It had to arrive – after a uniquely interesting cruise on the River Nile, we have reached the final day of this extended review of the Viking Pharaohs and Pyramids Nile Cruise. The introductory article to this cruise can be found here.
We awoke reasonably early and as we had sailed through the previous evening, I went up on deck to see where we were. A very busy place!
The clue is here in this picture. For the first time on the cruise, we were actually docked alongside another ship! And looking along the side of the ship gives you a view of what this small port of Edfu is actually like early in the morning:
We left the ship at 8:30 to head in our coach to the Edfu temple. Once again, it was not far as it is another of those temples that was partially buried for years under the town which helps to explain its good condition now. The entrance was much busier than any of the previous temples, and this next image might make you think this was going to be massively overcrowded, but I think many of these tourists were, like us, taking advantage of the shade to hear the initial story of the temple from our guides.
Inside actually turned out to be much calmer (except perhaps for the small sanctuary in the center of the complex) and we were able to admire the craftmanship of the carvings on the many walls of the temple. I picked this next image to show the multiple levels of carving around the heads and arms of these figures to get the correct 3-D effect. It is hard to imagine that you start from a flat piece of stone and slowly carve deeper and deeper into it to reveal the top layer that will be visible, perhaps the forehead of the slaves, and then you go deeper to show the nose and eyes, deeper to show arms that are underneath other arms and then make it look as though there are about 4 slaves standing side by side and carrying this boat. One mistake and you start the whole thing again! I’m not sure, but I imagine that these were carved after the wall was actually constructed. Think what a mistake would mean then!
Once again, the local wildlife had made its home in some of the carvings!
If you wonder why these carvings have been destroyed by hammers and chisels – blame the early Christians who decided that depicting these ancient gods was blasphemous and set about chiseling the faces away. There were a few gods that they liked, but this happened up and down the Nile.
Standing proudly outside the main entrance (which I think is called the Pylon) are two massive granite birds representing Horus. A powerful image indeed.
After spending maybe 90 minutes around the temple, we started to make our way to the exit (and the shops that always stand between the exit and the coaches) and by now, it is much less busy that you might have expected.
Our boat then departed Edfu to make its way north towards Luxor with a chance to relax (or pack up the cases) ready for departure the following morning. As usual, there was plenty to see along the banks of the Nile – I was particularly taken with this artistic rendition of some reeds along the riverbank reflected in the still waters of the Nile. Perhaps a print for my wall!
I did see some local fishermen striking the water with a long stick – I think to either stun the fish or surprise them into swimming into the submerged net – I didn’t see any actual fish but they were certainly making a lot of noise.
But there was some excitement to come. We had traveled through the Esna lock on the Nile overnight on our journey south, but now we were about to go through the old lock and dam (which is now just open) and on to the new one that can handle more, and larger, boats:
But finally, we arrived back where we had started, in Luxor. It was just in time to see the evening sunset hot air balloon rides above the desert on the far side of the river which brought back very happy memories of our own adventure in the balloons!
That evening was our final dinner on board and many people had to complete their packing of suitcases ready for an early departure to the airport and back to Cairo. The flight was with the same people as before and we had breakfast bags to take to the airport (although it gets very confusing going through security with these bags and several people lost them along the way!
Once in Cairo, we were taken to the Intercontinental Hotel Citystars, which is relatively close to the airport. There were two optional tours that afternoon – to the Coptic Quarter and alternatively to the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization. We were pretty tired by now and thinking of the next day’s adventure and so just stayed in the hotel. We had our final buffet dinner that evening and farewells to our fellow passengers. Some people had flights late that evening, others mid-way through the night and I think we left the hotel around 4am for our flight to Jordan and the extension there. I’ve covered the overview of that Jordan extension with its visit to Petra in this article.
But this is the end of the very extended story of our Nile Cruise with Viking on the Antares. If you have any questions, please leave them in a comment below, or just contact me and I’ll do my best to answer. I hope you have enjoyed the entire series (or just happily dipped in and out of it!)
You will find the other Viking Cruises I have reviewed on this page in my website.
