Luxor

Moustafa met us in the lobby at 830 am. This affable Nubia Tours representative took us into his capable hands and propelled us through aiport security in less than 5 minutes, bypassing long lines of families and businessmen. He offered to stow the boys’ squash bags in his home for the next week. The flight to Luxor lasted only 50 minutes. The ride from the airport to the Sofitel Old Winter Palace another 15 minutes. Our hoel was built in the late 1800’s and renovated in 1994. It has a refined British Colonial atmosphere, worlds apart from the cruise ships moored three deep across the street on the Nile. A mustached, uniformed waiter served us deep pink hibiscus tea, We are so happy that Ahmed our tour guide suggests we meet for the Karnak Temple at 3:30 instead of 1:00. We are exhausted after the Egyptian wedding and head to the pool for swim and lunch, then all take a nap.

The grounds at othe Winter Palace are generous and green. They are dotted with palm trees, an aviary, a shisha smoking terrace with sofas and oriental rugs, a ping pong pavilion and a large pool with swim-up bar, and various water fountain features. Only one middle eastern family lounges among the crowd of French and English guests. The sign at the pool said 105 F (approximately 42 C). In Egypt when temperatures reach 50 C, the government won’t report it., insisting that it is only 49 C. Apparently if the temperature reaches 50 C people are excused from reporting to work, but the government must still pay them.

Our guide in Luxor was an Egyptologist named Ahmed. He graduated 8^th in his class at the University and works exclusively for Nubia Tours. His English is easy to understand, he has just a trace of an accent, this is important because he is giving us a tremendous amount of information, names of pharaohs, dates, names of gods, roman invaders, etc. Karnak temple is an impressive comples of pylons, gigantic lotus topped columnts, rows of ram headed sphinxes, obelisks, smaller temples, open courts and hieroglyph carvings.

TO BE CONTINUED _WE ARE BOARDING OUR FLIGHT HOME