Gracy Bee

Egypt 7th April

Posted on February 8th, 2007 by GracyBee.
Categories: Places.

Flashback 7th April

Today we set off to the Valley of the Kings. With Aladdin as our genie to grant us wishes our tour guide, he explained why:

1. Unfinished houses: to avoid paying 40% government taxes on finished houses (O..K..)
2. Roofless houses: not necessary as it only rain once every 2 years. Even if it ever rain, it only last for 2 min
3. Sugarcanes crops planted 400 m away from roads: lesson learnt from previous terrorists attacks

We went together in a bus with 2 other Chinese and 2 Belgium and crossed the new bridge over the Nile. Aladdin also told us that it is easy to differentiate different tourists by looking at what they holds on their hands.

1. Japanese: make up and umbrella
2. English: a can of beer and a woman
3. German: two cans of beer
4. French: a lot of photography!
5. Spanish: a lot of souvenir

haha….don’t know if it is true so don’t be offended ya!

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Our 1st stop is the Colossi of Memnon.

 

Colossi of Memnon

These two remaining statues used to be part of the temple of Amenophis III, but it has since destroyed by an earthquake. So where are the stones? Apparently it has been recycled by the nearby villages to build houses etc , as what Aladdin said. *sweat*!

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Our next stop is the Valley of the Queens. Here is the burial place for all the Queens and their children. We visited Tomb 44, 52 and 55. Of the three, #55 (Tomb of Amunhirhkepshef) is the best preserved tomb, with some of the colours and drawings still intact. There is even a mummified foetus which Amunhirhkepshef aborted at grief after her son’s death.

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Our 3rd stop is the Valley of the Kings. We need to walk a certain distance before we actually reach into the heart of the tombs. What a hot day!

 

 

Into the Valley

Now these are really an eye opener! The Queens’ tombs decorations paled when compared to the Kings’. We visited the tombs 2, 6 and 16. The tombs are much longer, wider, bigger and more colourful. You got to admire the artworks on the walls AND ceilings. It is so wonderfully decorated that I can’t believe they can do that nearly 3000 years ago! What puzzled me was:

1. With primitive tools and no light while digging deep into the tunnels, how can they dig the tunnel in such perfection rectangle shape,
2. How do they do the decoratives on the walls AND ceilings so nicely?
3. The granite sarcophagus that used to hold the coffins. They are HUGE and how on earth did they drag into the tunnel? We have steps and levelled platform for us to walk on. But what about in the past?? Some are really deep underground!

The only picture I can take of the tomb

Oh ya, they have found another new tomb named KV63 in March 2006. An exciting discovery after 84 years. And this was documented in Discovery Channel in Dec. Though there were no mummy found, but the discovery inside is really good enough.

The new tomb

After the tomb visiting, I’m still baffled, and add on more questions in mind. I have to salute their expertise, architecture skills and knowledge.

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After the VK, we went on to Hapshepsut’s temple. Hapshepsut was the only female pharoah that ever rule Egypt in 1503 - 1482BC. The temple was 60% renovated and so it looked relatively new.

 

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It was late afternoon when we finished our journey to the VK. As we still have the time, we decided to visit the Luxor temple so that our schedule for tomorrow wouldn’t be so packed.

Luxor temple is not far from where we lived, and it looked smaller than I have expected. I can’t believe that this temple was once buried in sand that a village was built onto it. It was not until it was partially discovered that evacuation began. The village was removed but only a mosque remained and form part of the temple since.

Luxor Temple

The entrance. Can you see the mosque?

Yet again, I felt small when I was in there at the statues and column were all so talllllll. Nonetheless, you have to marvel at this little Jewel. It was near dinner time and off we went for dinner.

End of the day

Pleased with the outcome with what we managed to see today.

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