This morning we repeated the journey we had taken two nights ago to the Philae Temple - boat to bus to boat to Temple! We learned more given that Mohamed was with us this time. We learned that we were boating between the two dams and that we were in the area of the first of seven cataracts on the Nile, a cataract being a series of huge boulders that block the flow of the river and create major danger for navigation. In the light of day we could observe the hieroglyphs and the carvings of the temples with much greater clarity. Beautiful. Stunning. Vibrant colors. We learned of the influence of the Greeks and Romans in the architecture of site, particularly in the columnades and smaller temples that were built later in the history of the site. This site is definitely the largest we have seen to date and we loved it! On the grounds was a marketplace and coffee shop where the vendors generally seemed uninterested in sales until we expressed the slightest interest! I bought a red totebag with the image of King Tut embroidered on the front ... because I really need another totebag, not! :) In the marketplace by the bus Harold bought a hat but he may never wear it. The one from the 1998 trip to South Africa and Zimbabwe is hard to beat!
For those of us who were interested, the next stop was the Kyphi Perfumery. I stopped, of course, but Harold went on to the our next accommodation, a Nile River cruise boat. The Perfumery was quite interesting. The Egyptians were very early glass-blowers so we were treated to a demonstration of glass blowing that produced a perfume bottle. Following the demonstration we participated in a lesson on scents: essences, perfumes, and aromatics. Most interesting smells of lavendar, sandalwood, bergamot, musk, mint, eucaliptus, black cumin oil, clove, and sesame. But my favorite was frankincense so I bought a very small bottle of it in essence form and I adore it. I also bought several glass perfume bottles for several very special people in my life! ... in the mail for two of them, one to be hand-delivered in the spring, and one for display in my Grandma Phelps' china closet in our family room!
When we got to the river boat (after walking through two other boats!) we had lunch and then went to our cabin to unpack and get organized for the three days in this accommodation. Up on the top deck we had a great view of the Movenpick Hotel, our previous accommodation, as well as the Aga Khan Mausoleum, many feluccas, other river cruise boats, fishing boats and other nautical vessels of various kinds.
We had tea and then left by bus for an optional tour of the Nubian Museum a short distance from the boat. The Museum is a beautiful, modern granite museum with extensive grounds (which we did not visit since it already was dark outside) and exhibits tracing Egyptian and Nubian history. A parallel timeline was especially helpful in clarifying the relationships of various historical periods that we had heard and studied. Interestingly, the first site that greeted us at the entrance to the museum was a huge stone carved statue of Ramses II as if to say that the Egyptians still are in charge even if this is the Nubian Museum! There was a diorama of the Nile with the temples in their original and subsequent locations - again, a very helpful display to help us understand what we had been seeing and experiencing. There also was an extensive life-size reenactment of various scenes of Nubian life - agriculture, village, homes, families, etc. The special exhibit was a photo display of black and white photos from the 1960's showing how the temples and villages looked prior to excavation for the dams. It was extremely interesting to step back into that time and to try to see the sites as the early excavators saw them.
Parenthetically, this process of stepping back in time was a constant during our trip. We had studied the work of the mid-1800s to mid-1990s Egyptologists so much through non-fiction books and articles as well as through the historical fiction novels of Elizabeth Peters that we could place ourselves in history and be in total awe of the men and women who engaged in discovery of the tombs and the distribution of the contents throughout the world. Not that this latter was a good thing but ...
On the return to the boat, we explored the vast recesses and narrow streets of the markets of Aswan as Mohamed sought to fulfill a request from me and from Jill (another tour member) to purchase CDs with Egyptian rock music for music lovers at home. What an amazing journey through the streets and into the shop. Mohamed took charge of the purchase process and made sure we got CDs that would play on US cycles ... or so we hope! The tour members who stayed on the bus during our visit to the music store enjoyed being observers of the night culture of the Aswan Bazaar!
Back on the boat we enjoyed a welcome cocktail party sponsored by the ship's captain followed by another delicious buffet dinner and bed ... tomorrow is another big tour day, but then, what day in Egypt isn't?!
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