Egypt: Queen Hatshepsut Temple (Luxor)

Last stop on the Nile Cruise was Luxor (also known as Thebes) - basically it was the capital of Ancient Egypt for most of its history.

We visited the West side of the Nile in the morning, and then spent the afternoon on the East side. If you remember from the Pyramids in Giza, the Egyptians believed that the West side of the Nile should only be for their dead - so that's where the pharoahs, queens, and tombs all are.
The first place we stopped at was Queen Hatshepsut's Temple.

Queen Hatshepsut was actually a pharoah and is considered one of the most successful rulers of Egypt. Unfortunately, since women were forbidden to rule Egypt, she basically pretended to be a man. I'm not sure how that worked either - but I guess if you can lose a huge Temple (see Edfu), you can make people think a woman pharoah is a man.

Surrounding the area of this temple are many tombs for nobility of Ancient Egypt.