Visit to Karnak Temple

It was a lovely night in the sleeper train. We had two meals, dinner and breakfast and the beds were comfortable. I had a room for myself. Only issue was that there was no way of getting a wash.

The train staff was very friendly, uncle Aladdin attended to all our needs and made sure that he gave prior notice about an hour ahead before we reach the Luxor station.4

We were able to see the sunrise through the windows. We finally packed our bags and got down from the Luxor station around 6 in the morning where a cab was waiting for us to drop us at the port where we were to take our cruise which was going to be our abode for the next 4 days.

The Check-in time was 2:00 p.m. therefore we had to wait on the deck till our rooms were ready. The inside was absolutely beautiful. It was not a luxury one but had all the comforts needed. Luckily our guide got our room done by 12:00. So, we had a small nap, a quick bath and went out to visit the two temples that were planned in the itinerary.

The first was the Karnak temple. This is the largest temple ever constructed in the history of mankind. This is dedicated to the god Amun, Mut and Khonsu.  The temple of Karnak was known as Ipet-isu—or “most select of places”—by the ancient Egyptians.

It is the largest religious building ever made, covering about 200 acres (1.5 km by 0.8 km), and was a place of pilgrimage for nearly 2,000 years. The Hypostyle hall, at 54,000 square feet (16,459 meters) and featuring 134 columns, is still the largest room of any religious building in the world. In addition to the main sanctuary there are several smaller temples and a vast sacred lake – 423 feet by 252 feet (129 by 77 meters). Construction at Karnak started by 4,000 years ago and continued up until the time the Romans took control of Egypt, about 2,000 years ago. Each Egyptian ruler who worked at Karnak left his or her own architectural mark.

The Egyptians believed that towards the end of annual agricultural cycle the gods and the earth became exhausted and required a fresh input of energy from the chaotic energy of the cosmos.

To accomplish this magical regeneration the Opet festival was held yearly at Karnak and Luxor. It lasted for twenty-seven days and was also a celebration of the link between pharaoh and the god Amun. The procession began at Karnak and ended at Luxor Temple, one and a half miles (2.4 kilometres) to the south.

The statue of the god Amun was bathed with holy water, dressed in fine linen, and adorned in gold and silver jewelry. The priests then placed the god in a shrine and onto the ceremonial barque supported by poles for carrying. Pharaoh emerged from the temple, his priests carrying the barque on their shoulders, and together they moved into the crowded streets. A troop of Nubian soldiers serving as guards beat their drums, and musicians accompanied the priests in song as incense filled the air.

If there’s one term that can be tied to Egypt is colossal. Wherever you travel, all the monuments, structures, architecture are of massive size. Karnak is such an example. You could stand under the columns and feel the awe and beauty of the marvels that were done by the ancients.  I passed through the columns several times looking up at the sky through the capitols as if one was travelling through the past.

Beside the lake there was a statue of scarab beetle who is associated with god Khepri. It is believed that if you go 7 times in the anticlockwise direction, any of your wishes would come true. We also did the same, and let’s see whether mine would come true.

Another interesting item was the obelisk that is present there. At present, only three obelisks remain here as the complete form. But there had been about 20 obelisks in this Great Temple of Amun, in ancient Egyptian times.

There’s a lot to write about the temple. There are many stories that unravel secrets of the past. For a keen scholar, Karnak itself remains a place of great study and importance. We ended our tour there looking back many a times at the marvel and took the van to our next stop for the day, The Luxor Temple.

Visit to Memphis and Saqqara

After the pyramid visit we had yet more to cover before we were to head to the station to get the sleeper train to Luxor.

As we were not very hungry, we straight away took to route towards Memphis, the ancient capital of Egypt during Pharaonic times. Memphis was the capital uniting both the upper and the lower Egypt and located about 24km away from Cairo.

So when we stopped in Memphis it was almost noon and sunny. So with the tickets we entered the premises after a security check (Egypt has these security checks at all locations).

According to a commonly accepted tradition, Memphis was founded about 2925 BCE by Menes, who supposedly united the two prehistoric kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt. The original name of the city was the White Walls, and the term may have referred originally to the king’s palace, which would have been built of whitewashed brick. Ptah, the local god of Memphis, was a patron of craftsmen and artisans and, in some contexts, a creator god as well.

The first artifact to see was the giant statue of the king Ramesses II inside the museum. It is about 13m long and is made up of limestone.  

The premises also has a giant sphinx made of alabaster that belongs to the new kingdom. Among the others are the statue of the triad of Ptah, Sekhemat and Nefertem, various other parts of statues, tablets and capitals and bases of columns. They were built from alabaster, granite and marble.

After spending about one hour, we moved to Saqqara to see the step pyramid complex. On our way we stopped at a road side fruit seller to buy some oranges, apples and bananas as we were feeling hungry.

It is an immense necropolis located west of the ancient city of Memphis. This has been used as a burial ground during the ancient times. Site stretches for about 6km. It is best known for the step pyramid that was built during the 3^rd dynasty by Imhotep for king Djoser. This is believed to be the first stone work done by the ancient Egyptians. The Djoser complex is surrounded by a wall of light Tura limestone 10.5 m high.

Apart from the pyramid it contains a burial chamber, a temple, serdab court (a small enclosed structure that housed the ka statue) and a Heb-sed court (a space in which the king could perform the Heb-sed ritual in the afterlife). The remaining chapels on the west side are decorated with fluted columns and capitals flanked by leaves. Each of the chapels has a sanctuary accessed by a roofless passage with walls that depict false doors and latches. Some of these buildings have niches for statues.

 Heb-Sed, also called Sed Festival, one of the oldest feasts of ancient Egypt, celebrated by the king after 30 years of rule and repeated every 3 years thereafter. The festival was in the nature of a jubilee, and it is believed that the ceremonies represented a ritual reenactment of the unification of Egypt, traditionally accomplished by Menes. The king first presented offerings to a series of gods and then was crowned, first with the white crown of Upper Egypt and then with the red crown of Lower Egypt. Finally, the king, dressed in a short kilt with an animal’s tail in back, ran a ritual course four times and was then carried away in a great procession to visit the chapels of the gods of Upper and Lower Egypt.

The superstructure of the Step Pyramid is six steps and was built in six stages. The pyramid began as a square mastaba (this designation as a mastaba is contended for several reasons) which was gradually enlarged, first evenly on all four sides and later just on the east side. The mastaba was built up in two stages, first to form a four-stepped structure and then to form a six-stepped structure, which now had a rectangular base on an east–west axis.

After the step pyramid complex we moved few kilometers away from it to visit some tombs in the area. They were named as the tombs of Ti, Princess Idut, Kagemni, Mererika and so on who were either members of the royal family or some high ranking officials. You need to pay extra if you want to get photographs inside. Special one to remember is the joint tomb of Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum.

The walls were covered with pictures of scenes of everyday life. There are scenes of hunting, baking, dancing, offerings. Some have animals such as hippopotamus, birds, and crocodiles. Some of the colours are still well preserved. In the mastaba of Mehu on the wall to the right of this corridor, there is a door that leads to the wide courtyard that hosts two large pillars with reliefs of Mehu on both sides. On the back of these two pillars, there is the false door leading to the tomb of Kahotep, Mehu's son.

There was a lot of information that was given by our guide which was hard to digest. The pictures tell many stories and reveal many information about the everyday life in Egypt.

There were two visits for us to do, visit to a carper factory and papyrus factory. These are tourist attractions and they will teach you how these are made and you can purchase any souvenirs that you like at a good price. We bought some Papyrus scrolls and my friend who was such a lover of carpets had to satisfy herself with a small piece as the prices were too much to spend.

After a long and a fruitful day, we headed back to the hotel from where we packed our luggage and head towards the railway station to get the sleeper train to Luxor where we were to take our 4 day cruise.

A day with Pyramids and Sphinx

Egypt was in my bucket list for some time.  Because of reasons like money, leave, finding someone, I have been postponing the visit for many years. But this year I decided to visit somehow. The best was to go during the New year season which is in April which was supposed to be the best season to visit Egypt.

History of Egypt dates to the prehistoric time.  But the Pharonic Egypt which has gained the attention of many all over the world dates to about 5000 years ago. So, a traveler to Egypt never miss to visit the pyramids.  Most famous Pyramid is the Pyramids of Giza.

Located in the outskirts of Cairo, in an area known as the Giza Plateau they stand gigantic, fascinating to the eyes of the onlookers.

The great pyramid of Khufu is the largest single building ever constructed. It is made up of 2.3 million stone blocks and each block weighs between 2 and 15 tons. According to archeologist around 20000 workers were involved in the building. Today it stands at a height of 137m.

The pyramid had two entrances, we took a new one the original was blocked. There are shafts inside pyramids which are the passage ways to travel.  The inside layout is as follows (Taken from Web).

The Pyramid of Kafre appears taller than Khufu due to an optical illusion because it stands at a higher part in the plateau. It has a steeper angle and the only pyramid whose limestone cap remains. It measures about 216m on each side and each block weighs about 2.5 tons.

The southern part has the Pyramid of Menkaure and each side of this measures about 109m and it is 66m in height. Beside it are three small pyramids, built for the three wives of Khufu and a series of flat top pyramids built for his children.

We had a take a ticket to go inside the pyramid of Khufu. It was a novel experience and a dream coming true. The first part of it was dark but we could move standing, then we moved through a very narrow, rectangular tunnel like space and climb some steps up the burial chamber which was our last point. During the way we had to almost crawl at some places. It was indeed a dream coming through, to have the opportunity to get into a pyramid that was once, many many years ago have been trodden by people belonging to a great civilization.

The word pyramid comes from the Greek word ‘pyramis’ meaning wheat cake. This is an icon of the cut of the sun of Re which increased in importance during the 4th Dynasty. It was a status symbol and an expression of power and kingship. It is clear from the pyramidal texts sun and stars were important to ancient Egypt.

After the visit to the pyramids, we went to see the solar boat museum. As we had to pay extra money to take photos inside, we skipped that and only went and observed the artifacts that were displayed. This houses a 43m long vessel excavated in 1964. This was supposed to be used as a part of the pharaoh’s funerary procession and then buried with him to provide transport in the afterlife. The boat is made of cedar wood and to our surprise this was reconstructed over a 14 year period. It was huge but precisely reconstructed. These boats were found inside pits.

The Great Sphinx

Our next stop was to see the Great Sphinx. This was few kilometers away from the pyramids of Giza and in fact you can see the pyramids at a distance. This was built in about 2530 by Pharaoh Kafre. It is carved from limestone and has the head of a man and the body of a lion. It is approximately 73m long and 20m high. This is probably the head of king Khafre. He is wearing a pleated nemes (Headdress).  Lion is also regarded as a solar symbol by the ancients.  Seeing in right front of your eyes, taking a photo beside it was in deed something that anyone travelling to Egypt look forward to.

We never forgot to take as much photos as possible to capture these iconic moments that one day we will talk about. Our guide Meena was very capable of getting good shots asking us to stand exactly where that would result in some nice pics.

As we landed very late the previous night, we started the journey around 9 in the morning. We didn't even have the time to change the dollars we had to local curreny which is Egyptian pounds. So Meena had to pocket out from his own with the prmise that we would give him back the amount in the evening.

This was indeed a good start for what was to expect in the coming days. From Giza we headed towards Sakkara which was our next destination for the day…I will catch up with the write up.