to get caught up on things like that — it wasn’t so bad. A lot of what I’d spent had been budgetted for tomorrow, or for previous days. I had a hotel budgeted for tonight anyway, for example. Only the second taxi and the expensive drinks were really unanticipated. Still, I went through over £900 ($220) in one continuous run since my last budget reckoning.
Yesterday in Luxor I paid £360 for my 6 nights in Gezira, £32 for the bus ride to Hurghada, and £134 for food, sights and souvenirs. I paid a £5, 1/5 share of a taxi from the bus terminal to the ferry terminal. There I bought my £250 Fast ferry ticket. I paid £20 for drinks: “Nescafé + Mirinda”. I then paid a second taxi fare, £25, presumably to get me to the hotel, and £80 for the hotel. That was before I paid £150 for giardia medication.
I had a late “Salad Niçois & OJ” lunch at the “Style” Restaurant & Coffee Shop, Sigala. Could not find the “Inshallah” Fast Ferry Office, but a travel agent said that Tuesday’s ferry was at 5 AM, not 8 AM. So my need for an early start stood and if the ferry sailed I’d be in Sharm right on my original timetable. If it didn’t sail, I’d have some decisions to make as to how to get to St Katherine’s.
Hurghada was a city seeking a centre. Rather like a run-down part of the Gold Coast in Australia, but with mostly low-rise buildings facing the sea and the sort of half-arsed city archictectural ideas common in Egypt. Such as a massive (dry) fountain sitting in the median strip of Tariq En-Nasr, in a city whose water supply, piped from the Nile, was so unreliable that breakdowns are a daily event. Perhaps they could use seawater to at least get some moisture into the air.
They were replacing the pavements. In one spot I saw some nice-looking ceramic tile paving that they were covering with bog standard modern concrete tiles. Ah, well. At least they had a footpath; elsewhere there was dirt. In the middle of a major road stood a concrete snowman in red pom-pom and scarf, left hand raised as if to hail a cab while he gazed adoringly at the hotdog he held in his right hand.
A frosted-sugar icing mosque stood in an oversized traffic circle. A blue sign nearby the mosque heralded the “Hard Rock Café Hurghada”. The “Shady” Alumetal Office had a ground floor shop, there was a bridal shop on the first floor. Something for him and something for her. Pigeon towers were crammed in here and there. The beaches were white sand, but mostly rather run down and cramped by development that went down to the tide line. “Paradies Beach” parodied a real beach.
It took over an hour to walk to Sigala via the inland route, and just on an hour to walk back from the ferry terminal to Hospital Street via Sheraton Road. I may have dawdled a bit, too. So in theory I could set out on foot at 3 AM to be at the ferry by about 4 AM. The ferry ticket office by the ferry terminal was positive tomorrow’s sailing was 8 AM.
Back at the hotel, they asked for another £80 for a second night, as expected. Tired and hot, I paid up and headed for my room. They tried to divert me to their bar, but I brushed that off (I’d just paid for the privilege). Back in my room, the water was still off. Awkward if I needed to “go”!
That evening I had good internet session, followed by a nice chicken curry kebab for dinner.
When I came back to my room, a man followed me and said “den bounds clean room”. I said “no”. Repeat. I shut the door on him. He knocked. Same script. I came out, locked my room, and said “we go find manager”. I found the manager at the bottom of the stairs, but when we got back up the mysterious “cleaner” had vanished.
An opportunist looking for a buck? A disgruntled cleaner after a tip? Who knows. I knew that whoever “cleaned” my room today had only straightened the bed: the toilet retained its stains, as did the shower and handbasin. When I booked in last night, there was a pubic hair on the toilet seat. There had been and still was no toilet paper except what I brought myself. Service worthy of a tip? No.
04:42 Waiting in “Fantasia” coffee shop. The ferry is at 8.
I practised a random act of kindness and generosity and took the port guard a cup of tea. He was stuck out in the cold — which was not so very cold by my standards, but was cold enough for these hot-climate creatures.
This morning’s minivan cost me only £10 and dropped me in Sigala where I indicated, but I still managed my usual trick of zigging instead of zagging and wound up in a cul-de-sac south of the port, whence I had to retrace my steps and correct the wrong turn. All part of the adventure. I felt no particular urgency about the lost time: I really did believe the ferry people, that the ferry was at 8 AM; my early start was deliberately erring on the side of caution, just in case. No way did I want to be trapped here another day!
The dawn started slamon pink around 5:26, but shaded into fiery copper-bronze by 5:30. In a small shipyard — on the scale of a neighbourhood garage, with a few boats up on blocks — I watched a miniature geyser of warm water come up through the dirt. A leaky hot pipe? It had worn quite a ditch in the ground, so it was not a new leak if so.
By 6:45 the queue for the ferry had becone a mob scene. Since yesterday’s sailing was cancelled, today would have a full complement. Standing at the front of the queue, I was able to watch the riot grow with equanimity.
For breakfast, I had bought a beef bun and a bag of crisps. I ate the bun at once, of course, but I held the crisps back as a treat for the ferry ride. Once on the ferry, I opened the bag — and found a little plastic sachet with a neatly folded 25 piastre note! A whole £0.25. Three more of those would pay for a ferry ride across the Nile at Luxor.
From the shining blue sea, looking back, Hurghada didn't look so bad.
By 10:30 we were entering the harbour at Sharm el-Sheikh. By 11:00 we were docked, and by 11:10 I was in a minivan headed for Dahab, across a weird moonscape dotted with checkpoints and bedouin encampments.
DahabAt 12:16 we reached a last checkpoint, a T-junction closed by painted blue-and-yellow 44-gallon drums. Behind it, a huge sign had Mubarak waving to us in the middle, with “welcome to dahab” at top left and presumably the same message in Arabic at top right, all illustrated below by golden mountains and blue sea, with villages, boats, and sealife.
13:54 Dahab. Checked into Mirage — us$30! That’s over £170 per night, my most expensive bed yet — except of course for Mena House. Still, Dahab is lovely and I’ve decided to give it two nights. If the ferry had run yesterday it would very likely have been three nights. Not bad for a mere pit stop!
Compared to tragic Hurghada ... there is no comparison. This has been done right.
Of course, part of its appeal was just that it was so Western, with only enough of Egypt showing through to give it a slightly exotic flavour. But after three weeks of immersion in ancient and modern Egypt, that was a relief.
The main focus of tourist Dahab was a concrete boardwalk, flanked both sides by eateries and drinkeries. There was the occasional flash of hijab, but most of the walkers, eaters and drinkers were Westerners in short skirts, boob tubes, shorts, togs, and even bikinis.
I paid twice as much for dinner as I ever had in Luxor. I bought a science fiction book (Mike Resnick, A Hunger in the Soul) and sat on the beachfront reading it. The little knotted monkey in the back of my head looked up, looked around, and relaxed.
Odd how the mind works. I went to bed convinced that I was going to stay two nights. But after one good night’s sleep, I woke up divided, and I lay in bed waiting for clarity.
None came: but no decision would be a decision to stay, so to keep my options open, around 7:19 I went into the shower. When the hot water ran out halfway through, I realised that I had made my decision. I would go through to St Katherine today. By 7:45 I was dry, dressed and packed.
Dahab was a lovely illusion, the semblance of a Western beach town encapsulated like a pearl within a surrounding reality that was Egyptian and Bedouin. I saw that reality last night when I briefly walked away from the beach and immediately found myself in a typical Egyptian backstreet.
I am a child of the West, and I take my world with me in my head. When my physical environment most closely resembles that world, I relax. Yesterday I saw Dahab-the-West, and I relaxed. But today I see Dahab-the-East, and I find no rest here. Yesterday the staff here were strangers in a familiar land: today I know that this is their land and that I am the stranger.
I can’t stay here among the Lotus-eaters.
Soon I was waiting at the bus station. When the bus arrived and they knew if and how many seats it had, I could buy my ticket — or work on another plan. Meanwhile I took another walk into the back streets. It wasn’t a long walk, just long enough to confirm what I’d seen last night. A boat in the desert. A park, as artificial and contrived as the whole town. Then the real Dahab — building its mosques and pe-ruined houses like a rind around a rotten fruit with the money from the lotus-eaters on the beaches.
The bus broke down in Sharm this morning.
The bus might be late, but finally I was on my way out at last, in a red minivan. Where there’s money, there’s a way. £200 in this case, plus £20 to the facilitator, plus £20 tip to the driver, plus the £5 to the taxi from the bus, plus £2 baksheesh. I’d been bleeding money again, but it got me where I wanted to go and it got me the hell out of Dahab.
The Sinai is desert, but that does not mean it is deserted. People were everywhere. Rude tents and lean-to’s dotted the sands. Human figures wandered between bluffs, headed from one nowhere to another. Camels stalked across arid depressions. And over it all lowered huge rounded knobs of dry rock.
The awful wailing music cut off. My driver poked at the tape deck, ejected a cassette trailing a tangle of plastic. He started to throw it out the window, but saw me looking. He grinned, and offered it to me. I took it. He picked up another cassette, pushed it into the slot, and the wailing picked up where it had left off. [I rewound the cassette later; if ever I need to relive that journey, I need just pop it in a cassette player. If I can find a cassette player.]
A little square shanty with a blue door and a wicker porch. A 44-gallon drum with a broom handle protruding from the top. A massive cauldron beside another drum, and a tiny chicken-wire fenced garden. Some strategically-placed rocks and odds and ends. Someone’s home sweet home.
Rows of palm trunks lay spaced out in the middle of nowhere, each 10 or 20 metres from the next. Being planted? Being removed?
The land was rising, with more rock and less sand. A collection of buildings over there. A mosque on that rise. We passed a set of stone houses that could have been a millennium old, with clothes drying in a barely-glimped courtyard. Roadside domesticity. Something more substantial up ahead: a small village. A sign pointed to … “St. Katherine”. A turnoff. A winding road between crags.
A carpark. 4WDs and minbuses, one labelled “Uranus Tours”. You leave my arse out of this! Bigger tour buses. And then the music stopped. The minivan stopped. Some sort of structure hid in some trees just over there. A brown wall, a brown dome.
Saint Katherine’s Monastery.
St Catherine’s MonasteryA 11:59 I was sitting in the Café near the Monastery, waiting for the worst rush of tourists to leave. The Monastery was about to close; I shouldn’t have to nurse my coffee much longer. Time was now on my side.
After initially telling me I could stay only one night as they were fully booked tomorrow, the Guesthouse found one vacancy for three nights. Not one of their more desirable rooms, I think, but it looked OK. It had three single beds in it, but I did not have to share it. I would get access after noon.
Three nights in comparitive isolation should be good for my soul. And then direct to Cairo, as those nights were being stolen from the ones earmarked “Suez Canal”. I don’t now know why I’d felt a need to invest two valuable nights on the Canal. I had vague notions of exploring the length of the canal by taxi. But really, why? It's a canal. Unless you’re on a ship going through it, there’s nothing to keep you more than a few hours. Better to take a good look around St katherine, then give Cairo full measure.
Around 12:20, all booked in and ready for adventure, I drifted up towards the Monastery, past age-raddled olive trees that looked old as time. They did not really have trunks any more, just lattices where the bark had split and split and split.
The wall of the Monastery reflected the same process. It was lumpy and bumpy, with cavities and protrusions and bricked-up doors and windows and every possible shape and style of block, from big square stones down near the ground to small red bricks (possiblly also stone) along the top where repairs had been made.
Monks, genuine pilgrims and people who worked there used a small door close to the car park. Tourists were forbidden to use this door; they had to use a tourist entrance packed with sceurity. High on the wall were small boxes that had been the only, aerial, way in during tinmes of trouble.
Since visiting hours were over, I did not stop at the Monastery, but walked around it looking for the Stairs of Repentance, the way up to Mount Sinai’s summit. A big stone sign stood by the trail. “Saint Katherine protectorate, Mt. Sinai, Please stay on the trail.” This was the start of the camel path. low stone walls enclosed camel pens and more stones made huts and shelters. A wire fence kept the camels and other critters out of the Monastery’s gardens.
“You want ride gamel? Forty bounds.” Uh, no. The saddles had two woooden spikes, fore and aft, that looked likely to be painful to whatever part of my anatomy came in contact with them. Riding involved wrapping your knees around the front spike and crossing your ankles across the camel’s neck in front. Novices could grab the spike if the camel’s gait threatened to throw them off. Further up the mountain I got to see a German family — parents, two kids — riding the trail. The kids, boy and girl, rode their camels like horses. Mum rode hers gracefully, ankles crossed, like a frog on a rock, hands clutched in a death grip on the spike. Dad, for some reason, chose to lead his camel and walked wincingly, with his legs spraddled.
The Monastery rode the shallower slope near the canyon floor like a giant toboggan. At the upslope end, the dome of the mosque peered over the wall like a helmet. The corners and waist were buttressed by massive sloping piles of stone. The downslope corners had round towers. As I climbed, it gradually shrank in the distance and the horizon appeared beyond. The village encrusted the open end of the canyon. Another settlement was visible in the distance.
The peak that towered over me was not Sinai, it was Jebel El-Muneijah, with Saint Theodore’s church on top. The top of Sinai was no visible from here.
The heat reflected back from the rocks in a torrent. My water supply was shrinking visibly. The trail wound on up. A hut appeared above me, just as the Monastery was disappearing around the shoulder of the mountain.
The hut, when I got there about 13:30, was a refreshment stand, a stone-brick shelter with a covered porch, and a shop-counter at the back of the porch. Bottles of water and fruit juice, and cans of fizzy drink, stood in tidy ranks, surrounded by packets of biscuits and chocolate bars. Cartons of chocolate powder and stacked plastic cups suggested at the possibility of hot beverages, and packets of AA batteries awaited hungry devices. The selection was curiously limited, obviously honed through years of practice to exactly those things that had proven most likely to sell to thirsty, tired night-time climbers. A Mars Bar and 1.5L bottle of water cost me £20 (an identical bottle of Baraka brand water cost £2 down at the Moanstery, and a Mars Bar half as much as here).
I stopped here. Although it had taken me over an hour to get up here, the rest stop was actually only about 1.5 km from the Monastery Guesthouse. I started back down around 13:36, and by 14:04 I was back at the Guesthouse.
After a shower and a rest, I set out to walk to town. The toilet near the car park was a gloriously weird structure with columns, windows, and with plant pots above the columns. Further down, past the gatehouse, was Nabi Haroun, the tomb of Aaron. A white building was a Christian chapel. Nearby was a ruinous round tower, the shrine itself.
Looking out from the canyon mouth, it occurred to me that if the israelites really did camp around here, most of them would have been out there: there was no room in the valley, but plenty out on the plain.
Megalo Manna Garden was a set of low rock walls with a couple of trees. One tree appeared to be an olive, the other could have been a tamarisk. This fits with theories I’ve read since that “manna” was honeydew from insects sucking on tamarisk trees and other plants, but at the time I just went “huh” and moved on.
And then … a sign for the Golden Calf?
I looked around. Eventually I spotted it: a rock formation that looked vaguely like a calf flirting its tail. Inevitably, vermin had tagged it.
I imagined myself as Moses, standing atop the hill of Nabi Haroun with stone tablets in hand, watching my people worship a golden idol. Funnily enough, it worked. I could lay out such a scene in this place.
I passed Nabi haroun Cemetery; it resembled nothing so much a bare field with unshaped rocks standing upright here and there and a couple of rude stone walls.
Soon I was approaching the town. It was well spread out, with a dramatic gateway in the middle. The architecture sat poorly in the landscape. However, a cluster of signs shouted “WELCOME” in several scripts and multiple languages. Someone had built a building to house a commercial venture, slanted at religious travellers. Signs in Greek and Russian. An ancient water truck rusted in an otherwise vacant patch of ground. More of that red archictecture as seen in the toilet near the parking lot — and this one was also a toilet.
A mosque marked the town square. The shops faced it across the road, and the buses stopped there. The taxi depot was on the main road just out on the Monastery side. The footpath here was textured concrete paving. It took me a while to realise that it was made using a pattern. I only twigged when I came to a patch where someone walked across it while it was drying, leaving revealing footprints.
Abo Shousha Supermarket. Panorama Restaurant (Pizza, Burger). It had taken just under an hour to dawdle my way to town. I stopped in and bought some biscuits, drinks, and — an unfortunate necessity, as I'd found in my room earlier — mosquito spray. Then I started back to the Monastery.
At dinner, initially, most of the other guests were a single large Russian group. I formed a majestic second group of one. A few minutes later, three more people, English by the sound, and more Russians, arrived. The Russians each brought a small bottle of water with them. I looked at my glass of water. Was I missing a trick?
Looking out my window next morning, I saw a wire mesh goat pen, which explaining certain sounds I'd heard in the night.
There were quite a few faces at breakfast who I didn’t see last night, though some were Russian and I may have just missed picking them out of the crowd. The Café area was flooded with backpackers who’d obviously just come doen from the mountain. There didn’t seem to be any particular check on who was a guest and who not. The possibility was that some of the strangers were stray climbers who’d camped on the mountain.
By 9:04 I was looking at the mosh pit that was the queue to enter the Monastery. I reckoned I might wait a bit for the crush to ease. I climbed the slope opposite the Monastery to get some views over its walls. From here I had a good view of the camel path, too, well dotted with walkers headed both directions.
The crowd had surged into the Monastery, and I strolled through in their wake. My first stop was the Burning Bush. It was originally located where the apse of the church now stood; the new bush had been placed more conveniently for pilgrims, when the church was built. The hanging fronds showed a peculiar trimmed evenness, because pilgrims would snap off pieces to take back with them as souvenirs. I didn’t take a piece.
I walked through the Monastery, poking into the places open to tourists, but little of what I saw has stuck in my memory, and photography was forbidden in many places so my alernate memory doesn’t help. It seemed that every indoor soace, every patch of shade, was permanently occupied by other gawkers. The bell tower had several oddly small bells on its top floor; but of course, in this isolated place, even small bells could be heard a long distance. The bell tower was not particularly old, built about 1871. I didn't notice whether the mosque had loudspeakers; I don’t recall hearing it at all. Perhaps here the Muezzin still used his natural voice. I bought some icons and relics, and a book about the Monastery.
After the Monastery closed at noon, I took a walk around the external walls. Along the upslope wall I found a number of small reliefs.
I walked into town again and bought some oranges, more water, and a tangerine drink in preparation for the climb. I didn’t plan on carrying much up the mountain with me, though; I now knew I could get water and concentrated energy food along the way (for a price), if I needed them.
I watched the sunset. There was always a chance my heart could give out on the climb, or that I could fall. This could be my last sunset, so I made sure it was a good one. I shared it with a black and white cat, but puss preferred a substantial buffer zone. When I approached her too closely, she vanished into the rocks.
At 00:42 I was standing at the start of the camel path. I wasn’t averse to riding a camel up the path, but I was determined not to pay over the odds. The camel driver I came across here started at £60, dropped to £50, and there we stuck as I was determined not to pay more than £40 for riding this early. So I walked.
I reached the first refreshment stall at 0:55. Closed. It took me 45 minutes to reach my 50 minute check point from Day 1, but that was definitely the easy bit. After that things got steeper. At 02:07, I reached the welcoming lights of the 1.5 km rest stop where I had turned back yesterday. The Moon was out from behind the mountains by now, so the darkest part of the climb was over.
Around the halfway mark, my camel asking price dropped to £20, but I still walked, as the camel drivers still had the fantasy that £50, £40 or £30 were reasonable fees. It seemed they’d rather walk empty camels down to the Monastery than carry someone up cheaply. But eventually I ran into a young guy, Zachariah, who accepted my £20 price. So I rode from a couple of hundred metres up from the halfway mark until shortly before the path hit the stairs, where everyone had to get off and walk.
Riding was less strenuous than walking, but as I’d suspected, the wooden prongs of the saddle threatened to make a eunuch of me.
Once the ride ended, the climb hit the hard part, 750 stone steps up to the summit. Somewhere along here, a group of Egyptians adopted me for some reason, despite my unsubtle hints that they’d make better time on their own. They admired my then-considered-tiny but very bright LED torch. Only one spoke English, Ahmed. But they were young and fit, and I was determined to walk up at my own pace.
At 4:08, I stopped for shai and a Mars Bar. Warmth and quick energy. I also bought a souvenir woollen scarf. It looked like a football scarf, and may well have been made for the local football team, but it felt good once I wrapped it round my neck and tucked it into my jacket collar. As a random act of kindness, I bought four shivering Policemen a cup of shai each.
About 4:30, I reached the top. My Egyptian friends welcomed me warmly. The top was a wasteland of stone: stone rocks, stone buildings. There was a mosque, a church, and odd corners. But wherever a corner could be found that was protected from the bitterly cold wind, climbers lay sprawled, in blankets and sleeping bags.
I was just in time. As I looked out, I could see the faintest brightening in the eastern sky. twenty minutes later, details were visible in the valleys below. At 5:08 I caught the Moon setting. At 5:10 I saw the top of the Sun appear above the murk. By 5:20, I could see the pyramid-shaped shadow of Jebel Musa on the opposite hill. Everything looked crisp and lovely in the young sunshine.
The Christian chapel on the peak remained closed, but by now the small mosque was doing a roaring trade.
Around 5:30, as I started my descent, the souvenir stalls started opening. Trade was brisk, but I already had my souvenir, and my memories.
Below me I could see a square compound in Elijah’s Basin (12), marked by ancient trees. One of those trees was a thousand-year-old cyress. The Basin marked the top of the Stairs of Repentance. Around me, most people went down the stairs, but some scrambled over the rocks. Get down any way you can, seemed to be the rule. But the traffic went both ways; some people were still climbing.
At the base of the stairs, refreshment stalls welcomed those who had started down hungry and thirsty. At the top of the camel path at 5:52, camels crouched in strategically eye-catching spots waiting for the weary. A stone sign nearby announced the presence of an “emergency clinic”, really just a glorified first aid cache.
By 5:59 I was in Elijah’s Basin. There were toilets here. Three minutes later I was at Elijah’s Gate (13), an archway 100 metres down the Stairs of Repentance. At 6:10 I reached another arch, the Shrive Gate (The Gate of Forgiveness, 14).
Past this gate the Stairs, more a path than a staircase in many places, descended steeply to the Chapel of Our Lady of the Steward (Oikonomissa, 15), a ragged whitewashed structure with various legends attached. Five mnutes on, I caught my first glimpse of the Monastery below.
Climbers left small cairns here and there. Vermin had tried to carve their initials in the rock, but it was so hard it usually defeated them. No wonder god used a fiery finger to melt his message on the tablets (at least, if the movies can be relied on).
I saw Magafa, a small Byzantine monastery on the opposite wall of the valley. Many anchorite refuges had been cleared out during the Ottoman period, but several monasteries survived. Magafa looked accessible only by mountain goat.
At 6:41, the sun finally reached the upper wall of the Monastery. By now I could see the entire route down from where I was to where it met the camel path. Ten minutes later, I stepped off the Stairs of Repentance. At 6:54, I saw the sign that marked the start of the camel path.
by 6:59, I was canoodling with the cats hanging out by the coffee shop, and at 7:02 I was full length on my bed.
08:18 Breakfast, somehow. My legs are made of rubber and I desperately want to lie down — but I expended an enormous effort last night and only hunger drove me from my just-won bed. I loaded my plate and inhaled half of it before consciousness returned and I slowed down.
I spent most of the day in bed, snoozing at first, then doing chores. I showered and now faced the unpleasantly physical task of doing the laundry while I could use the day’s heat to quick-dry it. I also needed to start packing. My kit was scattered across the room and needed to be sorted.
Travelling light was proving both a pain — I ran out of clean clothes too easily — and a pleasure — even with accumulated stuff the load was easily managed. The bag/day-pack combo was working, but the day pack was too fat. Carrying my precious items with me was good but could be accomplished just as well in something slimmer.
By 05:41 I was sitting in a minivan taxi for “ten minutes” before we started for to Cairo. This was not the bus. The taxis had a nice little thing going on, where they hung around the bus shelter or cruised the Village looking for fares to Cairo. The guy initially asked for us$100, immediately dropped to us$50, then settled on us$25 as long as I was willing to accept any additional passengers he could drum up. It was not looking promising for him.
He promised me the taxi would be faster than the bus, and this promise was delivered at 7:14 when we passed a bus broken down beside the road.
At 07:26, I was gazing upon the Red Sea. The driver looked unhappy that he hadn’t got enough additional fares to make expenses. He said, “help me out, my friend”. We made a new deal: instead of Cairo us$25, it was Cairo & Suez, us$40. Since we go through Suez anyway, I wondered what I’d get for the extra us$15?
I found out in Suez. They gave the van an oil change! What I got for my extra us$15 was a ride out to Port Tawfiq and an hour to myself on the Corniche while they washed the van. Efficient use of their time, perhaps, but I felt somewhat dudded, especially over the oil change, during which I was parked in an adjacent café with a shai. At least the tea was gratis — I hoped.
At least I got my Suez Canal experience. I even got some photos, after I first chatted up the MPs in the pickup parked behind me.
The taxi ride from St Katherine, looking back, was a con job. After renegotiating the fare based on a sympathy plea, the driver later revealed that he had a big commission from Cairo for that evening. So he had to go to Cairo anyway! Every cent he got from me was pure profit. When he pleaded for me to “help him out,” he was playing on my generosity in order to increase his profit at my expense, not to cut his losses with my help.
He dropped me unceremoniously at a bus stop near Heliopolis. Dropping me on the far edge of Heliopolis when my destination was Midan Ramses was simply mean spirited. The fact that I had to pay separately for a minivan to get me to Midan Ramses (never mind the miniscule £1 amount, it shows that this was a separate journey) proves that I was not delivered to or near my destination, normally an expectation from a taxi ride.
My only consolation was that my picnic lunch snatched at Port Tawfiq certainly robbed him of a fat commission from whatever restaurant he had intended to take me to for lunch. The cost of the proposed lunch (“very good price for you”) was definitely not covered by the fare. In fact, given his crestfallen expression when I elected to skip the lunch, being dropped short of my goal may even have been spite over that lost commission. He probably planned to feed himself and the family (relatives, I suspect) he picked up in Suez on the profit from my meal.
May his sins catch up with him, and may all his many children be daughters.
I so curse this man. I so curse this man. I so curse this man.
Cairo DazeI reached Midan Ramses at 13:56. I stopped to gaze at the giant statue of Ramses II (no longer there, now in Giza). I walked down Al-Gomhuriyya. A right turn, and I checked into the Hotel Windsor, my planned home for the next six days. Through the hotel, I quickly made arrangements for tomorrow: £150 secured me a booking for a taxi to take me around Saqqara, Dahshur, the Bent Pyramid, and Memphis, and to wait for me at each.
The rest of the day is a blur. Sharia Alfy. At am Amex storefront I cashed in us$300 in Travellers Cheques for £1712. Talaat Harb. A glimpse of the Egyptian Museum from Qasr El Nil. Some bloke in a uniform on a pedestal. And then the Nile, three and a half years afer I last stood here. Lions still guarded the bridge.
By 17:09 I was sitting on the same bench beside the Nile as in 2002, as nearly as I could remember it. Actually it could have been the next bench, the second along from the bridge, but that was occupied by a couple of felucca touts, and I wasn’t going near them. But I was pretty done in, back in 2002: chances were I collapsed on the first bench I came to, so it could have been this bench.
But what a difference! That was the end of that trip; this one still had a week to go, with numerous big ticket items on the to do list. I had been weary then, and I was weary now, but this time it was mere physical fatigue, plus a slight jaundice from the duplicity of the Sinai taxi driver.
“Well, I’m back,” I told the river. The river ignored me. That’s how it rolls.
Dinner that evening was KFC, Egyptian style. Music pumped as high as it would go, total chaos at the counter, and “do you want a Pepsi with that?” Well, yes, I think the zinger meal comes with chips and Pepsi. Add large rice and small veg. I’m not sure why I made my first meal back in Cairo a Western one. I was tempted by a couple of clean kebab joints, but the queues were long and I wanted a sit-down meal. The only “restaurants” I could find with legible menus were the Western style fast food places.
Saqqara, Memphis, and the Egyptian MuseumBy 7:39 I was in my pre-booked taxi, headed out. We crossed the Nile and I caught a glimpse of the Pyramids over the rooftops. By 8:17 we were parked at the first stop of the day: the Pyramid of Djoser. Minutes later, the first optimistic Galabiyya Man was trying to tempt me with his tat. I didn’t even break stride. “No thanks,” I said, as I stepped around him and walked on to the entrance.
The Hypostyle Hall in the south-east corner of the site was a disappointment after the monoliths at Luxor and Karnak, but the segmented, bundled-reed pillars did show the evolution of Egyptian architecture.
Then I was inside the compound, gazing at the Step Pyramid of Djoser. Six terraces, the grandest mastaba ever, when it was built. Shivers down my spine. This building had been standng here for over 4600 years. Alas, the chambers within had just been closed for renovation and would not reopen until 2020, so I was restricted to the courtyard, but just being here was awesome.
I spotted some steps up and trotted across to the south-west corner to climb them and get an overall view of the site. It was a tall platform, the inward eaves lined with stone cobra heads.
Outside to the south-west, drawing my eye as my head came above the top of the wall, was the Pyramid of Unas. This externally-ruined tomb apparently has excellent internal decorations. But I didn’t know that at the time, so I just turned and focused on Djoser’s compound. The step pyramid dominated the scene, of course, but I noted the location of the Heb-sed court and saw what looked like a way in, half-way up the western wall. So I went there.
The way was marked on the map as a “temple”, but I found that on its south side I could just walk through and into the Heb-sed court. Fake temples overlooked the court, round which Pharaoh had to puff every so often to prove he was still fit to be Pharaoh. The temple façades had round roofs, a bit like aircraft hangers, and false doors. Here and there stood worn statues of Djoser, faces bereft of all individuality. In a couple of places, I found carefully-protected Hieratic inscriptions.
Walking around the pyramid counter-clockwise, I came across a cubical building, sitting cock-eyed in the ground. It had a glass window in one side and a couple of holes on the high side. Looking in through one of these I found myself face to face with Djoser himself! This must be the serdab, containing the ka statue of the pharaoh. It had been damaged — nose broken and one eye damaged — but it was likely anyone who knew him would still recognise him. The image was lit from the side by the light from the glass window.
Standing back, I noticed that the wall around the holes was worn and discoloured. Generations of tourists had breathed on this wall, and steadied themselves against it, while peering inside.
I continued round the pyramid, noting that there were pyramids visible in all directions. In the Mortuary Temple, I found a set of stairs leading down, but access was closed off for the renovations. Down there could be the oldest surviving stone room on earth (about 4650 years, pipping the Great Pyramid by less than half a century). The keys were supposedly available from the Directorate, but I couldn’t find that, and even if I had, the response woud probably have been “And who the hell are you to be asking?”.
At the South-west corner of the pyramid, I finally picked a likely spot, walked up, and laid my hand on a stone in the pyramid’s flank. I might not be able to enter the building, but at least I had touched it.
Back in the South Court, I found a second way inside, also blocked off. After going back to the cobra platform and peering down into the South Tomb, I headed back to the Hypostyle Hall to exit. I wandered the larger site to get some wider views, then went back to the taxi.
We whizzed down back roads through more green nilotic landscapes that could have been ripped whole from pharaonic times. I noticed a guy sitting atop a big drain, fishing from the irrigation canal that the drain emptied into.
At a fork, I saw a sign with a list of South Saqqara sights. Of them, I was only chasing Sneferu’s Pyramid (the “Red” Pyramid) and the Bent Pyramid.
At 1.7 million cubic metres, the Red Pyramid is third in bulk only to Khufu’s and Khafre’s monsters at Giza. It is about ⅔ the bulk of the Great Pyramid and ¾ that of Khafre’s. Standing apart from its neighbours, it has an odd grace.
I was approaching from the north. There were people clustered around the entrance, far above me. I climbed up, but for some reason I cannot remember now, I did not go in. The views were splendid, however; I could see Djoser's Pyramid in the distance, with Cairo looming on the horizon. Over there was the Bent Pyramid, my next target. I also identified the collapsed “Black” Pyramid of Amenemhat III. On another day I would have been tempted to walk over to it, but today the weather was too threatening.
Back at the base, puffed and sweaty, I set off on a counter-clockwise walk around the base. On the east side I found what appeared to be a pyramidion, plus a fragment of remaining casing. The pyramidion was obviously reconstructed from an incomplete set of large fragments, but it was not clear if it was from this pyramid or was even a pyramidion at all. It was surrounded by the ruins of what appeared to be some sort of shrine. Otherwise the Red Pyramid had nothing like the complex surrounding structures found at Djoser's Pyramid.
The nearby casing blocks were worn and scratched, but still shone white in comparison to the red blocks of the main bulk of the Red Pyramid.
My next stop was the Bent Pyramid. It looked close, but it was about 2 km away. I got my taxi to run me over to it. It’s by Sneferu, the same guy who commissioned the Red Pyramid. The Bent Pyramid is the fourth bulkiest surviving pyramid, 1.2 million cubic metres. No other pyramids appear to exceed a million cubic metres. Sneferu’s third effort, the crumbled Meidum Pyramid,is about half this size.
It wasn't open to tourists, so as before, I walked around the pyramid counter-clockwise. On the far side I found a smaller pyramid that at Giza would be tagged a Queen’s tomb. It had a very clear path up one side and would have provied a splendid view from the top, but I veered off.
The Bent Pyramid still has its white casing, although there are a lot of missing block around the base, creating an overhang that made it hard to conjure the ghost.
There was shrine at the base on the east side, but it was not really intelligible.
My last stop for the day was ancient Memphis. Here I made my first stop the Museum, to pay my respects to Ramses II again. The Museum held the twin to the colossus at Midan Ramses, and I had been hankering for a close-up.
It was probably a good, if idealised, likeness of the young Ramses — it certainly displayed the great beaked nose and slightly unshot jawline that were still discernable on his mummy. The statues at Luxor had seemed overly handsome, with smaller, straighter noses and stronger jawlines.
The courtyard held a bunch of other statues and steles, often in poor shape. I found a stele with the cartouche Ra-h-a-a-ib, possibly Wahibra, “the heart of Ra is enduring”, aka Psamtek I. There was also a sphinx of Ramses II, with handsome face and small straight nose.
There was a column base with the cartouche 𓃒𓈖𓁞𓁩𓌹 - ka-ams-ra-amun-mr. Part of it was incorprated in “Ramses”. 𓃽𓈖𓁛𓁩𓌸 𓃽𓈖𓁛𓁩?
I browsed the souvenir stalls and found a small Tawfreet figurine for a souvenir.
From Memphis we returned to Cairo. Returning past the Citadel, I was tempted to ask to be dropped off, but although the threat of rain had passed, it was now hot and humid and I was tired.
I found an air-conditioned McDonald’s for lunch, bought some needful things, then went up up to my hotel room to hide from the heat. In the evening I ventured out and bought fish’n’chips for dinner
By 08:40 I was in the queue at the Egyptian Museum ticket window. The current camera rule was, no camera could be taken in. All cameras must be checked (for free) at a separate window. Dammit!
Highlights —
Ground Floor —
First Floor —
By 13:20 I was all finished with the Mueum and I made my way to L’Americaine Café for coffee & juice. I also bought some flat buns for lunch. After several days of extravagant lunches, my budget was back on the wagon!
Modern and medieval CairoI don’t know how I spent my afternoon — probably hiding in my room — but at 19:22 I was at the “Peking” Restaurant near the hotel. The hotel restaurant never seemed to be open; perhaps they served their meals in the bar.
Interesting dissonance: quiet Chinese music where I was, drumming rave music on the other side of the wall.
They brought me the weakest screwdriver I’d ever tasted. I couldn’t detect any alcohol in it. The screwdriver was sent away and came back indetectably different. Perhaps they spat in it. But at least the food was good.
They were efficient at clearing the table as dishes were finished, not so good at asking the customer left with an empty table if there was anything else. Coffee was a choice between Turkish and Nescafé. To be a devil, perhaps I should’ve asked for green tea instead of the alcohol!
After midnight I went to the “Palmyra” to get a bit of the belly-dancing scene. Arrived around 13:30. £35 minimum, which included the first drink. I made it a Stella, figuring that since I wasn’t not fond of that beer, I would be motivated to make it last.
It lasted about 40 minutes, during which I got about 30 seconds of an unexcited woman in green lycra shaking her thing, then (after some stuffing around) 20 minutes of some guy singing in Arabic at ear-splitting volume (memories of the Hurghada hell-ride) to a live band, followed by about 15 minutes of assorted stuffing around, fragmentary singing and music and playing with the lights, during which a chubby woman in a long body-hugging dress joined the singer on stage but didn’t really add much.
Some bar girls added interest, one with hips like Godzilla and another, much cuter one with a bubbly personality and lovely grin but an inadequate bustline that nevertheless read “heavily padded”. They had lots of fun with a dissipated-looking guy in a galabiyya and red checked headshawl, obviously a regular big-spender. The place was mostly empty, one or two people to a table and quite a few empty tables.
At this point my Stella ran dry and I was faced with a choice: buy another drink, sit tight until forced to buy another, or leave. I cut my losses and left. Perhaps I missed something good starting just 30 seconds later, but if the average for the night held up to what I’d already seen, I had enjoyed about as much of it as I could take!
In the morning I got out an hour later than planned, in part due to running into JP at breakfast — he had a good day, runnng into some fellow (Egyptian) thespians. Despite the delay, I was on my way by 8:15 and when I walked down the Muski 20 minutes later, Khan-il-Khalili was still mostly closed. Some guys were setting up street displays on trays supported by empty 44-gallon drums, others were sweeping, but that was about it. So I pulled into ever-open Fishawi’s Coffeehouse for refreshment and to kill some time. A pot of tea and a bottle of frosty water hit the spot, although I humiliated myself later by tipping over my table when I got up to leave.
I walked on down toward Bab Zuweila, whose minarets added a certain elegance to what was originally a prosaic city gate. Once through, I found myself in the Qasaba, which by now was open for business. Produce baked in the sun. Fish lay in trays, attended by attentive but oddly nervous cats. In the distance, the towers of the Citadel were starting to vanish in haze — the air quality was not good. This boded poorly for my hopes of a view from the battlements.
I passed the Mosque of Sultan Hassan and the Rifai Mosque. The mosques were in disrepair, with many broken windows and crumbling bricks. Imposing though they were, the battered and dscoloured surfaces showed their ages, and the damage from car exhausts and industrial smoke.
At Bab al-Azab, the gate was closed. A plausible “student” named Omar caught me here and told me the Citadel was closed due to a visit from the Swedish King, as he tried to steer me elsewhere. Ignoring him, I continued into the Northern Enclosure, headed for Bab al-Gabal, the modern entrance. The Citadel turned out to be open. Perhaps the Swedish king cut short his visit?
Inside, the citadel was green and well maintained. School groups of all ages abounded. I was amused by some rather twee lions atop one building. I climbed up to the terrace above the Police Museum, and found that the haze did indeed severely interfere by the middle distance, just a few distant buildings rising in silhouette, but the view was still good. I decided to stop for lunch there.
After lunch I moved on to Al-Gawhara Palace. No photographs allowed inside, and my memories are inconsistent.
The cold I caught from the sneezing taxi driver in Dahab had taken hold. I had bought some tablets from a pharmacy in Khan il-Khalili that got me through the day. In fact I hoped to abort the cold, which took a week to go from a slight sore throat (which could have been from Cairo’s air pollution) to full-on cold, but it was now showing signs of running its full course. I gave up and headed for home.
Dinner that night was spaghetti bolognese and orange juice at the hotel, followed by an early night.
I headed to the Mari Girgis Metro station in Coptic Cairo, so named because it's beside the old Greek Orthodox Monastery and Church of St George, which had been built into a tower of the former Roman fortress of Babylon-in-Egypt. Other ancient archictecture nearby showed the characteristic banding of Roman and Byzantine architecture. The fortress’ Water Gate had become known as the Hanging Church.
I found the "French" Cemetery, dominated by a striking chapel (in fact just an exceptionally ornate family crypt) that resembled a mini-cathedral. By contrast, some of the crypts could have served as small churches. Stone mourners abounded, just as I’d seen in Paris cemeteries.
At one point I found myself gazing down into an enclosure that went down to the 1st C ground level.
I moved on into the Greek Orthodx Cemetery. Here too there were stone mourners, although these tended to look sleepy rather than anguished. There were areas filled with graves of less wealthy people, contrasted by a whole terrace row of post-mortem dwellings for the more welthy. One family slept in a Roman temple.
The Coptic Museum didn’t allow photographs.
At Om Kolthoum Museum there was a parcel of sights, but I was after the Nilometer. I did stop to admire the SS Nile Peking, and ornate old paddle steamer that would be a nice way to cruise the Nile. It was now a floating restaurant, I believe.
The Nilometer was a circular tower with a steep roof. Inside, a stone column held up the roof from out of a deep pit.
Manial Palace was closed. Bother!
11:37 And so it ends again, washed up and hung-out on a bench on the banks of the Nile. Not the same bench as in 2002, but my mental state is the same, and as then I am coddling a runny nose. Is it really a cold or just a reaction to the corrosive chemical brew that Cairo calls air?
It’s not quite over as yet, of course. There’s a free day in Cairo tomorrow, and there’s a day in Alexandra after that, then Dubai. But this is the end of the extended itinerary laid down in 2000 and 2002. This is the emotional end of the trip. The tracks have run out; there’s a little sign saying “future under construction: proceed with care”.
09:30 A humid, stagnant morning. A pall of pollution smothers the city: its exhalations claw at the nose. To walk from here to Ramses is a sweaty 20-minute effort, even though I cling to every shadow like it is my own — the same way my shirt clings to me after the first fifty metres. Everyone is lethargic and grumpy. Only a couple of cabbies can muster enough energy to croak “taxi, very cheap” at the station. None pursues me more than a metre or two.
First Class (£34) on tomorrow’s 8:00 Turbini was “complete” but I secured a £25 Second Class seat. For a 2-hour jaunt it makes little difference to me as it’s the train (905) that I was after. Car 3, seat 18. I might even, if I pay my hotel bill tonight to speed up checkout tomorrow, have time for breakfast. If it’s humid again, I could splash out on a taxi (£5).
I went looking for the ferry to Ragab’s Village, but either I passed it or it was a lot further than the Rough Guide claimed. I finally gave up at Ondine el-Maadi Restaurant, an overpriced eatery somewhere a long way south on the Corniche. There was some sort of carnival stuff on an island a little south of where I stopped.
There was also some sort of grandiose neo-Pharaonic building just north of there, on the edge of a military area. It bristled with guard posts so I didn’t risk taking a photo. Pity, as it was photogenic as hell.
Back at the hotel, I huddled beneath the blast of my air-con, blessing the inspiration that led me to check its settings last night. For four days it roared and rumbled ineffectively at cooling the room, but as those days were relatively mild and dry, it wasn’t an issue. I got enough of a breeze to cool me down. This last night had been hot and muggy, and after sweating a bit I climbed up and used a pliers to twist a likely-looking lever (the control knobs had been removed, presumably to thwart just such unauthorised self-help). I was rewarded by a blue light and a blast of arctic air. The thing had been set on “Fan”!
I felt no remorse. I was paying for air-con, not a fan, and I was tired of Egypt’s fraudulent make-a-deal-and-change-or-short-change-it. I wished I’d made the adjustment days ago. (I restored the setting just before I checked out the next morning.)
What can I say about Cairo that hasn’t been said? Filthy, crowded, hectic, hussling, hassling, and a lot of fun. I spent six nights this time, but the time was for unwinding and relaxing, not frantic sightseeing. I saw something every morning and kicked back in my room every afternoon, then went out in the cooler evening to seek dinner. It was enough.
The PharosBy 07:39 I was sitting on the Alexandria train, people-watching. Egyptians show a wide range of boody shapes, often apparently determined by age, with gaminesque children skipping alongside massive, bulbous parents.
At Alexandria, the Union Hotel only had a room without bath, which wasn’t the way I wanted to spend my last night in Egypt. So I walked down two blocks and checked into the Cecil. us$140 (presumably plus the usual extra charges) with breakfast, no view. Can’t have it all, but it was enough and it went on the Visa card. Relatively quiet aircon!
I hit Kadmar’s doorstep dead on 10:30 and went up. Ahmed was there, with the cash refund from the abortive flight — and a feedback form. Filled out the form, and tipped him £5 for giving up his Friday.
Added up my remaining Egyptian resources. £352.50 in my wallet earmarked for spending, £18 small notes earmarked as gifts to friends (can spend some as change), £38.50 clean notes earmarked as personal souvenirs. I was more flush with cash than planned, because the hotel was on the credit card.
By 13:00 I was at Pharos, sitting in the shade with my back to a pillar a little seaward of where the Temple of Isis once stood, looking across to Fort Qaitbey. Once the Lighthouse would have towered over there, filling half my view. Although the Fort’s outer walls filed much of the Lighthouse’s footprint, the square inner Fort they enclosed was such a squat little thing by comparison.
When I was here in 2002, it was being repaired and much of it was closed off except through the liberal application of baksheesh. It was all open now, except for the roof of the keep, and I had a good wander round, looking out the windows and admiring the architecture.
It was not hot, but I had been sweating profusely in the sun. Still, I thought I might try walking west to look for the ancient Temple of Poseidon and prehistoric harbour that probably weren’t visible at the far end of the island. A modern tourist palace seemed to tower over the site. Or I might explore the Pharos Scenic Path, including such stellar sights as the Misr Petroleum station, National Authority for Sewerage, and the Pharos Club Alexandria University.
Or I might not do any of these things.
In fact I went to look for the Temple of Poseidon, but ended up in the excavations of the Tombs of Amfouchy/Anfushi. Alas, no photographs, apparently for reasons of … copyright? Well, whatever, these five tombs had been here since Ptolomaic times and had been buried by later constructions, providing confusing layers of of chronology.
My last stop for the day was the statue of Saad Zagloul in the square by the Cecil. This had been the site of the Caesareum built by Cleopatra. Today, a bronze statue sat at the statue base, holding up an ankh, symbol of life.
Bus 555 brought me in from the airport in March, and took me back out now. By 11:50 I was waiting to board my flight to Dubai. I killed some time chatting to a Brit based in Shanghai, who wanted a drink but only had us$. I swapped him £5 even for his dollar, told him I was robbing him blind on the rate. He didn’t care — he was travelling on business and the odd 75 piastres (us 13¢) meant nothing to him.
My baggage weighed about 12.5 kg all up including the clothes I stood in. I started with 11 kg, but I’d discarded at least 1kg of guide books, pages and other stuff. So my assorted souvenirs and other accumulated detritus totalled about 2.5kg. Hard to credit. The Koran translation, the Egyptian T-shirt, 14 CDs, the Tawfreet statuette and assorted pamphlets, over 2 kg?
A day in DubaiI started my time in Dubai by booking into the Al karnak Hotel in Naif Road, Dubai. I had hoped to stay at the Delhi Darber, but that was full. And that was it for my day. The bloody Dahab taxi driver’s cold was still dogging me, so instead of using my two hours jet lag advantage to explore Dubai by night, I lay in bed watching TV and feeling miserable.
Next morning at 8:48 I burst out into Naif Road, determined to make up time. I had not adequately allowed for the size of Dubai, nor its supine surrender to car culture. I went looking for the Creek, but turned the wrong way. I passed the Fish Markets, which could have provided a shady interlude, with barely a glance. At 9:49 I found a body of water and marvelled at the width of the Creek, but of course it was actually the Gulf. So I had to turn around and cross back. Now that I knew where I was, it took me just 20 minutes more to find the Creek.
I soon found a boat willing to take me across to the Old Souk, and د.إ1 made the trip happen. The view from the Creek was very picturesque, and much cooler than the shore.
The Old Souk was a large shady passage but didn’t delay me long; I walked through and out the other side, turning downstream. I pased Shindagha tower, a watchtower, and admired Sheikh Saied Al Maktoum House, with its Persian-style badgirs (wind towers). Next stop was the Heritage Village.
After a quick look through, I was tempted to stop for a drink, but the cafe had no shade. I’d sweat it out as fast as I could drink it. Looking over the edge of the terrace, I was tempted by the thought of an excursion in the SeaScope S2 moored nearby, but decided it would be an expensive meh. Instead I made my way to a pedestrian underpass beneath the Creek back to Deira.
It was now so hot that I found excuses to stick to the shaded alleys of the Souks until I was close enough to make the last sunlit dash to the Al Karnak, where I holed up for a four-hour siesta. When I woke, I realised that my room had a balcony, and that the door out onto it was not locked, or even latched. It had been that way since I arrived last night. Yikes!
I decided to finish the day by getting out to see the big “seven star” hotel, but got daunted by the rings or security around it and opted for a public beach in nearby Umm Suqiem, in the shade of a lifeguard building, looking across to Burj Al Arab as the sun descended towards the last sunset of the trip. A Terminal Beach, in a manner of speaking. In less than 9 hours, I was due to start a 17-hour marathon (two 8-hour flights with an hour in Singapore to make a connection) that would deposit me back in Melbourne just after midnight on Tuesday morning. Tomorrow’s sunset would be seen, if at all, from the plane, somewhere over Australia, and so didn’t count.
The taxi to get out there had cost me د.إ40, and the taxi back after sunset (during rush hour) cost me د.إ50, so even though I didn’t go in or pay anything in entry fees for the “Wild Wadi” or other manufactured nearby attractions, it was still quite an expensive outing. But the Aussie was worth about د.إ2.6, so my 90-د.إ jaunt wasn’t quite as bad as it looked.
After wandering all through Deira, I finally found an aircon restaurant, the Royal Paris Star. Indian food — chicken curry, rice, roti, small salad, water, fresh OJ, served with efficiency and speed, and all for د.إ15. I was so impressed I threw in a د.إ3 tip.
In summary: Seriously interesting place but there’s really nothing to see. The true miracle was the creation of a city of a million people out of a little place beside a creek. 80% of the population was imported workers and assorted expats. But they couldn’t vote, so that was alright.
By 20:30 I was allpacked and in bed, killing the last four hours trying to kill the cold.
AustraliaAlthough my flight wasn’t till 02:45, I had to leave my hotel shortly after midnight. By 0:48 I was in the check-in queue at Dubai Airport. My next note was in Singapore, at 15:27.
I'll be back at work on ... Wednesday. Ugh. :-(
My flight from Singapore crossed the Victorian border, 40 minutes and 479 km from the airport, at 00:34. That put us an hour behind schedule. The Captain had thought we would make up time, but obviously that didn’t happen.
I felt profoundly weary. Not as in sleepy, but worn down. This trip was rugged in ways none of the others were. I thought it was the constant abrasion against attitudes and a culture that were fundamentally alien to everything I believed in. It was no sudden insight, but it wasn’t until I saw Dubai that I understood how different Egypt really was to everything I’d ever assumed about it. I say “Egypt” rather than “muslim countries” because the UAE gave me parallax. The two countries were both Arabic muslim but they were also profoundly different. To the immediate point however, religion went to the bone in Egypt, but the actual religion was really irrelevant. Both muslims and copts showed the same face to their belief. It was an acceptance of fundamental orders of existence that I do not share.
02:32 Home and in bed. Missed taking a “doorstep” photo, but that was about 02:15.
That was it for another year. Next year would be very different.
