Summary
This is the 4th (and final) part of the Cairo, Nile Cruise series. The last segment of our trip. We added this last minute and it turned out quite nicely. If we had planned ahead, we could’ve gotten a flight from Aswan to Abu Simbel. As it was, we ended up getting up horribly early and driving through the sahara.
Sunrise over the Sahara
The only good part about getting up around 4am was that about half-way there, we got to see the sun come up over the Sahara Desert.
Abu Simbel
Abu Simbel is another temple that was relocated as part of the High Dam project. The architect figured out the proper placement so the sun would shine into the temple on exactly 2 dates. Ramesses II’s birthday, and the Summer Solstice. When the temple was moved, it changed the dates so they are now off by 1 day (on each end).
Abu Simbel’s change of location was a little different than the Philea Temple. Abu Simbel was carved directly into the rock hill. They built a new “hill” and then extracted the interior of the temple, and the exterior and hooked it all together at the new site. Pieces that had fallen were left where they were found.
Lastly, yikes to the spider webs taking over that tree!
Thank you
Weather was unusually cool for the time of year, people were quite plesant (when they weren’t trying to convince you to buy something), food was quite good. A big thank you to Sun Ray Travel out of Toronto for a fantastic trip!
