Activity level: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️
Modes of transportation: 👟🚂🚐🚢
We woke up in a slight panic that we had missed our stop (we didn’t), but that was the jolt we needed to be awake. Our train guy? (For lack of a better term) asked us to settle up for the tea from the day before. That’s when we learned our second lesson from Egypt: don’t expect change if you don’t explicitly ask for it (even when the “tip” is much larger than the bill).
Sarah hadn’t slept well on the train. She woke up in the middle of the night to loud mechanical squeaking noises from the jostling of the train. She had the disastrous realization that she drank too much tea and desperately needed to use the bathroom despite Eric’s warnings. She made a dash for it and raced down the bunk to find her shoes. Unfortunately, it was too dark and too small of space, so there were no shoes in sight. She made a tough call and ran down the hallway for the toilet without shoes. She opened the door to find… the bathroom floor completely wet, so she had to go back and find her shoes. Luckily, she eventually made it, but that might have been the worst bathroom on the trip, and that includes the car camper with no toilet.
We were looking forward to getting to the cruise so we could shower and relax before our tour started in the afternoon (the train had no shower). We were surprised to see our guide, Ashraf, and a driver waiting at the station to pick us up to start our full day tour…..
First, we started at the Temple of Luxor. Ashraf said it wasn’t the largest, but it was “nice in its own way.” We thought it was awesome.
The highlight for Eric was the statue of King Ramses II (the “big deal” one) with an individual list of all of his enemies on his statue under his foot (“here lie all my haters”). Also, they’ve done an amazing job at restoring the temple to its original splendor—and our guide was one of the people who worked on it!
Next, we went to the Temple of Karnak, the largest ancient temple in Egypt. It was almost too massive, but it had so much inscription and so many ornate carvings that it was spectacular. We ended up having to sit down in a random untraversed corner when our guide gave us “free time” just to relax a minute.
There was also one benefit to starting early: the site was empty when we got there. We didn’t realize how lucky we were. By the time we left, it was absolutely swarming with people (apparently the tours get there at 9:30, so it was all at once).
From there, we finally got a break. We went back to the boat to check into our room and eat lunch. But first, we showered.
Lunch was an amazing spread and we felt the need to try everything (someone had told us this boat has the best food, though we learned that after booking). It was well worth it.
After that it was time to chill. We went up on the top deck to enjoy the views, and Sarah took a nap (while Eric napped in the room).
We were so tired from getting so little sleep that we slept on and off until dinner.
It was about this time that Eric thought it would be a good idea to leave the boat and pick up a few essentials (ie Sarah ran out of conditioner in India and hadn’t been able to find any). Immediately after disembarking from the boat, a man approached Eric telling him he worked for the boat and could show him the spice market if he wanted.
Eric definitely met a scammer. He “helped” Eric buy the conditioner for only a few dollars “tip” on top. Eric expected that. What he didn’t expect is that the pharmacist would (at least) triple the price of the conditioner. That’s when Eric learned the third lesson of Egypt: everyone will “scam” you because they expect you to negotiate with them. Even pharmacists. Also that conditioner was at least 3 years old, but it seemed like it still functioned (Side note: it’s better than what happened to an Australian man we met on the hot balloon tour, who had the same experience only to get home and find out the hair spray he had bought for his wife was empty).
Meanwhile Sarah got to enjoy the sunset… until an hour went by and no sign of Eric. Her iPhone just so happened to glitch and sign out of her account too so she couldn’t send or receive text messages. Then it got dark and she got really worried.
For dinner, we had to order a la cart. We both selected the Egyptian dish, which was stuffed quail. The appetizers, soup, and dessert were also delicious.
Our guide messaged us asking if we wanted to go on an unforgettable sunrise hot air balloon tour the next day. The catch: we needed to be up at 3:30am. Before deciding, we reflected on the past 3 nights…
We left India for a 30 hour layover in Riyadh and toured the city, then had a late night flight into Cairo where we woke up early for a full day excursion of the pyramids and ended the day on a sleeper train to Luxor, which we woke up and walked off into today’s tour and first day of the Nile cruise.
We decided to book the hot air balloon tour for the next day at 3:30 AM and went to sleep early. We were regretting it immediately. We can rest when we get back to the States! (Editor’s note: nope, maybe in the new year).
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