For this last segment of our recent Egypt trip, we’ll take you down the Nile and back north to the pyramids.
Sailing south on the Nile means you are traveling up stream, towards it source. After our cruise boat left Luxor, we reached the locks on the Nile in the dark.
The next morning we woke up to find ourselves at Edfu - an amazing temple complex built by the Greeks for the Egyptian gods, during the era of Alexander the Great.
Ancient Egyptians did not live on the west bank of Nile. This was the side of death. Each night, the sun died on the west side. But, if all went well, it was reborn each morning on the east side - the side of life. So people lived on the east bank. Tombs and mortuary temples were built on the west side of the all important river.
When Covid cancelled my school tour of schools across China in 2021, I was doubly disappointed since it would have been the first time that I was able to bring my grandson along. Nico was 10 then. Ever since he was born I dreamed of showing him the world. When our time in China was cancelled, I felt I owed him a trip. “Where would you most want to go?” I asked him. “Egypt!” he answered immediately.
Egypt - fabled land of sphinx and pyramids, of the river Nile and Cleopatra. I didn’t think I’d ever visit here. But - thanks to my books My Librarian is a Camel, the story of libraries around the world, and thanks to Stepping Stones, the story of a refugee family - I received an invitation from an international school in Cairo to come and do author presentations for the students. Of course, that was also an opportunity to plan some travel in Egypt. But where do you start and what is possible?
