How I Mine For Craft?

I've taken up Minecraft.

I actually took up Minecraft a while back, but getting it on my laptop on Thursday night has guaranteed that my academic career is going to be sufficiently imperilled. So I might as well show you guys what's destroying my free time now!

Back when I was living with Caveman, I tried create this huge underground version of ancient Babylon, complete with artificial sunrise and everything. Making the cavern was really time-consuming, though, so I decided to not start there. Instead, I started in a desert area near a river, so I decided I was gonna rock ancient and medieval Egypt. (I say medieval because I wanna make bazaars and the Hanging Church and such.) It's not gonna be a literal copy; I'm not going to recreate the world map and such because that would be a bitch. But I'm going to make civilizations appropriate to each biome I come across, and I'm starting in Egypt.

Anyway, pics!

We're starting on the Wannabe Nile, looking at large statues of nondescript pharaohs carved into the side of a mountain. They each bear the crook and staff, symbols of royal Egyptian power, and they both have those pharaoh goatees going on.

Now we're outside the temple. There's trees growing outside, the temple pillars have a leafy theme going on and the winged disk motif is on the top of the temple.

There's a sphinx in the center of the temple. There's also a passageway behind it.

The passageway has several motifs on it: ankhs, a scene of the pharaohs of Upper and Lower Egypt watching as a peasant in a boat harvests reeds, and the winged disc motif once more.

Going up some stairs and further down the corridor, we see a pool with an enchanted altar on the other end, and off to the side appears to be two places where waterfalls pour. Let's go down them!

It's a port hidden underneath the mountain! And like any good port in Egypt, it's got a bazaar right nearby for merchants to buy and sell their goods. There's a tavern where you can get a drink, there's a bookseller, there's someone offering some enchanted mushrooms, there's a pumpkin-seller, there's a smithy, there's a vendor of potted plants, there's another mushroom seller, and there's a... door beyond the archway? Let's check that out next.

Those are some swanky digs! Just like my real house, bookshelves are walls, dividing a bedroom, a workroom, a bathroom of sorts and an enchanting room... everything the ambitious Minecrafter might need, and protected from entry by monsters and villagers if I ever decide to play in anything besides Peaceful/Creative. And there's even a big window with which to look upon the port below.

Now, across from the front door was an area with some stairs... let's check that out.

They look like they go on forever! In point of fact, they go on all the way down to bedrock, but there's nothing down there yet. Eventually I'm going to put in a worldwide subway system, and when I do every place is going to be connected to it through a system like this.

Anyway, that's what I've spent all day doing. Hope you guys like it! I'll post more when there's more to post.