The Patterson Pair: Aswan - Friday September 22

Left Kom Ombo around 6 am on Friday morning and arrived in Aswan by 10 am. We were able to sleep in this morning and have a leisurely breakfast on board. There were no set activities in Aswan, so Siobhan gave us all the options and told us she would arrange whatever we wanted to do. We opted to go and see the High Dam and unfinished obelisk first, while some of the others wandered around the markets. The bus left the boat around 11 am and took us to the unfinished obelisk first. Ancient Aswan was famous for its granite quarries where all the stone came from for the pyramids and monuments that are in most of Egypt. The unfinished obelisk was meant to go to one of the temples, but before it could be completely cut out of the stone, it cracked and was left in the quarry, unfinished. After a quick viewing of the obelisk, we headed out to the High Dam. The dam was built between 1960-1971 to help control the flooding of the Nile. The Aswan Dam, which had been built previously, had tried to achieve this, but it couldn't control all of the water so a bigger dam was needed. I think Egypt originally asked the UN, Britain and the US to help with the cost but all refused, so they got Russia to help with the cost. It took 35 000 workers to help complete the dam and 451 died in the process. It's 3600 m long and 111 m high at the highest point. There really isn't much to see and no tours of the actual operating rooms are allowed, but for approx $2 Canadian you can drive up onto the dam and take a couple of pictures. I think approx 11 temples had to be moved when the dam was built, the most famous being Abu Simbel.
After lunch on the boat at 1 pm, a bunch of us headed out for an hour long felucca ride around Elephantine Island and Kitchener's island. The Nubians on board offered us tea and then proceed to heat up water over a giant bunsen burner on board. ( I declined both tea and cookies!) We passed by the Old Cataract Hotel, which is where Agatha Christie wrote her book "Death on the Nile." I believe the hotel is also featured in the film. You can have "high tea" at the hotel and see the room where she stayed but apparently it's quite expensive! We were supposed to be back at the boat for 3:30 pm to head out for a camel ride, but because the feluccas depend on the wind the ride was a little slow. Siobhan, who is always ready with cellphone and contacts, called up a motor boat operator, who came up beside the felucca and those who were headed out for camel rides, just hopped on the motor boat and went back to the cruise ship!
Only 6 of us attempted to ride the camels - Bruce (Chinese student, studying in England), a Korean couple, Siobhan and J and I. As cheesy as it sounds, this was something that I was really looking forward to on our trip. We took a motor boat over to the west bank of the river and met up with our camels and their drivers there. We took a 45 minute walk through the Sahara dessert and around a small mountain. Riding a camel was similar to riding a horse, although not quite as comfortable. They do have a certain swaying motion and when they get up and down it feels as though you're going to fall off. Since we were a bit behind in schedule, Siobhan told the camel drivers that this would have to be a bit of a quicker trip, so we actually experienced some "camel jogging" through the dessert as well. It felt almost the same as trotting on a horse, although some of the camels were more enthusiastic at going faster than others. I did discover that it is almost impossible to try and take a picture while on a camel, as there is no way to hold the camera still and try and focus at the same time. Walked by St.Simeon's monastery while in the dessert, but didn't have time to visit it. (It's from the 7th century and looks more like a fortress than a monastery)
Upon arriving back at the boat at 5 pm we discovered that the "Sudan" was moored in front of us. This boat was also used in the "Death on the Nile" movie and is the most expensive cruise boat on the Nile. It was built in 1885 and was originally from Thomas Cook's Steamer fleet before being used by King Fouad.
Around 5:30 we left to see the sound and light show at Philae Temple, which is another temple that was taken down and reconstructed on another island when the High Dam was built. Apparently all the sound and light shows in Egypt are very basic and cheesy, but this is one of the better ones to see. The only English show was at 6:30 so there were boat loads of tourists all trying to get to the island at once. Fortunately we had a local guide who arrange everything and got us on our boat safely. One of the ladies in our group was worried because some of the other tours had bright orange life jackets and we didn't have any. (Life jackets and seatbelts always seem optional in Egypt!) We assured her that they were only to attract the crocodiles and we would be much safer without them =) The sound and light show was narrated by "the Nile" and told the history of the gods to whom the temple is dedicated to and also a bit about how the temple was moved. We walked through part of the temple while the show was being narrated and sat down for the last 20 minutes or so. After the show ended, we caught our boat back to the bus and headed back to the cruise boat for supper at 8:30.

Granite quarry with the unfinished oblisque.

There are so many boats that dock in Aswan, that they pile them up three and four deep! We had to go through three other boat lobbies before we could get to shore. Our boat is the furthest from the dock.