Day 8 - Tuesday, February 27th

Another early morning today! We had to be up and at the airport in Aswan for our flight to Abu Simbel by 7:30 a.m. Abu Simbel is 280 kms south of Aswan and only 40 km north of the Sudanese border, on the edge of Lake Nasser. We are here to visit 2 temples, The Great Temple of Ramses II, and the Temple of Hathor, dedicated to his wife Nefertari. These 2 temples were hewn out of a solid cliff 1300 years BC and are the most amazing structures we've seen (really - THE most amazing.....).

Amazing they are and for more than one reason. This was a site in danger of being lost forever, submerged in Lake Nasser after the construction of the Aswan High Dam. Again, UNESCO came to the aid of Egypt and the world, saving these incredible temples. They dismantled and reconstructed the 2 temples, rebuilding them 90 meters higher on the banks of Lake Nasser, exactly as they had been before and I personally thank them from the bottom of my heart.

Our Habibi spent a long time explaining to us what we would see within the temples. We were not allowed to go in as a group and we needed to know what we would see inside, hear the explanations of who, what, why and when that Habibi always imparts and what the most important things we should take notice of were.

As we stood in front of this massive structure, the Temple of Ramses II, we discovered that each statue of Ramses is 20 metres high, the distance from ear to ear is 4 metres and the lips measure 1 metre wide (that's quite the smile!!) One of the statues was broken during an earthquake in 27 BC and when UNESCO moved and reconstructed the temple they put the broken pieces back exactly as they found them. The Hypostyle Hall with it's amazingly huge statues of Osiris with the features of Ramses makes you feel like a small ant, the carvings, the paintings, the symbolism, the stories on the walls are indescribable. All that we see is very clear and so easy to look at. Everywhere you look, this temple has something else to make your chin drop. But for me the most incredible moment happened when I was walking around in the Second Pillared Hall. I came around a corner and was faced with a painting of Hathor presenting a gift to Nefertari. For some reason this set me back on my heels and stunned me. I experienced one of those "Oh My God" moments that will never leave me. I still don't know what this was but...oh my...oh my... The Inner Sanctum of this temple is magical. Along the back wall, 65 metres from the front entrance of the temple sits Ptah (god of darkness & of the dead), Ra-Harakhty (god of rising sun), Ramses II and Amun-Ra (sun god). Only twice a year, once in February and once in October does the sun ever penetrate this far into the sanctum. And all but Ptah are illuminated - Ptah is always in darkness. Elaborate planning and logic from the 13th Century BC! I went back again and again to the Second Pillared Hall.

The smaller temple at this site - The Temple Of Hathor - dedicated to Nefertari, was so beautiful and feminine. Of course there were a lot of paintings and statues of Ramses here as well! Nefertari was Ramses favorite wife and the hypostyle hall in this temple is decorated with scenes of Ramses slaying Egypt's enemies, watched by Nefertari. The vestibule shows the royal couple making offerings to the gods.

The entire site is fabulous and the view to Lake Nasser beautiful. And really...this is the day and the temple that will stay with me forever. (Do you remember that in Day 4 we visited the papyrus paper shop? And, I said that we purchased some pictures and that most of them were scenes from Abu Simbel?? This was very eerie - the pictures I was drawn to earlier in the week turned out to be from the very temple that spoke to me the most!!!) I'm glad we didn't see this temple at the beginning of the tour. It is so outstanding and spectacular that the other temples would have paled in comparison.

Les and I had time to reflect on this temple and soak up the sun in a nice little garden cafe. For me that meant dreaming about what I saw and for Les it meant enjoying a lovely apple flavoured sheesha!!

On arrival back to Aswan, we left port to head back toward Luxor, sadly this is more than the mid-way point of our tour and we have seen the majority of the sights scheduled. We did have a quiet afternoon, sitting on the deck, laughing, chatting, watching Nile life flow by, and teasing the bartender (a lovely man with a GREAT sense of humour). We landed in Kom Ombo and some of us female Habibi's went shopping! We have lots of fun together and we are getting quite good at "tough bargaining" with the Egyptians!!