Aswan-- delayed...

  Aswan, Egypt
Friday, October 19, 2007

Plan: Early train from Luxor, straight onto our luxurious cruise-- definately splurged for this part. The ship is rumoured to be one of the nicest in all of Egypt. We will see the Kalabsha Temple, Beit El Wali & Kiosk of Kertassi before spending the night in the harbour on the boat.

I know... I know... I promised that I would get this updated sooner. I am sorry.
The good thing is that I took really good notes, and my memory is still fresh. So, here we go. (That and it is a lot easier to add photos now that we are home and have a much faster connection.)
 
We got up early to take a train from Luxor to Aswan. I think we got up much earlier than necessary because we seemed to wait on the platform forever, but I guess you wouldn't want to miss the train, that and I always feel that we are getting up earlier than needed.
 
The train itself was fine. Ben struggled with the endless hours of sitting, again. It definitely would have been nicer to cruise between Luxor and Aswan, but that just didn't fit into our schedule. Once we got seated on the fairly empty train, we were offered breakfast, which we accepted because we had forgotten to organize breakfast boxes from the hotel. However, two hours later, the steward (do you call them that on trains?) came by to tell us we owed him for the meal. What? We were both a little bothered that we were told after we had accepted that we owed money for the pretty meager, somewhat inedible collection of food, and feeling like we were simply lining his pockets, we paid. I am pretty sure Ben would have preferred to make a stink, if only it provided him with some entertainment for the journey.
 
The original plan, after the train, was to head straight to our cruise, but we got bumped. Our two days in Aswan were now split by the cruise, rather than coming at the end of it. I was really concerned about it at the time because I was afraid of missing the Sun Festival, but as you have already read, since it was posted first, we made the festival and it was one of our "greater" adventures.
 
So, this was the first time on the whole trip that I didn't know what the plan was. We settled into our hotel, which wasn't the Isis Island, but just the Isis Hotel-not nearly as nice, not on its own island, but realistically more suitable to our budget.
 
When we were organizing our bags, Ben noticed a sign that warned travelers to make sure their windows were locked (all rooms were like little one story bungalows) because there had been some break ins through open windows. Ok, so Ben checks the window, locks it, and then applied a little pressure-pop! It opens right up. We tried it a few times, and it opened every time, from the inside and out. We put all our bags in the washroom so that there would be out of view, and went to the lobby to get someone to fix it. After 15mins of explanation, they finally understood and told us they would send someone to the room to fix it. We went back to the room to wait, and wait. No one showed up. So we went back to the lobby... No, we didn't have to wait, they would take care of it. And the safety of our bags? They would be fine! We left feeling a little apprehensive.

Looks pretty

 
We attempted to find some lunch before our scheduled afternoon, but we got really frustrated looking... Unlike Luxor, Aswan lacks "easy" or "quick" eating. We did quite the walking tour and couldn't find anything we were looking for, finally settled on getting a bag of chips and some juice-not really the stellar lunch we were hungry enough for. We did manage to get some water, but it didn't last long.
 
Booked for our afternoon was a felucca trip around to the Botanical Gardens and around Elephantine Island. (I dropped the water trying to get onto the boat, it burst open like a bottle of champagne...)
 
The Gardens use to be a private residence, a gift to General Kitchener for leading successful military expeditions into Sudan. He was a very keen gardener and imported plants and trees in from all over. When he passed away, it was handed back to the city and turned into a park. 

Crazy eyes...

The island itself was beautiful. All the funky trees were labeled, and there were many people enjoying the place without it feeling too cramped or packed. The craziest part of the place was the number of cats-they are like squirrels here. Our guide, Summer, pointed out how the cats would avoid Egyptians, but would flock to tourists. She knelt down, and the cats that had been following us ran away. I knelt down and immediate had four cats purring and rubbing against my leg, it was really weird to see. One even had the craziest eyes I have ever seen on a cat. It was quite the trick to get a decent picture of the guy...
 
Ben and I had a chance to wander around ourselves for a bit, and we got some fantastic pictures of the surrounding landscapes, feluccas sailing by, and some cute ones of ourselves. We also met a local family that was really keen to introduce themselves, and practice a little English.
 

All about atmosphere

When it was finally time to meet back with our felucca, we found Summer, and set about trying to find our boat. The feluccas dock one on top of another and they are nearly impossible to distinguish. Anyone traveling on their own would absolutely need to remember their boats name, because it seems that the only way to find the right boat is to start calling out the name, and all the other captains get you directed to the right spot. It is interesting walking from one boat to another, balancing precariously...
 
The felucca itself was beautiful and peaceful-for the most part. At least it was until little "pirate" kids, as they call them, latched on to one of our trailing ropes. The captain was so choked that he started to whip the rope to shake the kid off. The only thing that got knocked off was my hat! Luckily the kids weren't that terrible, they rescued it from drowning, passed it to another passing felucca, which caught up to us and tossed it back. My hat got to do what I did not-swim in the Nile.
 
We spent our evening in the market, which was similar experience on our way back, so I will leave the discription until then.
 
Overall, Aswan was not our favourite place. While hanging out on the Nile was great, it wasn't quite great enough to offset our dislike for the city itself. It was hard to navigate, and we got hassled more than anywhere else. You couldn't walk ten steps without being hit up to take a felucca ride or carriage, and the horses were among the saddest I have ever seen. It just seemed a lot rougher than some of the other places we enjoyed. We were pretty ready to leave, and not sure what we would enjoy when we came back.
 
-Ash