The temple of Queen Hatshepsut is one of the most considerable temples in the world. The queen's designer, Senenmut, designed it and set it at the head of a valley overshadowed by the Peak of the Thebes, the "Lover of Silence," where lived the goddess who presided over the cemetery. A tree lined avenue of sphinxes led up to the temple, and ramps led from terrace to terrace (veranda). The porticoes on the lowest terrace are out of proportion and coloring with the rest of the building. They were restored in 1906 to protect the celebrated Reliefs depicting the transport of obelisks by barge(boat for transportation) to Karnak and the amazing birth of Queen Hatshepsut.

Reliefs on the south side of the middle terrace show the queen's expedition by way of the Red Sea to Punt, the land of anger. Along the front of the upper terrace, a line of large, gently smiling Osiris statues of the queen looked out over the valley. In the shade of the arcade behind, brightly painted Reliefs (pictures) decorated the walls. Throughout the temple, statues and sphinxes of the queen proliferated. Many of them have been reconstructed, with patience and originality, from the thousands of damaged fragments found by the diggers; some are now in the Cairo Museum, and others the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

On the West Bank of the Nile is Queen Hatshepsut's Al-Deir Al-Bahari temple (circa 1500BCE). Terraces of colonnades are set into the rock of the Theban Hills. Hatshepsut was one of the few female Pharaohs and originally a promenade of trees and sphinxes is believed to have run from the temple to the Nile, 3km to the East. Much of the relief-work and hieroglyphics in the temple remain highly colored.