Aswan, Elephantine Island, Sahara and camels

  Aswan, Egypt
Saturday, May 12, 2007

We were woken up on the train by the conductor announcing that brekky would be served shortly, eggs (staple breakfast food), rolls and a piece of cake.  Looking out the window we could see the farmers working in the fields - the people here are much darker in colour that the Egyptians in Cairo..


We hopped off the train in Aswan and were met by our bus driver who took us to the Keylany Hotel. We saw many feluccas sailing on the Nile along the way. Checking in, i headed upstairs for a shower (v v hot down here) then took off exploring, some money exchanging followed by a bit of shopping. 

I walked through the souq and bought some scarves, some papyrus, fridge magnet and a statue of some Nubian men.... While i was in the souq looking at some scarves the shop owner came over and told me   "i like your body" -... was classic! We met around lunch to make our way down to the Nile for our boat trip to various places.. After a beautiful lunch of soup, salad, rice and some tomato & veggie dish we were all ready for a nanna nap!  

 We made our way around Elephantine Island which contains old forts and temples and a Nubian village.  

 We passed Kitchener island where a gorgeous botanical garden has been planted before heading over to the West Bank to see the start of the Sahara desert, stopping for a drink and a pat of the cute puppies.. Cruising along the West bank we passed the soldiers tombs before hopping off the boat for our next means of transport - camels. My camel was called Moon and he was very well behaved!  He even took me for a little trot which was interesting but a tad uncomfortable.

We saw the huge St Simeon monetary which dates back to the 6th century before making our way down to the boat so we could check out Elephantine Island. Its a beautiful place with many narrow laneways, coloured buildings and tiles with wonderful views of the Nile and passing feluccas. A local Nubian man JJ invited us into his home and showed us his wedding video and photos then a local lady came and offered to give us some henna tattoos. I had a tribal type one done but she did a pretty crap job -- flowers were her forte !  After our cuppa we made our way back into Aswan and had some dinner at the Mona Lisa restaurant. Sitting outside amongst the huge Cruise boats was great. A vegetable tagin and a few Stellas (local Egyptian beer) it was time to head back to the hotel for an early bed. I washed my henna tatt off as much as i could (it was really really crap) and got my stuff sorted for the 3.30am wake up call to head down to check out Abu Simbel in the 4am police convoy (due to tight security around the tourist places all over egypt)..