Egypt

Thursday 23rd August

Well, we had a cool night and slept fairly well in our air conditioned cabins. The breakfast was not too great – a bowl of sloppy beans which is called ‘ful’ but we had some biscuits with us so we ate those instead. We came into the harbour at 11am and were delighted thinking that we would be in Aswan in a short while. Well, if we thought it had been a long procedure to board, then, this was even more drawn out and completely chaotic! We spent the next 4 hours pushing between the 500 passengers to get our passports stamped by the officials in the dining room, waiting in our cabins, and then finally, all squashed into the stairwell, while they called passengers out name by name to disembark!! You can imagine the chaos with every Mohammed, Abdulla etc squeezing from the back, complete with cardboard boxes, suitcases etc. Finally, at 3pm we were off the boat and through the customs – except for the drivers of the vehicles – they were held up another 2 hours trying to clear the vehicles through customs. The overlanders had a big problem as their carnet was in the company’s name and not the driver’s personal name, and Johan had a problem as he never had a carnet – both have had to sort this out. However, customs is just one part of the procedures, the next is the traffic police who have to give the vehicles Arabic number plates and check the vehicles engine number, and there was no time yesterday for that, and tomorrow is Friday(everything is closed) so Garfield has to stay at the harbour until Saturday at least!
In between all this, I received disturbing sms’s to say that my mother had been admitted to ICU as she had a cardiac block! She was raced into theatre at St Anne’s where they fitted a pace maker – luckily all went well and she should be out of hospital on Saturday. I certainly felt helpless right up here in Egypt!
We booked into the hotel in Aswan with the overlanders and we were all like kids at Christmas because we had showers with water coming out the shower rose and shower curtains, toilets with seats and double beds with air con!!

Our costs in Sudan were

Visas R 854
Registration R1 099
Taxis R 377
Cooldrinks R 319
Groceries R1 074
Internet R 40
Accomodation R 401
Sight seeing R 14
Petrol R1 435
Departure tax for us R 280
Departure tax Garfield R 350

Dave & my ferry tickets to Aswan were R 980 and Garfield’s Barge ticket was R3 237.
We are in our element here in Egypt as petrol is R1.71 a litre!!!! Cheaper than bottled water which is R2.20 a litre!
The average price we have paid for petrol in each country is as follows
Botswana R5.56
Zambia R11.71
Malawi R8.50
Tanzania R7.13
Kenya R8.63
Uganda R9.47
Rwanda R8.02
Ethiopia R6.29
Sudan R5.48



Friday 24th August

We woke up at 3am!! Yes you are reading correctly – we were going on a bus back down to Abu Simbel (275kms) and all the vehicles go in convoy. About 50 buses and mini buses all travel down together. We arrived at 7am and had 1 ½ hours to marvel at the enormity of this monument that Ramses II had carved out of the mountain side – and then the magnitude of the task of moving this gigantic rock structure with scientific precision so that it would not be drowned. Then it was the 3 hour journey back to Aswan. We arrived in time for lunch at the hotel and after that we had an afternoon nap – it is so hot anyway and all the shops close from about midday until 5pm.
At 6pm we went to the Nubian Museum which was really well laid out and gave a very good perspective of the Nubian history & culture, as well as an overview of the whole Nile valley with all the temples along it’s banks and the flooding of it when the Aswan High Dam was built in the 1960’s. UNESCO actually rescued 22 temples from the rising waters and relocated them – 4 were given to countries that helped with the mammoth project and we met a lady from USA who said she had seen the one temple in a museum in New York!
We came back to our room, watched a movie and then went out to buy some ‘street food’ at about 9pm. Aswan is so ‘1st world’ compared to Sudan, but I must say nobody can compete with the Sudanese on friendliness and hospitality – they are the best we have come across.
Aswan has the lovliest setting right on the Nile River with the Corniche(riverfront promenade) running just in front of our hotel.


Saturday 25th August

Dave, Harry and Harun have gone back to the port with Mohammed (our local agent that we have via Jeff and the overlanders) to try and sort out number plates etc with the traffic police. Johan and Jeff cannot proceed with this step until their carnets are sorted out.
I just spent the morning catching up on the computer work – blog and photos. Then I went up to the rooftop pool and relaxed with the overlanders, 44 degrees is certainly more manageable when you have air conditioning and a swimming pool at your disposal!
Dave finally came back at 3pm with a folder full of documents in Arabic! The Egyptians are bureaucrats at their best – Dave says there are several ‘windows’ you have to go to with no signage at all and absolutely no queuing system in place at the licensing department in Aswan town. They then had to go to the testing grounds, also in town, to collect an officer to take to the port 25kms away to check the vehicles engine and chassis numbers – this process took 4 hours (3 waiting for the officer to be found)! Then it was back to the traffic department back in Aswan to get documents signed and by then the working day was over. So tomorrow he will have to continue with vehicle insurance and number plates and payment of levies due. Dave says this would have all been completely impossible to achieve without Mohammed.
We relaxed until 6.30pm when we set off with Haan in a taxi and then a boat to Philae to see the sound and light show at 8pm. The main temple, the Temple of Isis was constructed over some 800 years by Ptolemaic and Roman rulers from 200BC till 600AD. After the construction of the first Aswan Dam which started in 1898, rising waters lapped and surged about the temple, submerging it for 6 months a year. With the building of the new High Dam in the 1960’s, the temple would have been drowned forever. So UNESCO relocated it and the rest of the Philae temples to Aglika Island from 1972 till 1980. Of all the cults in ancient Egypt, the worship of the goddess of Isis was one of the strongest and Isis-worship eventually spread throughout the Roman Empire. The nurturing, forgiving, loving Isis was Christianity’s chief rival between the 3rd and 5th centuries. Early Coptic art identifies Virgin Mary with Isis and Jesus with Horus(the son of Isis) - perhaps Christianity’s attempt to wean people away from Isis?
The light and sound show was really spectacular and the lights especially, seemed to bring the rock engravings to life!
At 9pm, when the show was over we went to the bazaar, where we had roast chicken for dinner and then we wandered around amongst all the colourful clothing, spice and jewelry stores. On our return to near our hotel, we paid a visit to a shopkeeper whom we had promised to visit yesterday. Well, we entered his very small shop, only to be led up and into an ‘Aladdin’s Cave’ filled with everything you can imagine. Before we knew it, it was after midnight and we had bought more than we intended!! So we bade him goodnight and hit the sack.


Sunday 26th August

Dave set off at 9am to try and finally retrieve Garfield. He got back at 2pm – exhausted and irritated but finally triumphant! Garfield is now parked in the street with an Egyptian number plate – apparently ‘20’! The temperature in Garfield had gone up to 55 degrees being all closed up, and our batteries had gone flat over the week, so the fridge had stopped working and the meat was rotten! Luckily we only had 4 or so packets, but still it was a stinky mess to sort out. Dave had thrown the meat out yesterday, but we still had to clean out the fridge.
We then went to the internet to ‘skype’ CJ and Daryl – unfortunately Rayanne could not get internet access so we missed her in our conference call. Then it was dinner before going off to the Tourist Police to sign up for the convoy to Luxor in the morning. We had to pay LE20 (about R25) each and I had to be ‘mauled’ by some official who put his arms around me to shake Dave’s hand and kissed my cheek in the process! These Egyptian men are something else and a few of the overlander girls have been propositioned with offers of ‘hour long sex as their British boyfriends can only manage 10 minutes!’ Luke, one of the British boyfriends, was not amused!
Driving at night is a little scarey as most vehicles do not use their headlights, so there are just ‘shadows’ coming towards you out of the dark – occasionally the driver will give you a flash of lights just to let you know he is coming!



Monday 27th August

We left at 7am to meet the convoy – all tourists in private vehicles or taxis or buses have to travel in convoy with a police escort. We traveled N to Kom Ombo where we stopped to look at the Temple of Haroeris and Sobek – this one is quite ruined so we didn’t pay to go in but just looked from the outside. Then about another 70kms N at the town of Edfu, the convoy stopped again for an hour for us to go into the Temple of Horus. This was very impressive and we enjoyed our visit although it was extremely hot.
The road continued N with the road, rail and river snaking together through the desert. The Egyptians certainly utilize the Nile water and there are cultivated fields all the way along – unlike the Sudanese who don’t seem to realize the potential of the ‘life blood’ that is flowing through their country.
We reached Luxor at 2pm and found Rezeiky Camp (www.luxorcamp.com) where the overlanders are going to meet up with us later – they have to catch a bus up as their truck is still at the port awaiting clearance! We are camping here but we do have the luxury of a lovely swimming pool.


Tuesday 28th August

We woke up at 7am and after a cup of coffee set off for a walk along the Corniche towards Luxor Temple. Most of Luxor Temple was built by 2 rulers, Amenophis III(1417-1379BC) and Ramses II(1304-1237BC). It was Ramses II that added the pylon and the pair of obelisks at the entrance. The temples along the Nile were generally built by successive kings and dynasties, some of whom added major sections and others merely decorated a wall. Each temple was envisaged as a progression from this world into the realm of divine mysteries and so halls get darker and doors lower and narrower as you approach the inner sanctuary. Generally, the inner sanctuary is the oldest section and the pylons are the newest. The temples were enclosed by lofty mud-brick walls and commoners were seldom allowed entry. The remains that we see are huge and very impressive and as we gain a better understanding of them, we enjoy them more and more.
After our visit, we then got a horse and carriage, Agmud the driver with his horse Cindarella. Agmud was a real gem and we had a good laugh as he took us into the labyrinth of alleyways that make up the souk.- at times people and produce had to be moved out the way to just fit our carriage through! Agmud bought us vegetables and fruit as well as sugar, matches etc and we even braved buying some beef! It was a very relaxing way to shop – the 2 of us reclined in the carriage with Agmud jumping up and down to do all the bargaining.
Then we came back to the camp site and just relaxed during the heat of the day – mainly in the swimming pool. Dave spends ages in the pool – can you believe it kids? Dad lolling in cold water! But it is just so hot that he says the cold water is wonderful.


Wednesday 29th August

We left at 7am with the overlanders in a minibus to visit the Valley of the Kings. The Valley of the Kings is on the west bank of the Nile as the sun sets in the west so the west bank signifies the end of life. First we stopped at the Colossi of Memnon which is a pair of 18m high statues originally from the front of the Temple of Amenophis III which later pharaohs plundered and destroyed. Then we went to Deir el-Bahri –Arabic name for the Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut – Hatshepsut was the only woman to reign over Egypt as a pharaoh(1503 – 1482 BC) that is for a period of nearly 22 years. Unfortunately her successor, Tuthmosis, defaced most of her images – she was portrayed as a male wearing a pharaoh’s kilt and sporting a beard!
Then we went around the bone-dry Theban Hills to the Valley of the Kings where we went into 3 of the 63 tombs so far un earthed – they descend at an angle into the ground, as the ancient Egyptians believed that the after life was in the middle of the Earth and not in Heaven as we believe. These tombs were secretive and most of the labourers only worked for 6 months at time to try and keep the secret safe. Sadly, they failed the test and the tombs were robbed mainly by past labourers. However, the dramatic shafts leading down into the ground and the carvings and decorations have remained for us to see and are truly amazing.
We did not go to see the Valley of the Queens, but instead went to Deir el-Medina, the Workers Village where the masons, sculptors and painters lived who created the royal tombs. In their time off, the chief labourers, who stayed for longer than 6 months, actually carved out their own tombs and built pyramids over these tombs. These tombs were so vividly painted that it looked like the paintings had been done a few months ago, not 3 000+ years ago!
We relaxed and swam in the afternoon and then had dinner with Jeff and the others at their truck. Jeff had gone into the markets and bought an assortment of local food and sauces plus some grilled chicken, so we had a real banquet. After dinner we all took a walk into town to the souk where we had fun bartering with the vendors. We bought an electric fan to hang up in our rooftop tent and we really slept well with our ‘air conditioning!’