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| Picture by Kolohe |
When I was younger, I always wanted to travel to Egypt to see the pyramids; but as I got older, I removed the pyramids from my bucket list. Then, surprisingly, Heather and Kolohe decided that they were going to Egypt and I was going along. At first I was a little reluctant to go, but then decided it would probably be a trip that I would not want to miss. A few years ago, Heather had an Egyptian foreign exchange teacher live with them for a year and then Heather and Brent had traveled to Egypt to visit her family. Since they enjoyed their trip so much, Heather wanted to return to visit the family and several other people that she had met while on their previous visit. This sounded like a really great trip. How could I not go.
On a Friday afternoon Kolohe and I flew from Las Vegas to Los Angeles, where we had a layover before we boarded a direct flight to Paris-De Gauille Airport in France. While waiting at the airport, there was a beautiful sunset over the LAX runway. Then, when boarding, Kolohe said it was going to be a great flight because she saw an "Aloha jacket" laying on the jetway control panel as we entered the aircraft.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
As we left LAX airport, we had a nice view of the Los Angeles coastline. We waved goodbye to Los Angeles and headed eastward.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
Unfortunately, the air turbulences were really bad almost all of the way to France, so we did not get any sleep. Because there was a 9 hour time difference between Los Angeles and Paris, it was almost 5 PM local time on Saturday when we landed in Paris.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
After going through customs at Charles-de-Gaulle Airport in Paris, we met Heather, Sophia, and Heather's friend Lynsey and her father Lynn. We had a two hour lay-over and then caught a direct flight to Cairo, Egypt.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
It was a little after midnight when we arrived in Cairo and Heather's friend Ali met us at the airport and arranged for transportation to the hotel.
The hotel lobby was highly decorated with Egyptian art and Ali made certain that we were checked into our rooms without any problems. We were really tired and collapsed on our beds. It was 2:30 AM Sunday morning.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
We managed to sleep for a few hours and when we woke up and looked out from our room's balcony, we had a partial view of the Pyramids of Giza.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
Khaled El-masry, our Egyptian guide, met us at the hotel and said we needed to start our visit with a tour of the Saqqara Archaeological Site, which is on the west side of the Nile River and south of Cairo. There are at least 16 pyramids in this area. Unfortunately, many of the pyramids have been vandalized (both inside and outside) and some of the pyramids just look like a large pile of rubble.
Saqqara is currently the most active archeological area in Egypt, where there are several excavations currently in progress. A number of recent discoveries have been made at the site.
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| Picture by Heather |
While Khaled was at the Saqqara entrance gate purching our tickets, we walked across the road to take pictures of the King Unas Valley Temple. The ruins are now partially covered with sand and it is difficult to see the Processional Ramp Road that runs from the Valley Temple to the eastern side of the Unas Funerary Temple over 1 km (about 3/4 mile) to the west. The Pyramid of Unas is now only a small pile of stones located on the south side of the Pyramid of Djoser ("Step Pyramid"). (In the picture there is a man leading a camel traveling toward the Djoser Complex.)
Over the past 5,000 years the Nile River has changed courses many times and the King Unas Valley Temple is now about one mile from the river. However, when the temple was constructed, the temple was a docking point on the west bank of the Nile. The Processional Ramp led from the river water to the temple and then up to the pyramids.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
As we were driving up the Pyramid of Djoser Road, we passed by one of the current excavation sites near the Tomb of Maia. Maia is believed to be the wet-nurse for King Tutankhamun and it is hoped that current excavations will discover more information about his early life. Major finds at the site include Door of the Cats, a catacomb of hundreds of mummified cats, and the rare wooden Ka-aper statue. Since excavation work was in progress, we were not allowed to get out of our tour van and taking pictures through the tinted glass windows was difficult.
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| Picture by Koilohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
The Djoser Pyramid ("Step Pyramid") complex is 544 by 277 meters (1,785 by 945 feet) and covers about 150,000 square meters (about 38 acres). At one time the complex was completely surrounded by a 10.5 meter (35 feet) rock wall. Most of the wall has now been destroyed. Although there were 14 "dummy" doors through the wall, there was only one actual entrance door. It is unknown why there are "dummy" doors, since the doors do not appear to be symbolic of anything or have any known religious purposes.
Once through the entrance door, there was a narrow passage with a stone roof that imitated palm-logs. The passage lead to a stone antechamber that had huge dummy doors carved on the walls, complete with hinges.
The antechamber connected to the Hall Colonnade that was comprised of 40 columns, each joined by a recess between the columns. It is unknown what was in the recesses, but it is believed that the recesses contained statues.
The Hall Colonnade exited into the 15,000 square meter (3.7 acre) Great Courtyard, which contained the Djoser Pyramid and other structures. Wandering around the Courtyard were various entrepreneurs that were selling goods and souvenirs.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Heather |
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| Picture by Heather |
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| Picture by Heather |
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| Picture by Heather |
The South Tomb is located in the southwest corner of the Great Courtyard. The purpose of the tomb is unknown, but it may have been intended for the king's organs that had been removed from his body.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
Located on the eastern side of the Courtyard is the Royal Pavilion, also known as the Heb-Sed Temple. This is where royal celebrations were held. The Heb-Sed festival that was held here is one of the oldest religious festivals in the history of humanity.
The Djoser Pyramid was built by King Djoser, the first king of the Third Dynasty around 2700 BC. This was the first pyramid ever built and the first large stone building in history. The pyramid was enlarged several times and eventually measured 121 meters (about 400 feet) by 109 meters (about 360 feet) and was 60 meters (about 200 feet) tall.
Before King Djoser, kings and dignitaries were buried in a large rectangular buildings called Mastabas, which were constructed out of mud-bricks. Djoser is known as the king that started construction with stone. Djoser's pyramid is a series of Masabas stacked on top of each other; thus the stepped shape. The step design is considered to be a giant stairway that King Djoser would climb after being resurrected to join the sun god Ra in the sky.
Located on the east side of the pyramid is a subterranean entrance that was not open to the public. The South and North Pavilions are also located east of the Pyramid.
Both the South and North Pavilions are "dummy" structures of unknown use. It is believed that in combination, the two Pavilions are symbolic of King Djoser's rule over the North and South of Egypt, or the whole of Egypt.
The South Pavilion contains some of the earliest know graffiti that occurred about 1,000 years after the pyramid was constructed. Inscribed in hieratic, the cursive form of hieroglyphics, Egyptians from the North came to Saqqara to see the pyramids and left inscriptions on the walls of the South Pavilion. The inscriptions are now protected by glass.
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| Picture by Heather |
The entrance to the North Pavilion has collapsed and only a few walls remain standing.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
Located northwest of Djoser's Pyramid are rows of stone blocks that were discovered in the Pyramid's burial chamber. The blocks are assumed to be from the ceiling and are stored outside of the pyramid until it can be determined where the block came from.
The Mortuary Temple is located on the north side of the Pyramid,
rather than the east side, which reflects a transition in religious ideology
that was taking place during the Third Dynasty. A placard states: "The fact that the Djoser mortuary temple faces north indicates that he was more concerned with the circumpolar stars in the northern sky than with the sun as a means of successful transition to eternal life beyond death."
The north entrance to the pyramid has steps that lead from the Mortuary Temple down 28 meters (about 92 feet) to the burial chamber of King Djoser. We were able to walk down the steps, but the burial chamber was not open to the public.
A placard stated that there were over 30,000 stone vessels discovered in the chambers under the pyramid. The vessels were made of alabaster, diorite, limestone, and slate. Some of the vessels were polished, while others bore inscriptions and engravements. A number of vessels were painted in colors with royal and nonroyal names.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
Located northeast of the Djoser Complex is the Pyramid of Userkaf, who was the founder of the fifth dynasty. He ruled only 7 years before his death. His pyramid was built with local limestone and has deteriorated greatly.
After leaving the Djoser Complex, we drove north to the Pyramid of Teti and various other Tombs. (In the picture, there is a car driving on the road between sand dunes.)
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| Picture by Kolohe |
While we were walking from the parking lot to King Teti's Pyramid, some workers demonstrated how anciently stone blocks were shaped when building the pyramids and tombs.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
Teti was the first king of the Sixth Dynasty and his pyramid has suffered enormous damage from workers who removed the exterior covering and many large blocks of granite. Located on the north side of the Pyramid was an entrance that was open to the public, but people were warned that they may want to skip a trip to the burial chamber if they had claustrophobia.
After descending a steep, narrow flight of stairs with a low ceiling, there was a small narrow horizontal tunnel, which also had a low ceiling, that led to the burial chamber and two other rooms. Located in the burial chamber was a sarcophagus that was constructed of bekhen stone and is still located in its original position. There are various hieroglyphic inscriptions on some of the room walls and there wee stars on the ceiling. The hieroglyphic texts on the walls are known as "Pyramid Texts" that are religious texts to help the dead king towards resurrection and showed him how to join the sun god RA in the sky.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Pyramid Staff Member on Ronnie's Camera |
Directly north of Teti's Pyramid is the Tomb of Kagemni, Chief Justice and Vizier of King Teti. The Tomb is decorated with scenes of daily life, including scenes of dancing, hunting, poultry fattening, presentations of offerings, and shrubs. One room is dedicated to the transportation of the seven sacred oils, which they believed were for the resurrection ritual. It was amazing that after thousands of years, some of the panels still contained colors, particularly reds and blacks.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Heather |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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| Picture by Kolohe |
Everywhere we went, there were a number of feral cats and dogs looking for a handout. As we were leaving the pyramids, Khaled gave the leftovers from our breakfast boxes to the dogs.
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| Picture by Kolohe |
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