EGYPT  2001:

After returning from the Aswan bazaar, we had our last dinner on the cruise boat and slept there for the night.  We woke up early the next morning, loaded up our luggage, and headed for the Aswan Airport.  We were getting on an Egypt Air airplane that would take us a relatively short distance from Aswan to Abu Simbel.  I was amazed to discover that our group of twenty almost had the entire airplane to ourselves, except for only three or four others.  We could sit anywhere except first class.  It was nice because I laid across three chairs, and for the first time I slept on an airplane for more than ten minutes.  I woke up when we began to land and took the third picture from the airplane of the great temple.

After landing at the very small airport, we hopped on a bus and headed for Abu Simbel.  One thing I remembered about this town was that it was very hot.  I think it ended up reaching over 110 degrees that day.  The heat would not have been that bad except for the fact that when we arrived at the temple, we were told to take all our carry on luggage off the bus and carry it for almost a mile to the temple because we would not be getting back on the bus.  The problem was that I was carrying three heavy bags with me.  One back pack full of water, a large camera bag, and a bag full of souvenir carved rock statues.  In addition to that, I was dressed up in hot clothes because we were supposed to meet the mayor of Abu Simbel at the airport, but he could not make it.  It would have been nice if we would have been allowed to stop at the hotel first to drop off our bags and change into more comfortable clothes, but I ended up enjoying the temple anyway.

The Temple of Abu Simbel was an amazing structure.  The entire thing was carved into the side of the mountain.  The amazing accomplishment of modern times was that the entire temple and part of the mountain it was carved into was moved from a lower elevation to its present location to save it from being flooded when the High Dam was built.  The temple was carefully cut into blocks and reassembled piece by piece in its present location.  Although it is possible to see the cut lines from the moving project, I believe they did an excellent job with preserving one of the most magnificent and unique structures in Egyptian history.

Abu Simbel Temple is actually two temples, a large one and a smaller one.  Both temples are amazing inside and out.  The four gigantic statues of Ramses II are artistic masterpieces.  While at the temple, I remember wondering how the ancient Egyptians would have cut the four colossal statues outside, and a large room inside the side of the mountain with the tools they had.

The last two pictures were taken on the way back from the temple.  The first of the two is a guy with a machine gun in plain clothes, and the second is of a merchant's display of statues for sale.