Cruised into Esna at 8 and were soon venturing out for the short walk to the Esna Temple.
As usual, you have to pass through a bazaar to get there.
The Temple didn’t look anything very special on the outside to our jaded eyes, but on the inside the decorations were in fabulous condition, having been recently cleaned.
From the Temple it was back to the ship. The only thing I wanted particularly from the market was a proper baseball cap which was surprisingly difficult to source. The hawkers were very excited when I interacted with them and only temporarily dismayed when they didn’t have what I wanted. There was a surprising amount of cooperation on display as one shop owner kept me from leaving while the other hot footed it to parts unknown to return with a cheap and nasty version which I didn’t want. Even as I walked off it seemed everyone knew what it was that I’d asked for. They all called out to me as I walked along the bazaar “Hey lady!” In the end it was the guy at the very last stall who grabbed one from somewhere, I suspect from the head of a friend. He overcharged me horribly – I beat him down from 1200 Egyptian pounds to 500 which sounds impressive but I suspect wasn’t particularly.
Shortly after we got back we set off to return to Luxor, which I learned yesterday used to be called Thebes in ancient times. The books say “not to be confused with the city of Thebes in Ancient Greece”, which seems wildly optimistic. Why wouldn’t you get them mixed up? I was thinking of the city in the Disney movie Hercules, I suspect that’s likely to be the Greek one sadly.
As we set off, we were followed by some more hawkers, these ones water based. They called out to me, trying to sell me a cotton tablecloth. When I didn’t reply they asked what language I spoke so I said français, and he immediately switched languages, clearly fluent in market-speak in many tongues.
We came across more, known as pirates, as we reached the lock soon after we set off. One of our group is a New Yorker called Tony who grew up in Lebanon, and was fluent in Arabic. He gave us a masterclass in haggling, and ended up buying two tablecloths for ten USD. The pirates called him Ali Baba. All the negotiations are shouted from the water level vendors in their flimsy boats, and the passengers who are on the top deck. If anyone looks vaguely interested the pirates will throw the goods up in plastic bags with an extremely accurate throw. For payment they throw you a plastic back weighted with a T shirt, you put the money in and throw it back. It’s fun to watch. Of course they rely on some honesty from the passengers. There’d be nothing stopping you keeping what they throw and not paying, but it can’t happen often enough to put them off.
We reached Luxor mid afternoon, I had a final swim in the pool and then we went to happy hour that had Arabian dancers as entertainment. This included the local version of a whirling dervish which was quite different from the ones I saw some years ago in Cappadocia.
I was sitting safely behind the front row, where I wasn’t at risk from audience participation. Or so I thought. I got pulled out to help with some dance with sticks. I was one rum daiquiri down, so was disinhibited enough to try and be a good sport, but too far gone to be coordinated. A poor combination. Groan.
Dinner, bed, another early start tomorrow.