Wednesday

Well, this is the end. We are staying at the Old Cataract Hotel, which is under the same management (but nothing like as good) as the Winter Garden in Luxor. Spectacular views, though, and a really good street market. Lovely fresh produce, with incense burning on fruit stalls to keep the flies away. The artefacts are good, the produce is good, the traders are friendly and all we now have to do is endure the obligatory cruise up the Nile on a tacky old boat with organized trips and canteen catering and then, yippee, back to the only remaining civilized country in the Mediterranean, Spain!