Taking it up a notch or 5

From the Sinai we took a very fun and terrifying speed boat across the Suez Gulf and then caught a terrible 10 hour bus ride to Aswan in the far south of the country. Our plan was to take a sail boat up the Nile to Luxor but when we saw the dodginess of the "faluccas" we let our Australian friends talk us into a 5 star cruise on a Movenpick boat. We stuffed ourselves on the buffet for three days and saw a number of great Egyptian temples, with tonnes of hieraglyphs and columns. Roman and Greek architecture was clearly based upon and inspired by Egyptian design. The area around the Nile is very green and lush, and contrasts starkly to the barren deserts which surround the narrow strips of life along the river.