Travel: Sprawling Luxor and a Nile cruise

How do you top birthday celebrations trekking to see tigers in Nepal, scuba-diving off the Fiji islands, taking bullfighting lessons with a matador in Colombia or sojourning among rug makers in the Medina of Fez?

This was the question as another big birthday loomed. Thinking back on the memories of my best birthdays, they all involved mind-opening adventures with my kids. But now that we've evolved into a large blended family of far-flung parents, children and grandchildren, putting such a trip together would be more of a challenge.
Egypt turned out to be the place to go.

I had been there more than 25 years ago with an alumni group. We had toured the sites between Luxor and Aswan aboard a luxury "hotel boat," then a relatively novel way to cruise the Nile River. I had vowed to return someday with my family.

This time we were looking for something more intimate, a boat that would accommodate just the six seasoned travelers in our party. The Royal Cleopatra, a 100-year-old "sandal," or wooden sailboat, with two larger cabins and one small cabin, fit the bill.

No visit to Egypt is complete without time in Luxor, home to Ancient Egypt's Golden Age. Egypt's seat of power from 2,100 to 750 BC, Luxor is sometimes referred to as "the world's largest open-air museum."

During the height of the dynastic era called The New Kingdom, the city's population reached 1 million. For those key 400 years -- from 1567 to 1085 BC -- Egypt's power and wealth, and its tremendous cultural achievements, were unrivaled throughout the world.

Everything about life in Ancient Egypt rotated around religion. Take government. The pharaoh was the ruler, but also was held to be a living god. And the ruling caste was populated by powerful, learned priests whose roles expanded well beyond religion as we think of it. They served as doctors, architects, astronomers, policy makers, and more.

Karnak Temple is arguably antiquity's greatest shrine. It covers more than 100 acres, and took more than 1,300 years to build. The celebrated centerpiece of Karnak, the so-called Hypostyle Hall, alone takes up 60,000 square feet. It contains 134 stone columns, each 80 feet tall and 33 feet in diameter. The sight of gigantic stone slabs forming the ceiling of this hall held our little band in awe as we stood below them and tried to imagine ancient engineers tackling the challenge of placing them so perfectly.

Karnak comprised a stunning array of temples, chapels, pylons and obelisks. Eighty thousand men worked there as priests, guards, administrators, servants and laborers. Buried under sand in the dry Egyptian climate for more than 1,000 years, it is among those sites along the Nile that have miraculously survived more or less intact. Even bright colors found on temple columns and walls date from the original construction more than 3,000 years ago.

A mile-long path, once lined on both sides by uninterrupted rows of sphinx statues, leads to Karnak's satellite site, Luxor Temple. While smaller and more compact than Karnak, Luxor Temple is no less majestic.