The Start of my Nile Journey

  Aswan, Egypt
Saturday, November 11, 2006

GPS Coordinates:
N 24°05'43.3"
E 032°53'34.5"

Temperature: 24.6°C
Humidity: 31.1 %
Pressure: 100.2 kPa
Altitude: 87 m

Salaam Alaykoom! (Hello... this time in Arabic!)

On my way to Aswan I met this fun "Groupe of Quebecois!" (Salut! special a tout le monde!). It was good to speak my mother tongue and see familiar faces from back home.

I was transported to a hotel with a nice Nile view and "crashed" for a few hours since at this time I had been travelling for approximately 24 hours straight. When I woke up from what I thought was a dream, I came face to face for the first time with the REAL NILE!! It wasn't a fantasy...it was really there, similar to what I had seen many times in books and on TV! The view was of Elephantine Island with it's many traditional felucca sailboats and the desert-like west bank. Aswan is still a relatively big town so there were a lot of 4-star, 5-star cruise boats (not as big as the seafaring ones) waiting to embark passengers for their journey up the Nile.

Once again I had a few "communications" problem with my tour agency but it wasn't as bad as the ones I had in Tanzania. After a few lost hours of debatting what was promised and paid but utimately possible most things were settled. It's as if the right hand in Cairo doesn't know what the left hand is doing in Aswan... sounds familiar on a universal scale?!

To have the chance to finish this adventure on a good note, I decided that I needed an extra week of vacation (I was actually supposed to leave the next day on the 11 Nov.). I then changed my flights back home accordingly, not with some difficulty since I was flying on points. The rest of the day I just walked around Aswan to see the sites.

Next day I left early to experience a small joyride on a felucca. We stopped on the west bank of the Nile where I took my first camel ride

Camel Ride

up the sand hills to go see the Tombs of the Nobles

Outside the Tombs of the Nobles

. Riding a camel is kinda "rocky" until you get used to it and go with the flow, especially to get up or down. The "Nobles" were influential people appointed governors by the Egyptian State to administer Upper Egypt. There are over 35 tombs here but only 6 are open to the public. I first visited the tomb of Sarenput I, then the tomb of Harkhuf with it's many interconnected chambers for the burial of family members and his entourage. In here, there was also a small tunnel leading down into blackness, let me tell you that at this point I felt like a real "Indiana Jones" archaeologist! NAHNAHNAHNAAAAHHHH  NAHNAH NAAHH...!

I then walked to the tomb of Sarenput II where I saw a granite sacrificial altar 

Sacrificial Altar

 . The area where they actually put the human remains was very well preserved 

Inside the Tomb of a Noble

. Finished this interesting visit by going to the father and son tombs of Mekhu & Sabni. Navigated the felucca back through the small islands while viewing other important sites from afar (St-Simeon Monastery, Aga Khan Mausoleum, Temple of Khnum & Ruins of Abu). And that folks was only the beginning of this day, heck! this week of amazing ancient history discoveries.

In the afternoon, I joined a tour to go see the Unfinished Obelisk, Aswan High Dam, and Philae Temple:

The Unfinished Obelisk 

The Unfinished Obelisk

is called as such because the stone carvers of the time found a major flaw / crack (Seen in pic) on the upper body of the obelisk and just abandoned the project instead of wasting their time in trying to save parts of it. It would have been the biggest one ever made if it had been completed. Over the ancient years, Aswan quarries supplied all the granite used in the construction of all major temples just because it's the only place you can find hard rocks, everywhere else is built around softer stones such as limestone and sandstone. They actually carved the stones / obelisks directly from the rock face with a harder stone called "durite". They would carve holes beside the stone and insert sycamore trees /  wood into them then waited for the flooding of the Nile to do it's job. Basically, sycamore trees swell when immersed in water and that pressure created cracks and broke the stones free along natural rock fault lines. The stones would then find themselves floating on makeshift rafts and navigated up the Nile towards Luxor (150km) and Lower Egypt (around Cairo 750km).

The Old Dam and newer High Dam of Aswan were not that impressive, just a big construction of concrete. They were apparently first built to control the flooding of the Nile and then produce electricity in second. The construction of the High Dam (60's) created Lake Nasser which is the largest (approx. 500 km long) artificial lake in the world. Problem is that it also flooded several ancient Egyptian temples along the way of which 14 were saved and relocated (piece by piece...!!) by an international effort driven by UNESCO. Most famous of these is the Ramses II temple in Abu Simbel (See below). Philae Temple is another one that has been "saved". It was originally built on Philae island but now stands (20m higher) a few hundred metres from there on Agilkia island 

The Temple of Philae

. We took a small ferry boat to go there and visit. The temple is very beautiful and impressive (The first one I visit!) and was built for the goddess Isis 

Inside Philae Temple

. The guide then told the very interesting story of the Cult of Osiris which features Osiris (of course...!), Isis (sister and wife!?), sister Nephtes, and evil brother Seth. Son of Isis / Osiris - "Horus" also makes a cameo appearance. Look it up on the Internet if you guys are interested because it is a little long but still very magical... Would make for a great movie thriller!
 

The next day, I took a flight (1 hour instead of the 5 hour to-from bus ride) to Abu Simbel to go visit the Ramses II temple, the most famous of the "saved" temples 

MC in Abu Simbel #1 (Temple for Ramses II)

. The facade of the four sitting Ramses II is the image that we most often see on TV or in books 

MC in Abu Simbel #2 (Temple of Ramses II)

. I shared a guide with two Canadians whom I met there. The guide explained who exactly Ramses II was. Basically he was a very successful warrior / pharoah that ruled by might for many many years (He didn't look so mighty when I saw his mummy at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo; see Cairo entry later). This success inevitably went to his head and he started to consider himself somewhat equal to the gods often depicting himself as such on walls of several of his temples. He was the only pharoah to ever dare! This possible egomaniacal personality trait made his dynasty one of the most prolific statue / temple making (of himself of course...!) era over all of Egypt. The temple is still very impressive. The four sitting statues represents Ramses II in different statges of his life (left to right; young to old). Having apparently united Lower Egypt (Nile Delta; Cairo and everything north) and Upper Egypt (Luxor, Aswan and anything south of Memphis (close to now Cairo)), he is often depicted with both ruling crowns. The white crown of Upper Egypt (big mound with rounded top) and the red crown of Lower Egypt (smaller tube / cylinder with long feather) which fit around the white one. Unfortunately, here and  almost everywhere else it is not permitted to take pictures inside the temples because of possible degradation of the remaining colored hieroglyphs and art. I think it probably is also a convenient way to make extra "tourist" money by selling official postcards and photo / info books. So... SORRY! but from here on end there will only be a few pictures of the insides of temples and tombs.

Ramses II also built a temple

MC in Abu Simbel #3 (Temple for Nefertari)

MC in Abu Simbel #4 (Temple for Nefertari)

for the goddess of love and beauty, Hathor, only a few hundred metres away and dedicated this shrine to his wife Nefertari (Ain't that sweet! What a nice gift... now you ladies out there, don't get any ideas... I think you should stick to the diamonds and chocolate...HA! HA! ;-) )  . 


 

 

On the way back my driver / guide from the tour agency stopped at two other "tourist trap" shops. One was an lapidary (stone worker) specialized in alabaster work and the other was a papyrus factory where they make amazing looking prints 

A Papyrus Factory

. Suffice to say I couldn't help myself, once again...


 

 




I was then late to embark on the traditional felucca sailboat that was waiting for me and  that would take me up the Nile for the next three days. The crew is composed of the captain and his first mate 

Captain "Cool" and First Mate

Captain MC on the Nile

. On this cruise are also two Queens of the Nile (Special Hello! to Clare and Hannah the two travelling girlfriends) and a co-Pharoah / "fanning" slave (Special Hello! to my friend Philip from the UK). 


 

 

We would sail most of the day and then stop on the banks of the Nile

The Banks of the Nile

Sunset on the Nile

 to have dinner (tried camel meat kafta's (spiced meatballs)) on the boat and take some shoreleave (a.k.a. R&R or "partying"!)  with the other crews from all over . Sitting on the sand on the banks of the Nile, I witnessed an extraordinary sight one night where I saw a longlasting, burning ball of green flames streaking across the sky which could only be a meteorite crashing down to Earth (or was it due to the alcohol...!?)

Party on the banks of the Nile!

. Suffice to say I made a sincere wish! We would also sleep outside, on the top deck of the felucca. It was very COOL! and relaxing...

 

 


 
 

On the third day we disembarked in Kom Ombo to visit a temple dedicated to Sobek the crocodile headed god 

Front of the Kom Ombo Temple

Side of the Kom Ombo Temple

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Then a small shuttle bus drove us north about 50km to Edfu where we would visit the temple of Horus dedicated to the falcon headed god 

The Temple of Horus

MC and Horus

 . Each one is very AMAZING in its own right and filled with ancient history that to this day we don't completely understand. Due to security concerns from past attacks on tourists, the tourism police organizes armed escort convoys to drive tourists around. The convoy could contain several armed guards in pickup trucks situated at the front and back of the dozens or so mini-buses filled with tourists. We then drove 150km to Luxor where this part of my tour ends.

I found this interesting, so just for your info, there is three main types of hieroglyphs. The sunken hieroglyphs were used to express daily events and history. The raised hieroglyphs were used when representing gods and religious related matters. Painted hieroglyphs on plaster surfaced walls were exclusively used in tombs.

Next Chapter: The Historic Sites around Luxor

Owl - Vulture - Mouth / Lips - Setting Sun - Two Bars / Lines - Wavy Line
(Martin in Hieroglyphs!)