Vintage Hills - Valley of the Kings, Egypt.

25th, April, 2007.

A vintage hill walk in Egypt on the big tour: Valley of the Kings and then the temple of Hatshepsut.

After spending some time in Cairo, we then traveled to Aswan and then spent a marvellous few days travelling by felucca with Captain Nassir up to Luxor, accompanied by a soundtrack of Bob Marley and Soliman Didi, (a brilliant Nubian musician, a tape of which we finally managed to track down in Luxor after quite a good deal of searching). We had a wonderful time visiting the temples of Edfu, Esna and Karnack en route.

After arriving in Luxor we found a place to stay called "Little Garden". We then headed off to Explore The Valley of the Kings.


The Valley of the Kings is a valley in Egypt where for a period of nearly 500 years tombs were constructed for the Pharaohs and powerful nobles of the New Kingdom. The valley stands on the west bank of the Nile, opposite Thebes (modern Luxor), within the heart of the Theban Necropolis. This area has been a focus of archaeological and egyptological exploration since the end of the eighteenth century. In modern times the valley has become famous for the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun (with its rumours of the Curse of the Pharaohs), and is one of the most famous archaeological sites in the world. In 1979, it became a World Heritage Site, along with the rest of the Theban Necropolis.

The official name for the site in ancient times was The Great and Majestic Necropolis of the Millions of Years of the Pharaoh, Life, Strength, Health in The West of Thebes (see below for the hieroglyphic spelling):

So after visiting three of the tombs in the valley, (a ticket only allows three tomb visits). We then decided to do some exploring and climb over some of the sandstone mountains to find Hatshepsut's temple. We headed up some steep and likely looking steps in the cliff and kept climbing until we were on a kind of plateau above the valley.

The view was pretty amazing and you could watch all the tiny tourists scurrying about the tombs.

We followed some dusty paths upwards, and much to our surprise but also gratitude we found a couple of guys with bottles of water for sale coming down. This was a stroke of luck as it was scorching.....

Whilst on our walk I did a bit of searching, as ever, and found some pretty interesting finds including a fossilized clam and a piece of worked quartz. Pictured below.

So we made it over the top of the plateau to the temple of Hatshepsut. Which makes for a spectacular view, with its tiny ant like figures scurrying about.

We had a bit of a scrabble mania on this trip and managed to play a quick game of Scrabble in many of the strangest places. Here's J and scrabble above the temple.

"Scotch on the rocks!"

We descended by a steep path beside the temple.
Hatchepsut means Foremost of Noble Ladies. She was the fifth pharaoh of the eighteenth dynasty of Ancient Egypt and is is generally regarded by Egyptologists as one of the most successful pharaohs, reigning longer than any other woman. Hatshepsut was one of the most prolific builders in ancient Egypt, commissioning hundreds of construction projects throughout both Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt, that were grander and more numerous than those of any of her Middle Kingdom predecessors. Later pharaohs attempted to claim some of her projects as theirs. Following the tradition of many pharaohs, Hatshepsut's masterpiece was her mortuary temple. She built hers in a complex at Deir el-Bahri. It was designed and implemented on the West Bank of the Nile River near the entrance to the Valley of the Kings because of all the pharaohs who later chose to associate their complexes with the grandeur of hers.

and rejoining the masses about to explore her temple....

The focal point of Hatshepsut's temple was the Djeser-Djeseru or "the Sublime of Sublimes", a colonnaded structure of perfect harmony nearly one thousand years before the Parthenon was built. Djeser-Djeseru sits atop a series of terraces that once were graced with lush gardens. Djeser-Djeseru and the other buildings of Hatshepsut's Deir el-Bahri complex are considered to be significant advances in architecture.

Was looking back through our journal entry for this excursion and found a pretty funny entry so I thought I would copy it here. This is exactly as it was recorded.......

...took a comedy cab back after the mid-day sun got the better of us.
Cab driver "where are you staying?"
Us, "Little Garden"
Cab driver, "Oh you are poor tourists - not much money.......when do you fly home?"
Us "We have no return flight"
Driver "Oh well, I give you my chicken- one can hold each leg to fly home! also it lays golden eggs"
Us "Really?"
Driver "You have no children?"
Us "No, no children"
Driver "You can have one of mine - I have three girls.....", "....also I have a very clever cat........he reads the newspaper, he dances, he plays the....um....um.."
Us, "The piano?"
Driver "Yes!, he plays the piano and reads foreign languages, a very clever cat"

So there you are - Egyptian cab driver with a pretty cool sense of humour!!!

Oh, and here are some hieroglyphics from the notebook....