Will this day end?

So we had a very early start - up by 3am, off to the airport at 4pm for the 7am flight to Luxor where we are to join a cruise on the Nile for the next 4 days. So far so good... arrived in Luxor about 10am and as our boat not ready until 1pm, we visited the Karnak and Luxor temples.

Karnak temple complex is very impressive, especially the massive decorated columns - there are 134 of then, most around 10 metres tall while another dozen are 21 metres tall. Many of the large wall paintings depict stories about people from ancient Egyptian times and it was amazing to see how well preserved they are considering they are thousands of years old.

The Luxor temple complex was constructed mainly under Amenhotep III & Rameses II, added to by Tutankhamun & others. The front gate has many statues of Rameses and there are several obelisks which really serve the same purpose as a church cross on top of the building or tower, or a minaret on a mosque.

From here things went a little pear shaped. We headed back to the ship for what was supposed to be a late lunch. Unfortunately, the presence of coronavirus on another Nile cruise ship has meant screening for the virus on other cruise boats. So, back into Luxor while the tour director is hastily trying to organise lunch for us. We finally got lunch at around 3.30pm after not really having anything much to eat all day. Finally we were able to board around 5pm and we all had our temperature taken and a small sample had swabs taken to see if the virus was present.

After Egypt we go to Jordan (and then Turkey), but some of the tour group were supposed to go to Israel after Jordan. This portion of the tour has now been cancelled. Still going to Jordan at this stage but borders are being closed or restricted every day. No news on Turkey yet but there is a risk they may deny us entry there. Shall cross that bridge if we come to it.Читать далее