Egypt / Sudan Border

We are now in Abu Simbel which is forty kilometers from the Sudanese border on Lake Nasser. IT IS NOW REALLY HOT...COULD NOT EVEN GO WALKING AFTER WE GOT SETTLED IN. We had to have a cold (??) beer and a nap! Even bridey had some beer...obviously no cider here!

We got here by overnight train from Cairo to Aswan. One hour before the train arrived in Aswan bridey phoned to Egypt air to see if by chance we could get on a plane to Abu Simbel (we had tried to buy tickets in Cairo on Thursday but they were insistent that we could not make it from the train station in Aswan to the airport in time).

Then we lucked out because bridey was told that there were tickets and we could make it in time. Even with the train being 15 minutes late, we hopped into a taxi anxi0us to get our business and headed for Egypt Air. He waited with me while bridey went in and bought tickets that were cheaper then any price previously quoted... go figure! Mohammad Ali then sped us to the airport arriving in time to sit down and have a coffee. You need to understand that the whole point of this was to be able to fly over lake Nasser. Turns out there were about 15 people on a plane that could have held approx. 200 passengers.

So instead of a 3.5 hour bus trip in an escorted convoy we arrived in 45 minutes. We did see the lake and the UNESCO temple site, which is our destination.

We were greeted at the hotel by the owner and ushered in with great gusto. We were then offered our courtesy drink of hibiscus...ice cold. This hotel is the Nubian Cultural Centre and is built in a traditional style. There are only 5 rooms in the whole place. It is very well cared for and laid out.

Tomorrow we will get up very early in the morning and go out to the site when it is still cool and before the bus loads of tourists arrive from their convoys. Once we have toured the site, we will go back to the hotel and rest up before we head off to catch a bus for the trip back to Aswan.

Now back tracking over the past couple of days. Contrary to what we had posted our plans unfolded differently. We did not go to the pyramids. We will do this later. We did spend a half day (Thursday) in the Egyptian Museum when it was not crowded with tourists. We spent Thursday evening trying to figure out Peter & Maureen's washing machine. It had the longest cycle ever and then did not want to let us in. There was a long wait for it to open...next morning!

On Friday which just happened to be Good Friday we had chosen to visit Coptic Cairo. For any who do not know who the Coptics are, they are an early Christian church...part of the eastern orthodox tradition. Needless to say all of the Coptic Christians were out in their finery and were in the many churches in the process of worship. We did not just look at architecture but experienced the real thing.

We have wandered the streets for many hours, frequently lost but have always had help from friendly Egyptians. We have mastered the Metro and it works so well...there is an exception to the mastery. On Friday bridey and I jumped on the train turns out we were in the female only car and I only realized this when I took a look around. I jumped off tried to get in the next car but it too was a female only car...the doors closed and off bridey went with the women. The women in her car were very concerned that I was left behind. They tried calling me on Peter's cell...but I had it turned off. When bridey was getting off they were worried about what she would do. She told them she would be fine...and she was. She just waited for me and I came on the next metro train. bridey has since taken a picture of the "women only" sign for me and I have been studying it!

We will try to post some photos when we get to Aswan where we will be for 4 days.

Having Maureen and Peter's place was such a great base for us to get our "travel legs".

Having an amazing adventure!!! New sights, sounds and smells every moment of every day in this amazing culture!! Hard to believe we have been on the road almost a week now.