Masato's Egypt Adventure

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Masato
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Re: Masato's Egypt Adventure

Postby Masato » Wed Sep 18, 2019 11:48 pm

My son got a bit sick, they say not to drink the water there. We had been brushing our teeth with it etc so no surprise at least one of us got sick. But the guide said this happens all the time and had some medicine he swore would work.

So we gave him the medicine, and the next day I stayed on the boat with him and slept in while Mrs Masato and my daughter got up at 3am for another bus trip to a place called Abu Simbal. They said the trip was great, but I was frankly happy to not wake up at 3am, sleep in, and hang out with the kid for a day.

Mrs Masato and my daughter however took some pics:

Bus left at 3am, they arrived just as the sun was coming up:
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ABU SIMBAL
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A real MIRAGE: can you see how it looks like there's water over there?
There isn't, lol
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Postby Masato » Wed Sep 18, 2019 11:55 pm

The next day Mrs Masato returned the favor and slept in with the kids and I got to go see another place all by myself. This was great because the kids were quite great but parenting 24-7 can drive you mad lol

Nice to have some time to STFU and just be by myself and enjoy things without having to keep an eye on all the dad stuff.

EDFU TEMPLE:

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'Holy of Holies' or something like that. The inner most sacred room for elites only to do their highest magic:
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BATS on the roof of the temple, they were flying all around but the roof is like 15-20 feet high so they didn't freak anyone out
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Almost everywhere we went, you would find the faces consistently defaced and chiselled out. This apparently was done by Christians, they would come and destroy any faces of gods or animal-headed creatures etc. Blasphemy I guess. A shame imo
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Horus:
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Rode in a freakin horse and carriage to get from the boat to the temple:
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Back to the boat. If you look you can see horses and carriages on the street up and down all day as taxis to the temple. No real taxis anywhere to be seen
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Postby Masato » Thu Sep 19, 2019 12:03 am

FYI:

For dummies like me keep in mind these are all BC, so add 2000 years to all these numbers. 3100 BC = 5100 years ago, etc

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Back on the Nile cruise. Most relaxing part of the trip. Lil' Masato was feeling better, we just chilled for a bit here and watched the Nile go by. It might not have looked so different a few hundred years ago

Lush around the Nile, but not far away it instantly turns to inhospitable desert:
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We'd see animals, and sometimes people out here doing god knows what. Seemed miles from any sort of structures, they were way out on the middle of nowhere:
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Passed a few small towns along the Nile:
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At one point, these locals ATTACHED THEMSELVES to the boat, and proceeded to start calling everyone on deck to see their wares and sellables from their little boats as they piggybacked on us for hours. They woke up Mrs Masato lol, calling and yelling for people to look over
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At one point we went into a lock, and the sellers were trapped inside. Everyone was confused how the fuck they'd get out without being crushed or whatever but they just went through no problem. They attached to us for a really long ways, we figure they would just hitch another ride back and there's a days work. Interesting gig
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Our cabin:
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Postby Luigi » Thu Sep 19, 2019 12:07 am

Sounds like a great trip. Funny you have to go on long bus rides when there is a giant river that can take you to anywhere in the country.
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Postby Masato » Thu Sep 19, 2019 12:14 am

LUXOR TEMPLE

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On the underside of some the overhead blocks, the colors of the original paint was still visible:
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KARNAK TEMPLE

Was cool we got here at night and they had these cool lights on everything:
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Postby Canuckster » Thu Sep 19, 2019 12:15 am

Oh man, enjoy, me so jelly
People say they all want the truth, but when they are confronted with a truth that disagrees with them, they balk at it as if it were an unwanted zombie apocalypse come to destroy civilization.

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Postby Masato » Thu Sep 19, 2019 12:30 am

Another highlight of the trip was the VALLEY OF THE KINGS

In the middle of fucking nowhere, there are tons of hidden underground tombs and tunnels where many of the most important pharaohs were buried with all their loot. There are no fancy temples visible from the ground, it looks like nothing but its full of shit hidden underground.

This is where they found Tutankhamen's tomb which was found by accident and had escaped 1000's of years of tomb robbers. But they are STILL DIGGING and looking for new stuff, as many pharaohs which should have been buried here have still not been found. Apparently sonar or whatever they have from satellites does not work because its too mountainous/rocky. So they are still hunting for loot the old fashioned way.

Here is a cool 3D model they made at the entrance for toursists:

This is a model of ABOVE GROUND, it shows the roads in black, and the little triangles are all the places they have dug and found shit.
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Then if you look UNDER the surface, you can see a scale model of all the tunnels and tombs they've mapped out from each of the little entrances:
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These tombs were crazy because since they were sealed up and protected from the elements, they were almost perfectly preserved. All the colors and paint inside were still there, you could see the brushstrokes as though it were painted yesterday:
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This was our guide. He was a badass. Not only a legit education in Egyptology and a walking encyclopedia (he could even read some hieroglyphics), but very street smart and able to handle any riffraff from the locals or bullshit with authority. He kept referring to most Egyptians as idiots. Later he explained that it sounded like he was being harsh but in his opinion they were actual idiots, lol he said with no education or knowledge of the world. He treated them kindly but as such, was interesting to watch him work
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trucks hauling out rocks and sand all day, still actively searching for treasure:
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If you look close you can see dudes in the background working in the hot sun hauling wheelbarrows of rocks back and forth, paid hands to dig and look for loot:
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Postby Masato » Thu Sep 19, 2019 12:36 am

After our guide took us to the shop of a friend of his.

Story goes that this guy had found some stuff under the rocks near his town and it was full of loot and he became a millionaire. Now he runs a studio and shop paying locals to make authentic alabaster stuff in the same style as the ancients and sell it to fools like us for ridiculously low prices.

He seemed rather crazy to me, but our guide warned us so lol
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This was his town:
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Temple of Queen Hatshepsut:
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Back on the bus for more multi-hour long rides through the desert to get to the Red Sea. In the days before cellphones I suppose if you car/bus breaks down you are fucking dead lol

This scenery went on for hours:
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yet sometimes I would see inexplicable dwellings, tents and mud huts in the middle of literally nowhere. I can't guess what they are doing there or how they survive. Fucking jawas I guess lol
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Postby Masato » Thu Sep 19, 2019 12:38 am

Canuckster wrote:Oh man, enjoy, me so jelly


dude it is really very cheap as far as traveling goes...

The whole tour was like $650 per person for 9 full days of tours, most meals included. Not including airfare but if you can score a good deal on flights the whole thing ended up being a really an amazing deal

You could probably get it for even less than $650 per person because we were sold the package through a middle man. If you went straight to the actual tour company (TIMELESS TOURS - I would recommend them) you may knock off as much as 20-30% of that.

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Postby Masato » Thu Sep 19, 2019 12:47 am

The RED SEA

After days of dry desert rocks and sand this was a sight for sore eyes

We went snorkelling and scuba diving for the day:
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anchored at a coral reef, apparently some of the best in the world for snorkel ans scuba
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Daughter getting ready to go scuba diving:
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Lil Mas:
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Kids coming up to surface again:
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I had tried scuba before and didn't like it, but the kids came up and said it was so great so I went for round 2 and the next spot. Fuckin LOVED it. Now I get it. Super fun.

Then back on the bus again return to Cairo.

For hours, out the right side of the bus was beautiful Red Sea... and out the left side was miles of empty desert deathlands
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