Egypt - Days 4, 5, & 6

Tues, July 27th
So, on a typical train, you don't get food. But...sometimes, when it's a first class train, like in India, you get a meal. So there I was last night, deeply sleeping, when the food dude woke me up, asking "What time would you like me to return for your breakfast?" In a daze, I did not understand, so he repeated it. A bit confused, I figured, OK, it must be included. So, in the morning, he woke me up again and asked if I was ready for breakfast. I was half asleep again, but said OK. So, he gave me a couple of pieces of stale bread with salty, tasteless cheese, along with a cup of tea, and then went away. I forced the food down and went back to sleep (yeah, as you can see, I slept a lot). So, another hour later, when we were almost at Aswan, the guy wakes me up again and asks for money. Damn, I should have known. But why did he keep waking me up to ask if I wanted anything? Annoyed, I asked how much. 25 Egyptian pounds!?! That's 5 USD, or about 15 pounds more than it should have been. At any rate, I was stuck, paid the dude, and gave him an angry look on his way out of the car. But on the bright side, it gave Dan and Billy something to laugh at me about for the rest of the trip.

We arrived to 43 degree (about 110 degree Fahrenheit) heat in Aswan and went to the Nida Nile Hotel. A bit dark, with poor beds, it at least had AC, and was actually cheaper than I expected. In fact, I only paid 225 USD for this entire trip (compared to about 5 times as much if I had booked it from home), from the pyramids, through Aswan, to Abu Simbel, around Luxor, and then back to Cairo, so I did not even expect to stay in a place this good.

The three of us grabbed lunch, not without people trying to scam us (overcharging, and who would ever imagine a kebab shop running out of kebabs at noon?). Next up was sightseeing, as we visted the High dam. It was OK, but not worth having to pay a chunk of money just to step out of the van for 5 minutes. On an interesting note, it is the 3rd largest dam in the world, provides most of Egypts electricity, and created the largest man made lake in the world, Lake Nessar.

Our last stop of the day was Philae temple. A temple hyped for being romantic, it truly was beautiful. Set on an island (having been moved from another after being flooded once the dam was built), it has a ton of amazing carvings. Being the first carved temple that I saw, it really stands out to me.

Another day through, I ran into Rachelle and we had food, shisha, and a great conversation. The shisha is great hear, even as a nonsmoker. I love the way that you can just sit back, relax, and watch the world go by. It really makes me feel like I am experiencing the egyptian culture, beyond just being a tourist.


Wed, July 28th
Here I lay, on a felluca in the middle of the Nile River. It's quite surreal. I am with a group of 9 other travelers and two boat guides. The sun has just gone down. The hot wind continues, blowing across the desert and across the water towards us. But, how did we get to this point?

The day began at 2:45 am, when I received the wake up call from the front desk at our hotel. We met in the lobby at 3:15 and were on our way to meet up with the rest of the convoy. Bound for Abu Simbel, near the Sudanese border, we had to travel as a group. Three hours later, having taken a white knuckle ride, since our driver felt the need to keep our van within two meters of the zooming bus in front of us, we arrived at our destination. The two temples were hot, humid, and remarkable. Created by Ramses between 1274 and 1244 BC, the larger temple opening has 4 colossal statues of a seated version of himself. The temples had to be moved to a higher point, placed into a man-made mountain, as the high dam flooded the area, creating Lake Nasser.

We returned through the desert to Aswan and then jumped onto a felluca, which is a small, flat bedded, traditional boat. We sailed a bit along with the wind, but soon the wind was too much and we pulled up to the shore. As we have found out, this habit of stopping quickly is really the norm. Regardless, it was a great day, but hot, so we braved the nasty nile and jumped in, stoked that we were able to finally cool down. After days of 40 plus degree heat, it was a great feeling to be swimming, especially because the water almost looked, dare I say, clean.

Dinner and good conversation, but soon we were trying to figure out how we would fit all ten of us on the boat to sleep. Billy ended up being the middle spoon (we definitely gave him crap for this the whole trip). A bit cramped, the next thing I knew I was falling asleep.

Thurs, July 29th
A chilly night ended with the sun coming up over the bank opposite where we were now stuck on shore. I helped push us off and had a cup of Egyptian tea, soaking in the warmth of the sun and enjoying the peacefulness of the moment. We drifted across the river and landed on the opposite bank, now having travelled only a total of maybe a kilometer or so from where we put in, but no worries, it was a nice trip nonetheless.

Hoping into a van, we moved along to Kom Ombo. A temple built to duly dedicated to Sobek (crocodile god) and Haroeris. A smaller structure, it was still quite cool. From here, we moved along to Edfu, visiting the Temple of Horus, which was begun in 246 BC and finished 180 years later. It is the best preserved example of Pharaonic architecture, because it was actually built about 2000 years after other Pharaonic structures. It was stunning, with large opening gates and covered with countless carvings.

Now, it was time to move on to our next city. Arriving in Luxor, we were taken to a great hotel. Beautiful lobby, rooftop swimming pool...it just felt too good to be true. So after waiting in the lobby for a number of minutes, I started to get antsy. And as it turned out, I was right. They said that the hotel was over booked (I don't think any of us believed that) and so the took us away and we ended up at Sunset Hotel. Walls of peeling paint, dark and spartan, this was our spot for the night. I can't say it was too bad, in fact it was just what we expected, but after getting teased with the good place, we could not help but be disappointed.

A quick and good pizza, and then we were off to Karnak Temple. It was fantastic. Huge. Monumentally huge pillars in the Hypostyle Hall stick out most, 134 in fact, forming the Temple of Amun, the largest religious building ever built in the world. It was truly an awesome sight. Built on the East bank of the Nile, set up with two orientations, one running West to East and the other North to South, it was largely built between 1965-1920 BC.

From here we moved onto Luxor Temple. A 3km trip down the sphinx road (currently being rebuilt) had led the kings and high priests frm Karnak Temple to Luxor temple, where they spent 21 days a year doing something important but for now, I sadly forget exactly what they were doing. This final temple of the day was yet another amazing feat of architecture and art. And yet again, it was a place where Ramses II made his mark. By the way, he had 40 wives and 197 children. 100 boys and 97 girls. Crazy, huh? He lived until he was 92, far longer than the norm, and obviously was a busy man. As a nickname, he is sometimes now referred to as Ramsex. Pretty fitting.

Anyway, back to the temple. Built largely before he came around, it did not have the impressive size of Karnak, but did have a wealth of carved features. Additionally, it had a mosque which was built in the 1300s, but os now hovering high above the ground. At the time it was built, the flooding nile had slowly deposited silt over the years, covering about two thirds of the temple. So now that the temples have been completely uncovered, the mosque sits at the silt line of the past.

A long and interesting day finally ended and we were spent. Exhausted and having seen so many cool temples, they sadly started to blur together.

So back at our sketchy hotel room, we got settled. Not hungry enough for dinner (the heat seriously kept us from almost ever being hungry) we went for a walk and for ice cream and an Aussie craving for watermelon. Now, this may not sound too interesting, but believe me, it was funny. We ended up back at the room with watermelon in hand and a butter knife. I'll have to put up pics of the watermelon jack o lantern that Dan carved out, as well as the watermelon headed man that Billy portrayed. And that does not even take into account the carnage that ensued as the watermelon was cut apart and eaten. Without plates, Billy and Dan hovered over the bath tub, while I used the sink. It tasted great, but probably could have set a record for the most seeds ever. And it was the first, and maybe last time, that I ate a watermelon that was hot and actually cooled off as we ate. Weird stuff.