Aswan

13th December 2009 (Sunday)

Yesterday was a relaxing day.. for a very good reason. Morning call today is at 3.15am and we will be leaving the cruise at 4am!!

But it will be totally worth it! :) We will be travelling to Abu Simbel!

This place is an optional tour, so those who opt out of it will have lots of free time till after lunch.

Itinerary for the day..

*This is a tour, not a holiday* ahhaha

And because it was so early, we had box breakfast again!

A lot of food packed into a box..

As you can see from the map, overnight our cruise have docked at Aswan and we need to travel to Abu Simbel. Total journey by coach is about 3.5hrs cutting through Nubian Desert. However to travel through the desert, it requires permit from the police and thus all the coaches have to assemble and travel together as a convoy. I guess it's also for the safety of the tourists that it is required to travel as a group through the desert.

Slept half the journey and woke up to this beautiful sight :) Sun rise in the desert..

After a while my photos of sunrise in the desert looks the same, and i went back to sleep :p

And then we have reached!

Construction of the temple complex started in approximately 1264 BCE and lasted for about 20 years, until 1244 BCE. With the passage of time, the temples fell into disuse and eventually became covered by sand. Already in the 6th century BCE, the sand covered the statues of the main temple up to their knees. The temple was forgotten until 1813, when Swiss orientalist Jean-Louis Burckhardt found the top frieze of the main temple. Burckhardt talked about his discovery with Italian explorer Giovanni Belzoni, who travelled to the site, but was unable to dig out an entry to the temple. Belzoni returned in 1817, this time succeeding in his attempt to enter the complex.

Tour guides at the site relate the legend that "Abu Simbel" was a young local boy who guided these early re-discoverers to the site of the buried temple which he had seen from time to time in the shifting sands. Eventually, they named the complex after him.

Walking down the path before temples come into view, with Lake Nasser on the right.

And Grand Temple of Ramesses II in Abu Simbel comes into view.

The Great Temple at Abu Simbel, which took about twenty years to build, was completed around year 24 of the reign of Ramesses the Great (which corresponds to 1265 BCE). It was dedicated to the gods Amun, Ra-Horakhty, and Ptah, as well as to the deified Rameses himself. It is generally considered the grandest and most beautiful of the temples commissioned during the reign of Rameses II, and one of the most beautiful in Egypt.
Four colossal 20 meter statues of the pharaoh with the double Atef crown of Upper and Lower Egypt decorate the facade of the temple, which is 35 meters wide and is topped by a frieze with 22 baboons, worshippers of the sun and flank the entrance. The colossal statues were sculptured directly from the rock in which the temple was located before it was moved. All statues represent Ramesses II, seated on a throne and wearing the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt. The statue to the left of the entrance was damaged in an earthquake, leaving only the lower part of the statue still intact. The head and torso can still be seen at the statue's feet.
Next to the legs of the colossi, there are other statues no higher than the knees of the pharaoh. These depict Nefertari, Ramesses's chief wife, and queen mother Mut-Tuy, his first two sons Amun-her-khepeshef, Ramesses, and his first six daughters Bintanath, Baketmut, Nefertari, Meritamen, Nebettawy and Isetnofret.

Cravings on the walls..

And this is the entrance to the temple. Above the doorway in a niche stands the sun god, a falcon headed representation of Ramsis, holding a war-scepter which shows the head and neck of an animal.

No photos allowed inside the temple, but took some photos from the net :)

The entrance leads into a Hypostyle Hall which is 18 meters long and 16.7 meters wide and was cut from the rock. It is supported by eight huge Osirid pillars depicting the deified Ramses linked to the god Osiris, the god of the Underworld, to indicate the everlasting nature of the Pharaoh.

The colossal statues along the left-hand wall bear the white crown of Upper Egypt, while those on the opposite side are wearing the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt (pschent). The bas-reliefs on the walls of the pronaos depict battle scenes in the military campaigns the ruler waged. Much of the sculpture is given to the Battle of Kadesh, on the Orontes river in present-day Syria, in which the Egyptian king fought against the Hittites. The most famous relief shows the king on his chariot shooting arrows against his fleeing enemies, who are being taken prisoner. Other scenes show Egyptian victories in Libya and Nubia.

To either side of the Hypostyle Hall are smaller rooms, two to the South and four to the North.
Beyond the Hypostyle Hall is the second hypostyle hall with its flowered pillars. Scenes in this hall show the King and his wife, Nefertari making offerings to Amun and Re-Harakhte (the Sun God), and beyond that is the three chapels, the central one containing the four deities worshipped in the temple (including Ramsis II).

It is believed that the axis of the temple was positioned by the ancient Egyptian architects in such a way that on October 22 and February 22, the rays of the sun would penetrate the sanctuary and illuminate the sculptures on the back wall, except for the statue of Ptah, the god connected with the Underworld, who always remained in the dark. Both dates are allegedly the birthday and date of ‎the coronation of Ramses II.

Temple of Ramesses II in the distance.

We then walked over to the Temple of Hathor / Nefertari which was curved into the rock beside the Temple of Ramesses II.

Generally smaller in size as the Queen's temple cannot be bigger than the King.

The smaller temple is dedicated to Ramses II's wife, Nefertari. Although she was not his sole wife, she was the best beloved. The sloping facade has three recessed areas on each side of a central doorway, flanked by two large statues of Ramses. Nefertari is shown as Hathor with the horns of the sacred cow, the solar disk and two plumes. The six statues are about 10 meters high. All have the left legs forward. Statues of the children of the royal couple are also shown--the princesses by Nefertari and the princes by Ramses.

No photos allowed inside again. So more photos from the net.

Nefertaris temple has a single pillared hall, with carved Hathor heads atop the pillars.

And that's basically what's there to see at Abu Simbel. Totally worth the long journey back and fro!

A shot of the temples together..

And view of the surroundings, which is basically Lake Nasser.

But did you know that without the international cooperation to pull funds and technical expertise together, these monuments most probably won't be here for us to see.

The twin temples were originally carved out of the mountainside during the reign of Pharaoh Ramesses II in the 13th century BCE, as a lasting monument to himself and his queen Nefertari, to commemorate his alleged victory at the Battle of Kadesh. However, the complex was relocated in its entirety in 1968, on an artificial hill made from a domed structure, high above the Aswan High Dam reservoir.

The relocation of the temples was necessary to avoid their being submerged during the creation of Lake Nasser, the massive artificial water reservoir formed after the building of the Aswan High Dam on the Nile River.

The picture below show how the temples would have been submerged if not relocated.

So how was the temple moved?

One the greatest archaeological engineering feat ever, the entire site was carefully cut into large blocks, dismantled, lifted and reassembled in a new location 65 meters higher and 200 meters back from the river. A new hill was built behind and over the temple, like a concrete dome enclosing the temples.

Below some photos of relocating the temples.

And that is the end of our tour of Abu Simbel, and its time to head back to our cruise ship for lunch (another 3.5hrs back!)

But an artistic shot of my parents up on the hill :D *like*

Last look at the surroundings, Lake Nasser, and the back of the artificial hill built to house the temples.

Some random path which i didn't have the time to walk down and explore.

Journey into the Nubian Desert again..

and then its time to sleep again!

Woke up to this scene and quickly snap photos.. i think its the River Nile and some small islands.

And that's our cruise ship at the dock and waiting for us.

Lunch time at the cruise's restaurant - typical Mediterranean fare.

After lunch, no time to rest and its time to head out full force with our tour group to visit the tourist attractions in Aswan.

First stop is The Unfinished Obelisk.

The Unfinished Obelisk is located at one of the stone quarries of ancient Egypt.

Archaeologists claim the pharaoh known as Hatshepsut sanctioned its construction. If finished it would have measured around 42 m, the largest known obelisk if it was completed.

The obelisk's creators began to carve it directly out of bedrock, but cracks appeared in the granite and the project was abandoned. The bottom side of the obelisk is still attached to the bedrock. The unfinished obelisk offers unusual insights into ancient Egyptian stone-working techniques, with marks from workers' tools still clearly visible as well as ocher-colored lines marking where they were working.

The unfinished obelisk cut out from bedrock can be seen below.

And the crack that run through the centre of the obelisk, resulting in the project to be abandoned.

And we found a little scorpion at the site.

We then head off to the Aswan High Dam which lies across the Nile River.

At the time it was completed, in 1970, it was one of the greatest engineering projects ever executed. Its purpose is mainly to alleviate the annual floods along the Nile River. The construction of this dam created Lake Nasser and the flooding of a huge part of Nubia, an area which included many ancient temples and tombs from Pharaonic times. The major ones (such as Abu Simbel and Philae) were rescued from the rising waters and reconstructed elsewhere, but many disappeared for ever.

Panoramic view of the dam..

And the "Lotus Flower" tower. This tower was built as an Egyptian-Soviet friendship monument to underline the fact that Soviet Union helped in construction of High Dam.

Next up is Philae Temple.

And to access Philae Temple, we have to get there by boat.

Philae Temple as seen from the River.

And that's the jetty we used to get on the island.

In actual fact, Philae Temple faced the exact same fate as the temples at Abu Simbel - being submerged in water due to the construction of the Aswan High Dam.

The Philae Temple we see today is no longer on Philae Island, as it has been dismantled and reassembled on Agilika Island about 550 meters from its original home on Philae Island (buried under Lake Nasser) in the wake of the construction of the High Dam.

The temple, dedicated to the goddess Isis, is in a beautiful setting which has been landscaped to match its original site. It's various shrines and sanctuaries, which include The Vestibule of Nectanebos I which is used as the entrance to the island, the Temple of the Emperor Hadrian, a Temple of Hathor, Trajan's Kiosk (Pharaohs Bed), a birth house and two pylons celebrate all the deities involved in the Isis and Osiris myth.

The First Pylon in the distance with the Eastern Colonnade on the Right.

The First Pylon

The Western & Eastern Colonnades

View of the Western & Eastern Colonnades from the first pylon

Things we see walking around the temple compound..

This is the so-called Kiosk, sometimes referred to as "Pharaoh's Bed". The rectangular building has fourteen columns with beautifully carved floral capitals that once supported a wooden roof.