Before leaving Luxor today, we visited a local family as part of Trafalgar's Be My Guest program. Through these experiences, Trafalgar guests are invited into a local’s home, where they talk about their craft, their way of life, and their family heritage. Who wants more bread?
The Esna Lock was constructed to control the flow of Nile water to preserve and store it for agriculture and to improve navigation in the river. The lock is a vital waterway on the Nile River that connects the upper and lower parts of the river.
You can check out the Be My Guest experience using this link to our All In The Family blog page.
This afternoon our Nile River cruise ship actually started moving! We've been docked in Luxor for the past two days while exploring this archaeological paradise! Now we begin sailing upstream towards Edfu, where our next stop will be at the imposing Temple of Kom-Ombo tomorrow evening.
So.....what's on the itinerary for the rest of this afternoon? It looks something like this - 1.) grab a book to read, 2.) go to the sundeck on the ship, 3.) find a lounge chair in the shade, 4.) cool off in the pool, and 5.) try to avoid dehydrating by drinking lots of Heineken! Repeat.
Of course, every cruise needs some entertainment. We certainly got that today! It seems the locals use every opportunity they can to "earn" a little extra money from tourists. These local "pirates" pulled up beside us and tried to hawk some merchandise to anyone relaxing on the sundeck. I don't think this is what Amazon had in mind for Prime free delivery in Egypt.
This was actually a great opportunity for us because our cruise ship was hosting an "Egyptian Night" tomorrow evening and encouraged all of us to dress like an Egyptian for the party. Of course, instead of paying $20 onboard the cruise ship for an Egyptian outfit at the gift shop.....we took this opportunity to negotiate a better deal on the black market and bought a few things for only $10 a piece!
These guys were quite the salesmen! They would show us what they had to offer (colors, styles, etc) and then launch several items up to the top deck of our ship for us to size up. Once we found the perfect fit, we stuffed some cash in the items we didn't want and dropped them back down to the boat below.
It was fun while it lasted.....but after a while, someone from our cruise ship got wind of what was happening and used a machete to quickly shut down this black market operation on the Nile River. The ropes that these guys used to hitch to the side of our ship were cut, which immediately put them out of business for the rest of the afternoon.
Who would argue that shopping on the Egyptian black market today wasn't money well spent? Just look at us......and I was ready to show off some of my Egyptian dance moves tomorrow night!
Tonight we would have some additional entertainment during dinner watching our cruise ship pass through the Esna Locks.
The Esna Lock was constructed to control the flow of Nile water to preserve and store it for agriculture and to improve navigation in the river. The lock is a vital waterway on the Nile River that connects the upper and lower parts of the river.
This would not be our first rodeo going through a lock. Again, our previous cruise on the Yangtze River was our first experience with a lock system. When a boat enters the lock, the gates are closed behind it, and the water level in the lock is adjusted to match the level of the river downstream. Once the water level is equalized, the gates on the downstream side of the lock are opened, and the boat can continue its journey down the river.....a total of 6 minutes.
Comments
Post a Comment