Down the Nile…
We tried to take an over-night sleeper train (which is typical for tourists) to travel from Cairo down south to Aswan but unfortuneatly the two people ahead of us in line got the last remaining tickets. Instead, we took the day train (seats, no beds). Leaving at 7am, 14 hours later we arrived, a little travel weary, in Aswan. We walked out to our hotel from the train station and immediately crashed, very happy to be in a bed.
The next day we woke up and walked around the city. It easily has the best promenade that we saw in Egypt; many shops, eateries, and people out and about. Here, we started to notice what people refer to as aggressive Egyptian men….. basically, as we walked down the promenade, a random guy would offer to us “water?… coke?…. beautiful!!…”. That last one was obviously directed at Paula… like you didn’t already know. Anyway, my name was quickly changed to ‘lucky guy’. This is funny and a bit flattering the first few times… it wears thin rather quickly though… oh well, we just ignore and keep walking; no worries.
The following day, we did a tour. It was to see the High Dam and the Philae temple. Maybe the worst tour ever. The first part was to see a dam. Basically you look at it…. “ok, there it is… look how it holds the water back, great”. Then we went to the Philae temple which was interesting but our guide had very limited english skills so we learned almost nothing. Also, he seemed very agitated when, in the middle of the tour, we would take pictures… apparently he wanted to do his shpeel then go sit in the shade while we take the pics. Oh well. We met some interesting people, though. A couple from England (although the guy was really from New Zealand (Nick) and the girl was Indian (Preety)) and a couple from Ecuador. We had dinner with the Londoners and received an open invitation to stay at the home of the Ecuadorians when we visit Ecuador. They were all so nice that we had a good time on the tour anyway.
Next we’ll be doing a cruise down the Nile… can’t wait!
Tags: aswan, Egypt, philae temple
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