March 27 Abu Simbel

We’re now on our way to Abu Simbel. It is 300 kilometers from Aswan and the government has dictated that all tourists travel in a convoy for safety. This is an experience it itself. We drove to the site where the convoy begins (at 11:00 am – the first was at 4:00 a.m. and there was no way that the Kuffners were going to make that one!). Armed guards using a long pole with a mirror to check that there were no bombs underneath our van. The guards then verified that our guide was with us along with two drivers (two because they keep each other in check – i.e. one stops the other from nodding off). We’ve been on the road for over an hour and the only thing to see on either side of us is the dessert. There are forty vehicle in our convoy. This is considered small as the early morning one can be comprised of over two hundred! The hghway is new..Although a two-way, vehicles travel down the middle unless there is oncoming traffic. We’re trying to relax and just go with the flow but it’s a bit unnerving!

According to Lonely Planet, the village of Abu Simbel lies 280km south of Aswan and only 40 km north of the Sudanese border. Abu Simbel was carved out of the a mountain west bank of the Nile between 1274 and 1244 BC.

We questioned whether we should drive three hours in each direction to spend an hour and a half at Abu Simbel (the maximum time that the constraints of partipating in the convoy allows). Everyone we talked to, however, said that it is an absolute must. We now wholeheartedly agree. When you arrive at the site you have to walk around the back of the mountain and down towards Lake Nassar. Rounding the bend we felt our hearts beating. There in front of us was the huge façade of the Temple of Isis towering over us. Mahmoud, our guide, spent twenty minutes outside explaining what we would see in Ramses II’s temple and that of his wife, Nerferti (unfortunately guides can’t accompany tourists inside the temples). The boys said that it was like visiting the Petra site from Raiders of the Lost Ark and we had to agree. The sheer size of the monument inspired our imaginations..

Before we knew it, we were on our way back to Aswan. We joined the convoy and started our three-hour journey back. Two hours into our ride night fell. It was disconcerting, to say the least, to have to ask our driver to turn his lights on (Egyptians generally don’t uses their lights at night, certainly not in the city). Our guide also found in quite unnecessary to wear seatbelts. We insisted and occupied the seats in the van where they were not broken. The trip went quickly. Joe immersed himself into a book that I had just finished (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo) while I read ‘The Last Lecture’. The boys read for a while and then played DS for the rest of the ride. Thank you, Marie-Josee.