Day 34: Oct 8th: Dedicated to the ancient god, Horus

In the night (around midnight) we went through the lock. There wasn't much to look at, but you could feel the boat knocking the side of the lock with a jolt during the hour it took to get two boats through. No wonder we were sitting at the lock for over 7 hours!

In the morning we awoke early to tour the temple of Edfu. This temple was dedicated to Horus, the falcon god. Again, we saw huge statues, colorful decorations and wall reliefs. It's hard to describe because all the temples are so different, but on paper (or in our cyber-world) they all sound the same!

We went back to the boat for a few hours to have a dip in the pool, lunch, shower, and have tea time before heading for a tour of Kom Ombo. This site was also very beautiful and packed with endless reliefs on the walls. It's dedicated to Horus and Sobek, the crocodile god of healing. We were there at sunset and saw the whole temple light up, first with the last rays of sunlight from across the Nile, then with the giant lights from the floor.

We rushed back to the ship to make it back before we set sail for Aswan. We shared yet another lovely dinner with Mark and Eleanor, before heading upstairs for the Galabaya party.
This was one of the weirdest parties that either of us had ever been to. The point was to dress up like an Egyptian. Of course, neither of us had bought traditional Egyptian clothing, and weren't comfortable covering our heads in the traditional Muslim manner, so we just wore shawls and kind of went along for the ride.

So the 'costume party' part did not make it weird. What made it weird was the crazy games that they had us playing. (And of course the fact that everyone spoke a different language). For exanple, one of the games was for the women to dance in a circle, and when the music stopped, to grab a spoon. Of course, there were casualties. Eleanor and I had the same idea to grab a spoon across the way and both ended up sliding for it at the same time...we both got minor floorburn - mine wasn't as bad seeing as I know how to properly slide :) - and I ended up winning some fruit juice. It was very exciting. Another game was "for couples", so Karla and I got up right away. The object was for her to mummify me with TP to the best of her ability in 5 minutes. We tied this game with Mark and Eleanor. We were all pretty proud of our table of champs!

After the Galabaya, Karla and I played ping pong with another friend, Matthew, that we had made from South Africa, and are now looking at very little sleep. Tomorrow's another early day!

We almost forgot to mention that upon returning to our rooms for lunch time, we found a nice surprise in our room. They had made a crocodile out of our towels. They were so proud of themselves when they came over to make sure we liked it. The day before they had made swans. Clearly they have far too much time on their hands.
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