The Tejchmas: Welcome to Alaska, No Hassel No Hassel, Aussie?...EGYPT!!!

Our last stop and most exciting place to visit was Egypt! Here's a picture as we wait to board our flight.

We arrived in Egypt and got to our hotel around 2am. The next day we looked out our window, and here was the view.

View of Cairo and the Nile River

More views of the city of Cairo. Interestingly people specifically do not finish building their houses because if they are not finished they will pay less taxes, however in doing so it makes the city look like crap! Oh and they also put their livestock up on the top floor, can you believe that!

Here's a cool picture with the pyramids in the background

First day of our tour visiting the Egyptian Museum where we were able to see King Tut's buried treasures including the head piece they placed over him when he was buried. Very cool to see all these items but unfortunately you cannot take pictures inside or at most sites we visited.

Visiting the ancient pyramids and playing with the view!

The pyramids of Giza. These pyramids were so big, it was such an amazing view to finally see them. Definitely a once in a life time moment!

Goofing off and walking like an Egyptian!haha

The Sphinx and the Great Pyramid

Kissie kissie! Love this picture :) After today we left Cairo and then headed south to Aswan, Egypt via bus.

Next day sailing down the Nile in our felucca boat in Aswan.

Nile River

Was such a beautiful day!

Locals enjoying the river and nice weather

Jason taking a look at the scenery

After our boat ride we were able to hop on some camels that took us to a small Nubian village where we spent the next couple hours. Scariest part about riding the camels was when they got up and got back down. They are so tall! And no none of them spit.

Me and my camel! Had a mind of its own let me tell ya!

Who would have ever thought, but Jason has never ridden a horse, but now he's ridden a camel!haha

On top of our camels

The lovely bathroom they had for us to use. Only for the limber! Kind of reminded me of a bedpan built into the floor.

The following day we woke up at 2:30am to take a 3 hour bus tour to the Abu Simbel Temples built by Ramesses II. Behind us is Lake Nessar, which was created when they built a dam on the Nile River to control flooding. This is the largest man made lake in the world and is filled with crocodiles and you are not allowed to swim in this lake.

Abu Simbel Temple, so worth the drive and waking up early. What an amazing site, and it was actually was originally built at a lower site, but when the dam was built and the lake was made they had to move the temple to preserve it. So the temples were moved, cut into blocks and relocated to a safe location beyond the rising waters.

Ramesses II statues

Here is the famous Queen Nefertari's temple. Nefertari means the most beautiful, and this was King Ramesses II's most favorite wife. He built this temple as a monument to her.

In front of her temple. The statues include Nefertari and Ramesses

A view of both the temples

Another view of Lake Nessar, by the way it was like 6am when all these pictures were taken and it was this sunny out and probably about 100 degrees!

Once we got back to our cruise boat we had a little time to eat lunch and then we were back on the road to visit Kom Ombo Temple.

Another great temple to see with amazing hieroglyphics everywhere. One thing about all the places we visited is that every temple is covered head to toe in hieroglyphics.

Just showing you how high up these walls are, and that they are just filled with hieroglyphics.

Inside the temple

Picture moment from the outside

Edfu Temple the next morning

Picture moment. Edfu temple was built to worship the crocodiles because they kept eating people and they thought that if they built a temple to them, they'd be safe. Here's me doing a Gator pic!

Outside Edfu Temple

Jason doing a little hieroglyphic reading

Always felt "safe" with the security guards walking around with their guns!

After Edfu temple got back on the boat. Picture of the Nile River bank.

On cruise ships they usually make animals out of your towels and it is no exception in Egypt. Our guy made us a little baby!haha And the gross part is that after the picture we were looking at what he used to make the facial features and it was from some of our trash from the trash can! Really!?

Later in the day after lunch we hopped back off the boat and took horse carraiges into the town toThe Temple of Horus at Edfu. This temple was dedicated to the sun god Horus.

Walking into the temple built over 2,000 years ago.

Being creative wtihour background once again!

After Edfu, we left land and began cruising north back up the Nile River. Here's our swimming pool on board. As you can see we are coming up to a low bridge...

They've obviously done this before, but there is no room for error! Watch your head!

Creepy guy who cleaned our room who sort of had a "crush" on me. He kept lurking outside our room the whole cruise! Then at the end he built this crocodile in the hall and wanted me to take a picture with him. P.S. hand thing his idea not mine!

After our overnight cruise ride we arrived in Luxor where the Valley of the Kings is located. Apparently the pharohs were originally all buried in the pyramids, but their tombs kept getting robbed because everyone knew that all their jewels were inside. It was kind of like a huge bull's eye. So to prevent further robberies they started building their tombs in a mountains in Luxor. The site became known as the Valley of the Kings. Construction for each pharoh began as soon as they became king and finished 70 days after they died because that's how long mummification takes. Only the architect in charge of each tomb knew where the pharoh was buried because they would seal off the door themselves and try to disguise the entry. It was a good shot, but the robbers still found 61 of the 63 tombs. The only one not found was King Tutankhamun. They believe his tomb was not found because this pharaoh died at the age of 18 and since he was so young they did not have a long time to build his tomb, so it was small. However, when we saw all his jewels at the Egyptian Museum it was alot! Another interesting point is that since only one person knew where each pharaoh was buried King Tut’s tomb was literally right above another pharaoh’s tomb making it less likely to be found. However, during his construction the builders had no idea they were so close to another pharaoh’s tomb. There is still one tomb yet to be found.

Hatshepsut Temple, built by Queen Hatshepsut one of the most successful pharaohs, reigning longer than any other woman of an Egyptian dynasty. Her temple was right on the other side of the Valley of the Kings.

Osirian statues of Hatshepsut at her tomb, one stood at each pillar of the extensive structure

Beautiful colored pictures were still evident in her temple, which was built sometime around 1460BC

Huge pharaoh monuments along the side of the road

Karnak Temple Complex in Luxor. The complex is a vast open-air museum and the largest ancient religious site in the world.

Ram headed sphinxes are attributed to Rameses II because the statuettes between the sphinxes paws bear his cartouche (name).

Inside the temple

After Karnak Temple we headed over to Luxor Temple. This picture shows a mosque about 15-20ft in the air where the street level is now. Below where the picture is taken is where the original ground level was when the temple existed thousands of years ago.

Entering Luxor Temple.

From the Temple of Luxor a paved road flanked on both sides by rams leads to the temples of Karnak. Only just discovered this a little bit ago.

In front of Luxor Temple

Our group

After leaving Luxor our gropug divided and some of us left to head back up to Cairo. Along the way we stopped in a town on the Red Sea. We were only in the city for a copule hours to eat dinner, but a few of us decided that if we were this close we wanted to try and see the Red Sea. Finally after bribing a security guard at the marina we were able to run to the beach and put our feet in the water. Here we are in the Red Sea!

Next day back in Cairo we visited another temple built by the Pharaoh Djoser, and the whole area is an archeological site of the Saqqara necropolis.

Step pyramid

Necropolis

In front of another step pyramid but that is falling down.

Before the great pyramids were built these are what the pyramids looked like before. They are called step pyramids and were built during the third dynasty. No pyramids exist any longer from the first and second dynasty because they were made of rock and mud and did not survive.