Aswan

OK, I'm about to try to squeeze everything into one post. Here goes!

Us budget travelers take the train from Cairo to Upper Egypt, either Aswan or Luxor. It is a long ride so we opted for the sleeper car. We went to Aswan first. It is really lovely with a set of islands in the middle of the Nile, the largest being Elephantine Island. Most people who go there take a day to go and see Abu Simbel, a very famous temple, but we decided it was just too dang far- 4 hours one way! Instead we happily toured the Aswan Museum, wandered along the narrow streets of a Nubian village on Elephantine, and checked out the ruins of Satet Temple. At the temple, Froody and I were amazed by the details of the carvings (as always). I mean, what were they doing in Europe at the time? Fingerpainting on some cave walls? The Egyptians just blow that all away with their carvings and writings.

In Aswan we took our first felucca ride. We went at sunset which is beautiful in Upper Egypt because the sun actually sets instead of sliding into the murk.

We also spent some time at the High Dam which once and for all put Nubia under water. That day was weird. Feeling adventurous, we took the train to the end of the line where we were told the dam was. We figured we'd walk or hitch a ride to the top of the dam. Well, we were approached by a taxi driver who was there with his two clients (French girls I had seen at our hotel) and said that if we were interested he'd take us along with them to Philae Temple, the top of the dam, and back to Aswan. After some negotiating, Froody got a decent price and a trip NOT to Philae (bleh, we were almost done with temples)but to the unfinished obelisk instead. And the top of the dam. So the taxi driver, Abdul, hustled us all into his car and took us to the top of the dam. Then he started to say something about a ticket, and did we have one, and do we want one, and there is a guarded checkpoint coming up and do we have a ticket, and if not it's OK but...now it's too late. I tapped the shoulder of one of the girls and asked her if she understood what was going on. She smiled and said, "No" she didn't have a clue what he was talking about. Instead of letting all of us off at the viewpoint he stopped his car a couple of times and hurriedly waved, practically shouted, at Froody to get out and take a picture. In retrospect we all four tourists figured out that if we wanted to stop at the viewpoint we needed tickets (which the girls had so I don't know if they ever ended up going or not) but the tickets were about LE20 each, and the taxi driver didn't think it was worth it since all you really needed at the viewpoint was 10 minutes to take your pictures, so he "saved" us some money and let Froody get some pictures.

The French girls were taken to the ferry for Philae and then Abdul took us to the Unfinished Obelisk. When he dropped us off, he invited us over to his home later on that night for tea with his wife and two daughters. We politely said we didn't know, he said the French girls were going to be there and that he wasn't trying to get money from us he just really wanted us to have tea with him. Eventually we exchanged mobile numbers and said if we weren't too tired we'd try to make it.

The Unfinished Obelisk is pretty cool. It's in the Northern Quarry and it's supposed to be where a lot of the red granite we've seen in all the temples, pyramids, and the statues in the Egyptian Museum came from. Story goes they were making an obelisk which was to be the twin for one that is now in Rome and would have been the tallest one around, but before they were done a crack was discovered so it was abandoned. Being there just got us to ask a whole bunch of questions: how long did it take to carve something like that? what types of tools did they use? how the heck were they going to lift up that thing? how did they get all the granite out of the quarry?

After the quarry we wandered through the Fatimid Cemetery (actually much older than the Fatimid dynasty). It was interesting to see how different these "modern" graves are from the tombs and pyramids.

That evening Froody and I discussed whether or not to have tea with Abdul and his family. I was pretty tired and fed up with people trying to get us to spend money (felucca captains, touts, shop owners) and I was convinced that Abdul was going to try to sell us something. Froody was convinced that his offer was sincere, and wanting to believe in the good of mankind again, I gave in (also, it helped when Froody promised that we would leave if Abdul did try to make a sale). Man, was I so glad to be so wrong!! Abdul and his wife and children were very nice and hospitable. I think, if he did have any ulterior motives, it was to get pix of his kids and you can't really blame him as cameras are very expensive and his girls are very cute. The French girls also showed up so it was a pleasant evening. We all left at about midnight and even then it was a bit difficult. Abdul couldn't understand why we would leave so early. :-)