So a Lot of Stuff Happened

 

[Mostly composed by Phil as I attempt to recover from the nasty cold I probably caught on the first Egyptair flight]

In the morning we took an Uber to the Montazah Gardens, thirteen miles along the coast. Well, actually we took two Ubers. The first one broke. We strolled along the wide paths, admired the late 19th century palace, visited the beautiful conservatory, and walked by the sea. Tranquility and quiet that we needed…but then the chaotic return! 

Our Uber cancelled on us, so Phil and Ben insisted we take one of the hundreds of Russian Lada taxicabs, a car from the 1950s. Very cramped, very wild driver. We got lost in the maze of a colorful, trash-filled souk full of caged fowl and weird vegetables. Tycho had to direct the driver with his gps, which took a full hour.

After a short rest, we took another Uber to the 15th century Quitbay Citadel to watch the sunset over the sea and explore the interior, which contained the second oldest mosque in the city. Sadly, the aquarium closed before we could visit the fish, but we ate some nicely roasted sea bass and red snapper at White and Blue, a Greek place, after walking the seaside promenade.  

Greek food, including, the grilled octopus, seems right since the Greek conquerer Alexander founded the city.

We Ubered back to Cairo easily, except for the absurd ticket our driver got for being from Alexandria. Our flight to Aswan, 525 miles to the south, was a freaking nightmare, with another flight to the same place scheduled 15 minutes later and a third flight folded into that. We were rescheduled four times, moved from gate to gate to gate. A large group of furious Chinese tourists got rather physical, shouting and pushing and nearly resorting to fisticuffs with the hapless attendants. 

We left 2.5 hours late (seems to be standard for Egyptair) and arrived long after dark at the Dolty Kato House in the Aswan Nubian village. It turned out to be a gorgeous little guesthouse where they served us (and the other delayed people) a superb dinner long after their closing time. A benign end to a brutal day.

The next day we rose early and had a bountiful Nubian breakfast, savory vegetable dishes of eggplant, spiced mashed potatoes, etc.  We were met by a rep from the Sonesta Moon boat who led us to a adolescent driving a glorified motorcycle (tuk-tuk) with a flatbed attached, which held our luggage and us as we held on for dear life, bouncing over rutted roads through the village as camels passed us and merchants opened their shops.

Deposited at the agent’s car, we drove to meet our vivacious, enthusiastic guide Mohammed, an Egyptologist professor in his sixties who runs his private tours like a college seminar, packed with information and questions. [DZ: I found that I tuned out after about 20 minutes, Phil asked dozens of questions, and Ben took it all in silently and remembered everything — a total reflection of the way we performed during our own times at university).

He took us first to the massive Aswan dam that separates the Nile from Lake Nasser, then to an ancient granite mine where we saw the Obelisk that was supposed to be the largest ever to honor Cleopatra V but cracked and was never completed. Then we stopped in a souk specializing in spices (bought some) and then a fascinating presentation at a perfumery on the creation of essences and medical elixirs (bought a mint oil for Squirrel to inhale).

We took a short boat ride with glorious views of the temple and received a very detailed commentary from Mohammed, who knows everything and everyone, has worked on all the boats, knows shortcuts everywhere, and has some provocative theories of his own (which he shared with Bill Clinton when they had coffee and with John Behner when he guided him. He was for several decades the guide for the American ambassador to Egypt. He did not like Hillary). He likes to refer to himself in the third person, grip the arms of his interlocutors, and illustrate complex chronologies with pen and paper. We now know how to read some hieroglyphs and learned the entire story of Osiris and Isis, including the missing penis of Osiris that Alexander claimed he found, thus inspiring the temple to Osiris’s sister, wife, and savior. 

Next stop was the boat, one of 185 now sailing out of Aswan --very cushy, decked out for the Christmas  holidays, with comfortable cabins and plentiful if undistinguished food that is not ethnically Egyptian. [DZ: My plan of losing 5 pounds in Egypt so I could regain it in Venice is shot to hell.]

After lunch Mohammed took us a backroad route (necessitated by a roadway flood caused by a broken pipe) to the Temple of Isis, built under in third century BC and moved to an island when the dam threatened to submerge it.

We spent almost two hours there before retuning to the boat for cocktails (margaritas) and dinner, preceded by festive Nubian entertainment in which Squirrel and I were inveigled to join in as dancers. Fun. More drinks after dinner on the upper deck.  

 

Tomorrow we sail!