EGYPT  2001:

The first group of pictures are of our boat, the Oberoi Shehrazad.  I took these after coming back from Edfu Temple.  The second picture is of our transportation to and from the temple, the horse and buggy.  The others are of the deck and docking at Kom Ombo.

After cruising for a while, we arrived at Kom Ombo that same afternoon.  We walked to the temple from the boat because it was very close.  On the way there, we passed a market which sold traditional Egyptian apparel.  The clothes were sold to tourists because all the boats have an Egyptian costume party that night in the bar and dance area.

Although Kom Ombo was relatively small compared to the other temples we have seen, I found it amazing because of the records of the scientific achievement of the ancient Egyptians.  This temple had records of medical technology, construction methods, aqueducts, and even an ancient calendar carved into the stone walls.  It also had a well which was used to measure the water table.  This temple truly displayed how advanced the ancient Egyptians were.  It also made me think about how all this technology was lost for such a long period of time when the Egyptian empire fell.

The picture after the one Fathy is pointing at something in, is of ancient medical devices used for surgery.  You can see the hooks, spoons, tweezers, and scissors used in ancient times.  The two pictures after this one, with the strange looking shape like an hourglass cut into the stone, is used for an interesting construction technique.  To hold and pull stones together, the Egyptians cut these shapes into the rock and pounded a wet piece of wood in the same shape into the hole.  When the wood dried, it contracted and pulled the stones together to make a very strong seal.  The next picture is of the well used to measure the water table.  Next is the oldest aqueduct in history.  The fourth, fifth, and sixth pictures from the last is of an ancient Egyptian calendar.  The first is of the entire calendar, the second is of a smaller section, and the third is of four individual days.

After Fathy gave us a complete tour of this temple, he told us we could come back to the boat on our own because the boat would not leave until early the next day.  I hung around for a while by my self to take some more pictures.  It was getting pretty late and the sun was about to set, so I decided to stay a little longer in order to get a picture of the sun set from the temple.  I took the sun set in the third to last picture and walked back to the boat to take another one from the deck.