Edfu and Kom Ombo - Thursday September 21
Our wake up call was at 6:30 am on Thursday morning and I felt well enough to do the temple excursion in the morning. We left the boat at 7 am and took a short bus ride to the Edfu Temple, which is supposedly the best preserved temple in Egypt. It was built in 57 BC by Ptolemy XII Neos Dionysos and is in the Graeco-Roman style. Unlike most of the other temples in Egypt, this one still has it's roof on it. Siobhan gave us a quick run down on the history and highlights of the temple, as we didn't have a guide for this one, before we took a quick look around. Headed back to the boat and had breakfast at 9am - more bananas and dried toast. (Their toast is quite dry here - almost like our melba toast) Spent the rest of the morning sleeping, as I was still feeling a bit weak.
We floated down the Nile for the rest of the day, before arriving at Kom Ombo around 3:30 pm. (Kom Ombo is about 65 km south of Edfu) We had a couple of hours on shore to do see another temple and do some shopping, before our Egyptian dress up party that night. The Kom Ombo temple was dedicated to Sobek the crocodile god, so the temple had a old crocodile pond as well as a few mummified crocodiles in some dusty display cases. Also saw a Nilometre which the Egyptians used to measure the height of the Nile each year. If the water was high, it meant there would be lots of flooding and good crops, so the taxes were higher. If the Nile didn't rise as much, crops would be poor and taxes would be lower.
After a quick tour of the temple we cooled off in a little local coffee shop and enjoyed some chocolate and mango ice cream before braving the markets yet again. These markets weren't as bad as Luxor and we managed to snag a few deals. J had bought me a Egyptian shirt on Wednesday so he was trying to find something for himself to dress up in. He did manage to get a shirt and a black and white beanie cap. (Don't know the official name!) As usual, most of the prices start up around 150 Egyptian pounds but end up around 20.
Most of our crew dressed up in Egyptian garb and it was quite entertaining to see the different outfits. Only one fellow didn't find anything, but he just wrapped a bath towel around his head and joined in anyhow. After super we had some entertainment by Nubian dancers and also a Sufi dancer. Naturally, they wanted crowd participation and since J had the strangest hat on, he always got picked. We both ended up there at one point, but most of our travel mates were dragged up later on and everyone had a good laugh! Didn't stay up too late that night as we were both quite tired from the weeks activities!
Temple of Horus at Edfu
Catching some sun while cruising down the Nile
Temple at Kom Ombo
Sufi dancer
"Tourist trap!"
Group photo
Egyptian dress up party!
We floated down the Nile for the rest of the day, before arriving at Kom Ombo around 3:30 pm. (Kom Ombo is about 65 km south of Edfu) We had a couple of hours on shore to do see another temple and do some shopping, before our Egyptian dress up party that night. The Kom Ombo temple was dedicated to Sobek the crocodile god, so the temple had a old crocodile pond as well as a few mummified crocodiles in some dusty display cases. Also saw a Nilometre which the Egyptians used to measure the height of the Nile each year. If the water was high, it meant there would be lots of flooding and good crops, so the taxes were higher. If the Nile didn't rise as much, crops would be poor and taxes would be lower.
After a quick tour of the temple we cooled off in a little local coffee shop and enjoyed some chocolate and mango ice cream before braving the markets yet again. These markets weren't as bad as Luxor and we managed to snag a few deals. J had bought me a Egyptian shirt on Wednesday so he was trying to find something for himself to dress up in. He did manage to get a shirt and a black and white beanie cap. (Don't know the official name!) As usual, most of the prices start up around 150 Egyptian pounds but end up around 20.
Most of our crew dressed up in Egyptian garb and it was quite entertaining to see the different outfits. Only one fellow didn't find anything, but he just wrapped a bath towel around his head and joined in anyhow. After super we had some entertainment by Nubian dancers and also a Sufi dancer. Naturally, they wanted crowd participation and since J had the strangest hat on, he always got picked. We both ended up there at one point, but most of our travel mates were dragged up later on and everyone had a good laugh! Didn't stay up too late that night as we were both quite tired from the weeks activities!
Temple of Horus at Edfu
Catching some sun while cruising down the Nile
Temple at Kom Ombo
Sufi dancer
"Tourist trap!"
Group photo
Egyptian dress up party!
posted by The Patterson Pair at 5:32 AM
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