I'm an animal lover and share my house with my 5 rats (and my husband). My hobbies are learning lang...
I'm an animal lover and share my house with my 5 rats (and my husband). My hobbies are learning languages, tap dancing, figure skating, snowboarding and scuba diving.
Member since:02.02.2001
Reviews:30
Members who trust:11
My husband and I spent 2 weeks in Luxor for our honeymoon. It was our first time in Egypt and the first time my husband had visited an Arab country.
We stayed in a small, family run hotel called the St Joseph. It was very friendly and all the holidaymakers staying there got to know each other so the atmosphere was really good. The hotel provided entertainment most evenings which was just as well because there wasn't much going on at nights in Luxor. I loved Luxor but I was disappointed that the only places you could safely eat in were hotels which served up international food at more or less the same prices you would expect to pay in the UK.
We did the usual tours of the various temples and we did find the entrance fees for most of the museums a bit expensive at around £7 a time. I wondered if any of the locals could ever afford to visit them or if it was just an overinflated price specially for the tourists. One of the highlights of our stay was being taken round the town in a horse drawn carriage by a very nice man called Mohammed who treated his horse extremely well. He even invited us out to his house for the day.
A useful tip to avoid being hassled by the carriage drivers asking you if you want a lift is to walk on the side of the pavement going against the traffic. If you are walking in the direction the carriage is going in you will get constant hassle to accept a lift. It is a good idea to agree a price before you get in either carriages or taxis.
The people are extremely friendly and will invite you to their houses or to weddings which normally happen every Thursday. About 90% of the population are moslems with the rest being made up of various religions including coptic Christian.
If you enjoy bargaining then this is the place to be, but if you don't then make sure you go into the shops with fixed price notices outside them. We went in September and we decided to buy all our Christmas gifts in Luxor because of the price and the opportunity to pick up some unusual presents for friends. We found a shop in the back streets of Luxor that sold good quality football shirts for around £8. We picked up ones for Mexico, Morocco and an Egyptian one as well.
The Arabs are really nice people but expect to be hassled when you wander round the markets and shops. This kind of hassle didn't bother us much, however, we were slightly shocked at the amount of people who would ask you very personal questions about your sex life! They seem to think that Europeans are at it constantly.
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Thanks for a great opinion, and one of the single most original and helpful travel tips I've come across in many a long while - walk in the opposing direction to the traffic flow to minimize taxi aggravation! Amazing!
rustifer 16.02.2001 15:46
In reply to a comment on my Luxor opinion about whether or not I have ever thought of the consequences of visitng a place where people have been massacred or murdered, I would not be inclined to go somewhere during full scale war. However, what happened in Egypt can happen anywhere. I was working in Turkey when tourists were massacred in Fethiye. I was working in Paris at the time when the Jewish areas were being bombed and I spent a lot of time in Derry, Ireland, in the seventies visiting my family, where bombs were going off on a regular basis. I believe that what is for you will not go by you and that you can't live your life wondering what might happen to you.
Plissken 16.02.2001 15:15
We were all booked up for Egypt around four years ago, until that group of tourists were butchered...didn't that sort of fanatical behaviour ever worry you?
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Feb 16th, 2001
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