(14/05/07) - 5 pages
This page follows on from the First Egypt section.
Right, it was off to Dahab after the hot air ballooning, but first we checked out Karnark Temple on the way:
The walls at the entrance were huge and weren't finished. In fact, you could see how they built the massive walls in the first place due to it not being completed! They used sand stone blocks to build up a "ramp" as they went, dragging the much harder stone blocks up it. Then, once the wall was built they would've dismantled the sand stone ramp and carved the hieroglyphics in to the wall as they went.
The Hieroglyphics at this temple were also carved deeply into the walls and pillars, this made it a lot harder to get rid of by any bad guys as opposed to hieroglyphics that stuck out of the walls (having had their backgrounds carved away):
In one of the rooms you could still see the paint. We were told that when the place was built, all the walls and hieroglyphics would've been painted:
Here's a scarab beetle, they're used for good luck, not for swarming over Indiana Jones wanna-be's and eating their flesh after breaking in to temples like I thought. Also, mummies don't come to life...
me with Hatchepsut Temple in the background:
We endured a 10 or so hour bus ride to get to Dahab, where we spent the next few days just chilling out. Dahab is pretty new as far as Egypt is concerned and was lined with shops and restaurants along the waterfront:
Seriously don't know what I was trying to do in this pic:
I did go hard out with my sea food order one night:
I didn't spend my time chilling out too much in Dahab, however, I spent 2 days diving while the others climbed Mt Sinai! I'll create an entirely separate page for diving though, it was spectacular.
After 3 days in Dahab, it was off to Jordan! We caught a nice sailing boat to get to Aqaba (which used its motor to get us there, but still):
Which was in a bit better condition than the life saving boat that these guys had (who were waving at us as we sailed past, happy as Larry):
Close up of their life saver:
Here's where we went:
