Tuesday, February 11th – Friday, February 14th, 2025
World Tour Days 101 – 104
Nick and I departed Aswan by car in the morning to get to Luxor. We left 30 minutes earlier than scheduled but somehow ended up being 1.5 hours late since the driver needed to take that many smoke breaks for a 3 hour drive. Luckily, once we arrived everything was much smoother. Our hotel had a view of the Luxor Temple, the Nile river, and had an amazing rooftop restaurant that we ended up eating at numerous times.
Our first day we walked along the Nile and explored the Temples of Karnak. There were many columns, sphinx’s, and ruins of temples. For dinner we tried fateer which are crispy pies. They come in both savory and dessert forms, so we got both.
The second day in Luxor was a busy one. Nick and I started off by exploring the Valley of the Kings. There were many tombs, but we decided to go inside 6. Ramesses V & VI, Seti I, and Tutankhamun were the highlights. Tutankhamun had many well preserved paintings and even had his mummy on display inside. We opted to not do more tombs as that would cost extra but we could’ve spent the entire day going inside all the ones they had if we wanted to.
Next we went to the Temple of Queen Hatshepsut which was nearby the Valley of the Kings. This temple had multiple floors built into the side of the cliff. There were many carvings remaining and some tombs on site that we also explored. These were less busy than the other tombs in Luxor so we enjoyed getting to look at them at our own pace.
The day ended with a walk to the Luxor Temple which was a short walk from our hotel. The temple has an alley of sphinx’s that go all the way from its entrance to the entrance of the Temples of Karnak. There were many columns, status, and engravings.
Third morning in Luxor was a special one as we took a hot air balloon ride. We walked down to the Nile where our boat was waiting for us. They provided some tea and coffee to enjoy while waiting for our turn to go up in the balloon. Our group watched on the water as a group of hot air balloons went up for sunrise. After this it was our turn to take the boat across to the West Bank, drive to the launching field, and climb aboard. The air balloon ride was around 30 minutes over the Valley of the Kings, which was pretty neat.
Post hot air balloon ride we checked off a long list of sight seeing on the West Bank. This included Valley of the Queens, Mortuary Temple of Ramesses lll at Medinet Habu, Temple of Seti I, Colossi of Memnon, and the Ramesseum. At the Valley of the Queens we were disappointed to find that the tomb of Queen Nefertari was closed for renovations. However, our disappointment was short lived because all the tombs we could enter were amazing. They had so much of the paint left remaining and were well preserved by glass so people couldn’t rub the paint off. The tombs were 100x less busy than the Valley of the Kings, and in my opinion were much better.
The remaining sites of Medinet Habu, Temple of Set I, Colossi of Memnon, and the Ramesseum were all quick stops. They are all fairly close together, which was convenient. My favorite engraving was one that looked like a platter of milkshakes. The only unpleasant part of the day was when our taxi driver insisted we pay him more even though we would be driving for 2 hours less than the day before when we also drove with him. It was the first time we were really aggressively pestered for more money after agreeing on a price (that was already too high). Luckily for me Nick handled it like a pro and otherwise our day was great.
For dinner we tried a camel burger which was absolutely delicious. All the food we had tried in Egypt was amazing. The following day Nick did some exploring on his own in the markets near our hotel as I unfortunately had food poisoning (so one meal was maybe less amazing). We enjoyed endless mango milkshakes, and tried many Egyptian dishes in Luxor. The rooftop hotel restaurant was a great spot to watch the sunset, and people riding their camels on the street below.
