Cruising the Nile (Aswan to Luxor ~ Egypt)

December 2019

One of the must do things when visiting Egypt is to do a cruise along the Nile. We opted for a three day cruise from Aswan downstream to Luxor. Trying to organise a cruise exposed us to the full brunt of the Egyptian mindset - and have to say that they couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery. 

Was going to write a long rant about how frustrating/inefficient things were and whilst it would make me feel better (venting my spleen) it would make for a boring read. Suffice to say we did get a cruise organised to take us from Aswan to Luxor (which actually turned out to be 15kms upstream of Luxor - sorry, last rant I promise). The cruise ship we ended up with was called "La Terrase" and apparently had had a full refit three years ago (which I think means it had a paint job), but in all fairness have to say it was better than we expected. Cabin was comfortable, and about mid-level, so nice view when cruising and the food was ok.

The cruise would included some guided sightseeing in Aswan, Kom Ombo and Edfu. The quality of the 'guides' made us glad that we had not joined guided tours before but relied on our own research.

Upstream of Aswan is the Old Dam (built in the early 1900s) and further upstream again is the High Dam (built in the 1960s) and between these to dams is the Island of Philae. This island and the temple on it was flooded for six months of the year and tourists could visit it and row boats between the partially submerged columns. With the construction of the highest dam the island would have been flooded full time so the decision was made to move the temple, brick by brick, to another island at a higher level. Staining of the blocks due to repeatedly being  submerged can still be seen. Personally I would have liked to have rowed between the columns of a partially submerged temple.

In the distance the metal piles of the coffer dam put in around where the temple used to be can be seen.

The high dam is a massive earth dam (comprised of the equivalent of 17 prymaids worth of material) and forming Lake Nasser (largest man made lake in the world).

It was built with the help of Russia - hence the moment to Russian Friendship.  This occured in 1960s (think cold war) and caused no small amount of international strife.

Having seen the local sights we made ourselves comfortable on the boat and started heading downstream.

Kom Ombo is unique in Egypt in that it is dedicated to the two gods - Sobek (he with the crocodile head and generally a God to be feared) and Horus (he with the Falcon head and generally a nice guy). 

This temple is understood to have been used as a place of healing (and the closest thing to an ancient hospital as you are likely to find). This is backed up by what are believed to be surgical instruments displayed in various carvings. Such as birthing stool, forceps and a stethoscope. 

At the same site is the Crocodile Museum which is home to a multitude of mummified crocodiles - some of which had their own sarcophagi. Primary reason that Sobek was worshipped and crocodiles were mummified was in order to placate Sobek and hence not be eaten by a crocodile.  

Next stop upriver was Edfu and the Temple of Horus - this we did see in the morning. Half an hour before sunrise in fact - the plus side of seeing it at this godawful time of day meant that we were pretty much the only people there.

The Temple of Horus is one of the best preserved temples in Egypt, mainly because it was covered with sand up until about 200 years ago.

After Edfu the ship continued downstream through some locks. Given that that the cruise boat passed through the locks at a rather sedate pace enterprising locals would  row out to the boat, throw up their wares and try and persuade passenger's to buy them and all the while trying not to be crushed between the hull of the cruise boat and the locks side.

We eventually  docked about 15 km out of Luxor. Spent the day chilling on the boat as we had already seen the sights of Luxor and from here we were heading back to Cairo on an overnight sleeper train.  Sleeper train was surprisingly comfortable, once you managed to lie down, and only arrived 2 and a half hours late in Cairo. 

Once in Cairo we checked into a fancy hotel in the new city and not far from the airport, for the night and flew out midmorning to our next destination - Sri Lanka.