Saturday, July 21, 2007

Karnak


Ramesses Makes His Mark
Originally uploaded by Son of Groucho.
I'm not going to bore you all/ both with every detail of our holiday in Egypt, but there were certain highlights that I thought I should record. The first ancient site that we visited while the boat was still moored in Luxor was the Temple Complex at Karnak. Karnak consists of many temples built over 1,300 years and the site occupies 200 acres! Needless to say, we didn't manage to see everything, but highlights included the huge statue of Ramesses II (Ramesses the Great), and the Great Hypostyle Hall that was built by his father, Seti I and was completed by Ramesses (shown here).

Other things at Karnak included the tallest obelisk in Egypt erected by the only female Egyptian Pharaoh, Hatshepsut, whose mummy was only very recently identified.

We were fortunate to have a fantastic guide for the trip called Amro Mounir, who also lectured at the Cairo Museum. The visit to Karnak was a superb introduction to Egypt and egyptology.