Aswan & Abu Simbel

1st & 2nd June 2010

We got off the train and straight on the bus to our hotel. We were lucky enough to be able to check in early (around 9am), which was really nice after 12 hours on a train. We showered and lazed about the hotel, in air conditioned comfort, for a few hours.

We thought that we'd better do something with our day, so we decided to go and check out the markets at Aswan. We headed out about noon, and the heat just about knocked us off our feet. The sun was so hot, but we persevered. We got a little lost trying to find the markets and ended up in some sketchy looking back streets, but it wasn't long until we found the colour of the bazaar. It must've been too hot even for the locals as it was pretty much deserted. We spent an hour or so sweating our way through, but eventually we had had enough of the sleazy Egyptian men making sexy passes at me, and trying every trick in the book to get us into their shops. It was funny walking through the markets because we obviously stood out as tourists so as soon as the shop owners saw us coming they started running at us trying to get us into their shop. I think I heard Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, Oi, Oi, Oi at least 20 times and Captain Cook another 10. They all think they're so clever.

After we gave up on the markets we headed back to the hotel for a bit more lazing and surfing the net. We decided that we wanted to give McDonalds a try (Mainly because our tour guide said it was the only hygienic place to eat in Aswan) so we googled the address and set off for a late lunch. Maccas on the Nile was some of the best McDonalds I've eaten. I sampled a Chicken Big Mac, while Dan tried the McArabia (Burger contents but in a toasted flatbread). We ordered them as meals and were blown away at the size of them. I think we got almost a litre of Coke each, and fries that pretty much filled a tray. We ate as much as we could before setting off into the scorching sun back to the hotel.

We regrouped at the hotel around 6.30 to be taken to dinner. As an optional extra, most of us had decided to go and have a traditional Nubian dinner. We were taken by boat across a small section of the Nile to the restaurant. The food was quickly served to us - meat in a tandoori like ceramic pot with a tomato sauce and rice and a heap of salads and nibbly food - before the traditional entertainment begun. It was a lot of music (Drums and horns) and dancing, all very colourful. There was a guy who twirled around in a pretty skirt and jumping and chanting and even men in a horse costume. It was all pretty cool. After dinner it was back on the boat, we met the others who didn't come and we all went as a group back to the markets. There was heaps more people there at night, and it had a really cool atmosphere to it. MoMo took us to a mini market where he promised we would be charged local prices and shouldn't be ripped off. After we'd all bought snacks and drinks he checked how much we'd each paid, and then told us we'd all been over charged. He quickly went in to see the shop man, yelled at him in Arabic then gave us all heaps of money back. We got more than half of what we paid back!! There's such variation in the price of drinks and snacks that its pretty difficult to tell if you're paying too much! Most of us just headed back to the hotel around 11pm for some sleep after the markets as we had a very early wake up the next day.

Wake up call the next morning was at 2.30. We showered, collected our breakfast box and were on the bus by 3am. The bus made its way around Aswan's sleepy and deserted streets until we found about 30 other buses all lined up along the side of the road. We toileted and stretched our legs while MoMo told us what was going on. Apparently all tour groups that go to Abu Simbel temple must travel in a police escorted convoy for the 350km through the Sahara Desert. This is because in the 90's a terrorist group jumped out of the desert and killed 65 tourists travelling by bus. The journey passed pretty quickly as I was sleeping (There wasn't anything to look at but sand) but did wake up a couple of times - once when the bus driver nodded off and we ended up swerving our way through the sand on the side of the road, another when we were driving on the wrong side of the road and I could hear truck horns and lights screaming in at us. We must have been going pretty slowly though because by the time we arrived at the temple (around 7.30am) we weren't even part of the convoy anymore, they'd all overtaken us!!

The weather was pretty hot, and that was another reason why we had to get up so early to go to Abu Simbel. During the day, the temperature can easily reach 50˚, so if you get it done in the morning it's not as bad. We walked around to the massive temple, and the slightly smaller one, while MoMo told us about the who's, where's, why's, how's, when's etc. the bit I liked the most about it was that it was actually cut up into tiny pieces and moved block by block in the 60's to prevent it going underwater when a new dam was built. Abu Simbel was a temple built by King Ramses II, (MoMo's favourite King, because he had 53 wives and over 153 kids - all when he was King, during the ages of 50 - 91), and is pretty recognizable. The slightly smaller temple he built for his favourite wife, Nefartari. We spent about an hour looking in through the beautifully preserved temples. I got caught on the way out of Abu Simbel temple by the tourism police, who handed me the big golden key to the front door of the temple. He put me in the right pose and Dan took a photo, then he took our camera so he could take a photo of two of us together. We had a good laugh and as we were walking off the Policeman started shaking his hand at us wanting tips. 2 pounds later and we were allowed to leave.

We were back on the bus around 9am, for the 3-hour convoy journey back to Aswan. We were again quite lucky in that MoMo had kept two rooms at the hotel for us to shower, change and hang out in for an hour or so. Everyone who went to Abu Simbel was hungry when we got back, as we'd eaten breakfast at 4am, so we decided to get McDonalds. Not being bothered to walk the kilometer there we rang up from the hotel and got some delivered. It was good, but not as good as the day before.

Around 1.30 we all reassembled with our bags and headed off for our next destination….