January 30, 2012
Saturday, January 21: Road trip to Abydos and Dendera
After a lovely day visiting the sites of the Queen’s Valley and Medinat Habu in the West Bank of Luxor yesterday, today we took a three-hour road trip to Abydos Temple (or Seti I and Ramses II) to witness the majestic and lofty scenes and its famed King List. The group members loved seeing rural Egyptian life along the Nile and canals. The route back was on the desert road, cutting the big loop of the Nile and reaching Dendera in a timely way to see its noted zodiac, secret basement rooms and the historical image of Cleoptra VII and her son Caesarion as this was the last temple built at the end of the Ptolemaic period. While reading or napping on the return trip, we came back to Luxor to board our Mövenpick “Lotus” river cruise ship to get ready for the glorious river cruise to Aswan for the next days. It is true that still plenty of ships are not moving, but again, this is a time of no crowds and bargains to be had. Security was provided at all the sites, but frankly I did not feel much need of it.
