Nile cruise - excursion to the temple of Karnak


	In the late afternoon we get off to the temple of Karnak, the first object of the booked holiday. The buses with the day trippers are already on the journey back to the Red Sea, so the temple is visited only a little and we can look the construction in complete silence.




	The first constructions inside already originated in the 11th dynasty (2081-1987), so the Egyptians worked as a whole for more than 2000 years on the sanctum. The temple is consecrated to the god Amun, to the highest one of the Egyptian gods. Reason enough for the Pharaoh ship to decorate the buildings more and more to immortalize themselves in the sanctum.


	Already from wide one we see the mighty first pylon which is connected by a Sphinx avenue of rams with the rests of a small quay. Begun in the 22nd dynasty (from 949 to 717), however the entrance was never finished. So the otherwise usual reliefs are absent and located on the backside of some bricks, which served in the 30th dynasty (380-343) as a scaffold.

In the first big court we could see a statue of II. At his feet there stands his general and royal wife called Nefetaria. He also adores her in the temples of Abu Simbel.
At the same time the statue guards the II. Pylon which leads to the room with the famous 134 papyrus pillars. One look to the floor shows the good quality of the colours of the old Egyptians because you can still find blue and red fragments.

Near the Holy Sea in which the priests washed themselves before the customs in the earlier times we come to a scarab. We don't know if it was there in the time of the pharaohs. But it should give luck if you go around it for five times anticlockwise. A good custom which is used by tourists and indigenous people. Actual: most of the people start to laugh. On the one
hand because the feel stupid and on the other hand because they get problems with their “circulation”.




	While our guide was going to a papyrus company, we went our own way the first time. A show in which you can see that one papyrus band is put down length wise and the other crosswise (a show with only a few movements)is not that what I wanted to see. We ambled through Karnak to take photos of the obelisk of Hatschepsut for example. Then we got comfortable home to SHIP Solaris by an old and nice coachman.



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