Elephantine Island

Today’s weather. Low of 10C and high of 25C. Sunny all day.

Mornings outside are surprisingly cold but our puffer jackets, buffs and layers have been awesome!

There seems to be so much to see here. There is no way that we could visit all that Aswan has to offer in the time that we are here.

We decided that since we have already seen so many temples and tombs, and we have travelled so much in the past 18 days, that we would just omit the trip to Abu Simbel. Hopefully we won’t regret it. Later today, we are meeting up with Marit and Chris from Holland who went there right after leaving the boat yesterday, so we will hear about their trip and see their photos later today.

This morning, we went for a walk around the Island. There are two Nubian villages here. Many of the Nubians in the villages and farms on the Nile were relocated here during the last half of the twentieth century as construction of the High Dam in Aswan neared completion. The construction of the dam essentially meant that the Nubian communities had no option but to move as their homes were going to be flooded in the creation of the huge Lake Nasser.

So what did we see as we walked around the quiet village we are staying in?

- a shop with a man weaving on a loom and filled with lovely hand- woven cotton, linen and silk/linen shawls.

- a primary school. The kids are studying for exams so they weren’t at school but we met teachers and the headmaster and could look around.

- the inside of a Nubian house. The man took us on a tour of his house that was filled with stuffed and live crocodiles!

We passed a group of ladies and Chris noticed a Mickey Mouse design on the front of an old lady’s dress. He pointed to it to make conversation and the old lady screamed and backed away, giving him a dirty look. Later we learned that women do not allow any man to touch them in any way. Only their husbands can do that. He didn’t touch her but she thought that he might. We passed this lady again later in the day and she gave Chris the evil eye and once again loudly scolded him, we think, in front of her women friends.

The Aswan Archaeological Museum is close by and so are the 2 km square km ancient ruins of Abu with its Temples of Khnum and Satet. The temples date back to 1497 BC. and that’s where we met three of our fellow boat mates.

In the afternoon, we crossed the river and went to the bustling city of Aswan.Baca selengkapnya