Egypt is a great active holiday destination, with the country's desert offering adventurous holidaymakers a chance to experience a camel safari and divers drawn to the clear waters of the Red Sea.

However, if you are looking to find an exciting way of experiencing the country's top attractions — such as ancient Luxor — then there is one experience well worth considering.

For holidaymakers who like heights, a balloon flight will give some of the most incredible views of the Egyptian desert as well as unique views of the courtyards, statues and grand buildings of the ancient sites...

Balloon over the sights of ancient Luxor, travelbite.co.uk, UK, May 17, 2007.

During my first day in [Luxor], which is spread out along the eastern bank of the Nile, I took [Fyodor Dostoevsky's] " " to the Karnak Temple. It wasn't long before I discovered a cubbyhole amid fallen and crumbling pillars and settled down to read.

My eyes pored over sentences like "For the mystery of human existence lies not in just staying alive, but in finding something to live for." At some point a security guard stopped by to ask what I was reading and to offer a cup of tea.

At dawn the next morning, I boarded a ferry bound for the opposite bank. Scores of other travellers were boarding as well. But while they were venturing to the Valley of the Kings — the location of the burial chambers of numerous Pharaohs, including Tutankhamen — or to the stunningly located Temple of Hatshepsut — the 3,500-year-old mortuary temple built by a prominent female Pharaoh — I was heading someplace slightly off the beaten track...

Two young girls and a book made the trip memorable, Joel Carillet, Christian Science Monitor, USA, May 25, 2007.

The new issue of Minerva magazine is available now. It contains an article that may be of interest to Egyptophiles as follows.

• From Poland to the Sudan: 150 Years at the Poznań Archaeological Museum
  by Marek Chlodnicki

Minerva Magazine, London, UK, Volume 18, Number 3, May / June 2007.

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