6 Continents, 5 Months

Today we are going to see the top attractions of the Luxor area. First we saw The Valley Of The Kings. In the valley is where they discovered King Tut's tomb. The are sixty-three tombs in the valley but we didn't have nearly the amount of time to see them all. We only got the three tombs because we had lots to do. Inside they were tremendous in size. There was paintings and carving from over 3000 years ago and they weren't in bad condition! I learned to recognize some hieroglyphics from the paint shop a few days back so I saw some symbols I knew. The Valley Of The Kings was truly remarkable. After the valley we continued to the queen's temple. It is clearly visible from the city and that's what I saw the night previous. The was lots of stairs leading up to the temple and it wasn't very big when we finally got to the top. It was about the size of a courtyard on the inside. On our way out we got a picture with one of the cops and he let me hold his AK-47. It was awesome! After the temple we grabbed a bite to eat and then went to the Karnak Temple.The temple was right across the road from our hotel. There was graffiti from the British in 1875! It was carved high into some of the pillars from when tourists from like 150 years ago toured to Egypt. Egypt didn't become an independent country until the 1950's because it was under the control of Northern Africa so it was classified as a colony, with a King and Queen (the current King is in exile in Switzerland). This temple was sixty acres. It wasn't when the Egyptians initially build it by the Nile River but it receded so much so it exposed about fifty-five extra acres that is not just cobblestone rocks and buildings. We were at the Karnak Temple until sundown then we went for dinner. We had a nice dinner but we called it in early because we have to be awake at 3 am to catch a flight. No more drives through the desert of Egypt.