Today was a particularly cold morning at the site. It is 18 December and the previous high temperatures have been gone for weeks now. But there is nothing better to warm up than climbing the mountain of Deir el-Bahari each morning and a good tea from Naggar.

The archaeological work at the tomb of Henenu has been completed today. David, Iria and Nisha have finished excavating the last squares. Fragments of cartonnage, mudbricks, ceramics and textiles have been found near the east wall, so this is an area to be taken into account for the next season.

Due to the amount of work at E1, Carmen has moved there for the last days of the campaign. The work is focused on extracting the sand and large stones that had collapsed into the descending corridor. Carmen is in charge of recording the materials that are being extracted. Meanwhile, Raúl is working with the total station and Sergio is directing the excavation.

At Ipi’s tomb, with the documentation completed, the work now focuses on sorting out the storage space inside the tomb. Bea is organising this year’s finds by type of material and context, placing them in boxes on the enormous shelves that occupy part of the tomb’s corridor. For their part, Enrique and Manuel have been studying the mummy that appeared yesterday in E1 and have continued with the skeletal remains found in the courtyard of Ipi.

The conservation team has finished the inventory of special objects from the tomb of Henenu and is continuing with those of Ipi. This allows them, above all, to plan the necessary treatments for the next season. Because many of these objects are fragile, they are also building boxes to store and protect them until they can be treated in the future.

After breakfast, Ella and Rawda returned to Dagi to store the most fragile and important wall painting fragments in boxes and to install a datalogger, which measures the temperature and humidity in the tomb. This will help them understand the environmental conditions there and how they may affect the wall paintings.

Activity at the Marsam continues as it has in recent days, with the whole team working to finish the reports due on 21 December. However, it is hard to forget that we are coming to an end of the season and there is an aura of early nostalgia surrounding the team, knowing that these are our last days together.