Egypt 11 - edited with photos

[bazfaz]

We are back in Luxor, staying at the same cheap hotel. After an absence of 10 days they remembered us - we didn't behave that disgracefully - even asking if Madame was feeling better.

Our last couple of days in Aswan followed a routine of seeing something in the morning, felafel for lunch, lazing and reading a book on the roof terrace of the hotel in the afternoon, a stroll along the Corniche, vodka (Egyptian, OK) and Mountain Dew and supper. Nothing very exciting but just chilling out.

Tombs of the Nobles on the West Bank at Aswan








Camel on the West bank at Aswan



We were going to have our last meal at the Emy whose waiter had begun by trying to cheat us but now was on friendly terms. Alas we got there just too late as a group of 2 dozen French people had drinks and were studying menus. It would be 2 hours before we were served. So we went next door to the Salahdin. Lovely view over the Nile, poor service and crap food. I ordered pigeon. Eventually my plate arrived with some thin bones connected by skin. Perhaps I got 15 grams of meat. When the waiter came to ask if everything was all right he seemed stunned when I said no. He peered at my plate, muttered something about the pigeons having no breast and walked away. So my advice is to avoid the Salahdin and go to the Emy but scrutinise the bill closely.

We kept bumping into an Austrian who worked for the United Nations Museum something or other - he kept flashing his card to get free entry to sites but I never got a proper look at it. He said he was going to look at a temple up on Lake Nasser and there was a train to Aswan High Dam. Indeed there was. It was billed as the 11.40 and we all three went and sat in it. Is there a fourth class on Egyptian railways? If so, this was it. 11.40 came and the train didn't move. More and more people piled on. Then we worked out our possible timetable. Journey to the High Dam 20 minutes. Walk across the dam another 20 minutes. Haggling to get a boat. Trip on the boat. And the train was returning to Aswan at 2.15 (in theory). So some time after midday we abandoned the Austrian. I wondered what happened to him.

We bought tickets at Aswan station for today's travel. In my best Arabic I said "Luxor...boukra" and held up 8 fingers. "How many passengers?" the ticket clerk asked in his best English. So we got our two tickets and went to the station about 7.45 this morning. We were stunned to see a train standing there (it is the terminus for the railways so the trains start from there). We showed our tickets and were pointed out our wagon. Again, amazingly, the train left at 8.01.

About 5 minutes out of Aswan the ticket inspector came, lloked at our tickets and launched into a long spiel of which all we understood was that this was not the 8 a.m. running on time but the 6 a.m. starting 2 hours late. But I didn't like the way he kept our tickets and shouted. After 20 minutes he came back and a student was found who spoke broken English. It turned out we had been given tickets for the 8 p.m. train not the 8 a.m. The inspector wanted us to buy 2 new tickets but in the end he settled for only making us buy one. The student's broken English extended to saying, "He is showing mercy."

Last day at Luxor - a stroll along the Nile on the West Bank







A Nubian baby on the West Bank!

[Deleted]

Why must things always be so complicated in that country? I hope they are at least selling new tickets and not the same old ones over and over again as sometimes happens.

I certainly hope that Mrs. Baz can be persuaded to post a photo report of all of these adventures when you return. You may be busy picking up some branches and debris, because the weather has been quite rough repeatedly over recent weeks -- it was the perfect time to be basking in the warm Egyptian sunshine instead.

[onlymark]

Nothing is ever quite what it seems in Egypt, is it?!

[bixaorellana]

Ay, Baz ~ what an exhausting sequence of ups & downs your trip is turning out to be!

The whole Aswan high dam non-adventure reminds me of trying to see Uxmal. Not a story for relating here, but suffice to say Uxmal remains innocent of my gaze.

I am assuming that you indeed saw the dam, and that you will report on same, yes?

[bazfaz]

We saw the dam from the bus coming back from Abu so we didn't miss that much.

A coiple of other things about Aswan I forgot.

Driving in on the bus we passed a shop selling furnitutr. Above it was the name: Mohammed Al Fayed. So Harrods has a branch here.

The other thing was the curious incident of the felucca. I wan
ted to do a 2 day journey to Kom Ombo, spending one night on the feluxxa or on shore. But the hot weather vanished and it got really cold at night so our enthusiasm waned. Still I thought we would just see what arrangemnents we could make.

On the Corniiche in Aswan a boy tout offered a felucca. When I mentioned Kom Ombo he summoned an older man. Finally a proper felucca captain came up and we begab to talk. We hadn't even got round to cost when a blue pick-up with the police insigniaon the door stopped, 2 plainclothes men got out and grabbed the two younger men literally by the scruff of the neck and gave them a clip over the ears. As they hauled the two youngsters off one of the cops turned to Mrs Faz and gave her a wink.

As internet usage has it - WTF?

[Deleted]

Did Mrs. Faz just barely escape being sold into white slavery on a floating bordello?

[bixaorellana]

Cool, Baz ~~ you all slipped into an alternate reality!

[bazfaz]

Bounce

[Deleted]

More wonderful photos!

I know that camels are a miracle of nature and perfectly suited for their environment, but when looked at abstractly, they seem very poorly designed with all sorts of strange protrusions and folding parts.

[bazfaz]

Indeed, being on a camel that is kneeling down is a wierd experience.

[onlymark]

Camels are the only animals designed by a committee.

[bixaorellana]

The photos are out of this world! What's the story on the white stuff on the columns in the first picture? I assume the whole thing was once heavily painted & ornamented -- is that correct?

What is the interesting beehive shaped structure in photo #6?

Even though you all had so many frustrating experiences, Mrs. Faz has extracted a great deal of beauty and joy out of the experience with her camera.

[onlymark]

Bixa - I hope Baz doesn't mind me slipping in here and I hope he will correct me if I'm wrong.
The white stuff could well be remnants of the decorations, but I tend to think it is more like the minerals leeching out of the stone. It could be like salt and I theorise that now that the tombs are open to the public the humidity, albeit small maybe, from the atmosphere and expelled breath (not a lot of ventilation down there) are affecting the pillars.
I could be way out though.

In picture six you see three regular domes and a more pointed one to the left with holes in it. The regular domes are the traditional way to build a roof for many thousands of years. It is called a corbelled roof where, like with lego bricks, a ring of bricks is placed on top of the wall. The next layer is placed inwards by nearly half a brick width. The subsequent layers are all placed slightly in towards the centre as with the second layer until they nearly meet in the middle. Usually a cap stone finishes it off.

The more pointed one with the holes in it is a pigeon coop.

[onlymark]

You will find the same techniques for roof building forming the vaults within the pyramids. The reason being that any load placed on the roof is transferred down and out to the walls. That is why the vaults in the pyramids can sustain such a weight of stone upon them without collapsing inwards, the weight transferred to the thick structure of stone surrounding the vault.