Egyptian Adventures Part II

I feel like I didn’t do the 16.5 hour train ride in the previous post justice.  There are just now words to describe everything that happened.  But I have to move on to our actual arrival in Luxor!

Luxor

When we finally pulled in to Luxor train station it felt so surreal.  It was almost scary to get off the train but we managed to do so and even took a survival picture on the platform. We had wanted to eat but couldn’t find any restaurants so we headed to the hotel, Nefertiti.

Nefertiti was tucked back into this typically Arab ally way.  We checked into the hotel and tried to clean up a bit in our little room. After our short rest we met once again in the lobby where one of the employees met with us to discuss our plans for the next day and a half.  We told him we had no plans and before we knew it we were handing him our money paying for our adventures in Luxor.  He was so nice and such a great sales man.  One of the things he offered us was a hot air balloon ride for a grand total of $45.  Most of the group decided that the 4:30 am meeting time was reason enough to not do it.  I decided that I didn’t care, I could sleep when I got back to Amman and decided to do it.  From there one by one the rest of the group decided that they too would do the hot air balloon.

The time was pushing 4:00 and the sun would be setting soon.  We were hungry and needed to catch our boat for the sunset Nile cruise.  Our booker told us to give him 10 pounds each (about $1.50) each and he would send someone to get us shwarma to eat on the boat.  He came back with our sandwiches in a bag and we bought some sodas on the way and we were off to the dock. 

We hopped on our boat and our captain, maybe 17 years old, took us across the Nile.  We moved to the top of the boat and sat on the roof as the sun was setting.  It was so beautiful and so worth the exhausting train ride.  The boat took us to what they called Banana Island.  This was just an Island in the middle of the Nile where they grew bananas.  We were promised to see some Nile crocodiles so the guide took us to this stone water area with a cage over it.  He proceeded to stab at the water until he found a baby crocodile which surfaced for just a moment.  Moving on from there I believe he took us to the roof of his house where we saw the beautiful beach of East Luxor illuminated with lights from hotels and boats.  After descending the stairs we ended our journey on the island with a plate of fresh fruit including some of the bananas fresh from the island.

Once back on the mainland we visited the Temple of Luxor.  This was an INCREDIBLE place.  It was the first time I felt like I was in Egypt.  My first glimpse of hieroglyphics (which I actually touched…oops) was in this temple.  It was illuminated at night and was just stunning. Something that is interesting about this temple was that when the Muslims came into Egypt they built a mosque in the middle of the temple.  Since it was the night before the Eid holiday there was lots of celebrating that came from the mosque which made the temple quite the lively place to be.

Scammed in Luxor

That was the night that my friend and I got scammed.  After the temple some people headed back to the hotel to sleep but me and one of my friends decided to do some exploring in the back streets of the area.  We wanted some food and while wandering around my friend was called out by someone passing by saying that he recognized my friend from the hotel, he claimed to be the cook and invited us to join him at the spice shop.  We took the cultural opportunity and before I knew it I was buying spices that I really didn’t need but thought it would be cool to have.  On the back to the hotel my friend decided to ask one of the "tourist" spice shops how much they were asking because we were told the tourist shops were more expensive…the one my friend asked was about 75% cheaper than what we just bought.  Once back at the hotel we told the owner that we had met his cook and he told us that it was probably just a kid on the street claiming to be the cook so he could make us feel comfortable with him. This guy was TOO good at his game.

From there I was too exhausted and I went to bed.  Much like now.  Stay tuned for part three!