Egypt Part The Third 2022 - Warning - Archaeology Alert!!!! The Valley Of The Queens and The ''New'' City Of Aten

 After my last visit I did a couple of updates on new discoveries but didn't include the 'Dazzling'' city of Aten not far from the Colossi of Memnon... 

Excavation work has been continuing apace here for a while but as yet it is not open to the public....

So you are saved one bit of history!!

Moving right along... The Valley of the Queen's gets a bit neglected I am sorry to say, mainly I supposed because it is not quite so ''exciting'' and doesn't contain the tomb of King Tut, Seti, etc., etc., etc.,

Indeed I myself have neglected it in the past and so time to make amends..

Mentioning my thoughts to the boy, he promptly offered to take me there at a 'special rate' which means I am going to have to buy lunch again, and that as we are heading that way it will probably be in the subterranean cafe in Al Qarnah, their speciality is pigeon by the way... As it turned out the price i had to pay was to get the car fully valetted for the occasion, this cost me the grand total of about £3.50 (70 LE), plus two cups of tea, 20 LE..

This again was an experience which most tourists don't get, i never knew that washing a car needed so much shouting, and while it was being done I was sat on a bench with 3 elderly Egyptians who insisted on speaking German to me, in the end I gave up telling them I was English and replied with my very limited German.

Now one thing we all know about the Valley of the Queen's is that is contains the tomb of Nefertari which is the main reason for going there..... Or so I thought until I looked at the price of the tickets..... To see the tomb of Queen Nefertari will set you back a whopping 1400 EGP or 70 quid in English money.

And I am sorry I am just no paying that so I settle for the normal ticket of 100 EGP (a fiver)..

The Queen's Valley is a lot less crowded than the King's indeed it is quite pleasantly uncrowded and there is a really strong north west wind blowing straight down the valley which means I had to take the Panama off.

And like the King's Valley the landscape is somewhat alien and pitted with holes everywhere..

I must say the tombs here are impressive, not in size perhaps but in the quality of carving and in the colours that have survived thousands of year. Oh if only modern paint manufacturers could make paint that lasted that long today..

i have already made the comment that one camera has given up the ghost, and the Canon is rapidly depleting its battery so I am reduced to a phone camera which means I can at least take a video.

The Egyptian Govt has given up charging for using cameras these days, mainly because every phone is now a camera and they couldn't make people leave their phones at the ticket office as there would be thousands of them in cubby holes, they do still charge for a camera tripod though...

So I got to see three tombs, which from the set up appear to be the only 3 that are open, apart from Nefertari's, although if you look around the place is full of burial shafts and other 'walk in' tombs which are not open... For some reason the tomb of Queen Titi, (Teyet) ahs a large sign on the door saying NO PHOTOGRAPHS, and the man in charge was applying this quite rigourously, although no doubt a 100LE note pressed into the palm of his hand would have changed his mind.

I did take a couple of stills inside but the conditions for photography are difficult because all the walls are protected by perspex screens to keep sticky fingers at bay, and of course the screens are not only dusty but do have sticky finger marks on them so you have to contend with that and also the reflections from the lights.

Hopefully though you can still see the carvings and colouring sufficiently well to be impressed!

By the way on the way out the the man in charge of the ''very clean toilets'' has taken the price for Nefertari's tomb to heart and is asking a piss taking price of 5 LE as against the normal 1 LE, (it used to be less than that but they seems to have stopped using all the piastra coins these days).

Needless to say he only got 1 LE from me and nothing from some other people,,, so on with the videos..

Firstly the tomb of Prince Amenkhopshef...

And second the tomb of Prince Sethherkhopshef...

And sadly I am now getting near to end of my stay because it is Saturday 19th February and tomorrow I have to get a pcr test, but still more time for a bit of out and about!! Meanwhile a picture of the resident dog at the Valley of the Queen's, and like the King's Valley the people trying to sell you alabaster and papier mache statues and replicas are a bloody nuisance....