No seriously, does it get any hotter?

This morning we woke up and proceeded to check out of our room and made our way to the Aswan international airport for our charter flight to Abu Simbal. Since so many people had joined this optional excursion they were able to charter a separate flight for our group and one other. To dive a little deeper into the airline procedures or lack of rules and procedures, let me explained how we boarded this flight. We got to the airport and put ourselves and our bags through the x-rays. Note that we did not remove our liquids or electronics from our bags at all- they just flew through the scanners without a care. We walked through the metal detector and more than likely if it beeped, you just kept walking and there was not a problem. At the most, you’d have to tell them that you were wearing your passport and they waved you through. Then we got to check our bags and they just put a luggage sticker on your bag that says your destination and the tour director gives you a boarding pass with a random name on it. On the flight to Abu Simbal I was “Wendy” and Brad was “Fabio” which was the talk of our group! We take an open air bus to the plane, walk up the stairs and sit wherever we want on the 1960’s beat up plane. Brad’s tray table fell on him when the plane was taking off…so many more stories about the airlines later. This was worse because it was a chartered plane, EgyptAir is much better.

We got to Abu Simbal which is in the middle of the Sahara desert and a quick drive to the Sudan boarder. This is the land of no air conditioning. So when we got off our plane and for about 2-3 more hours, no air, just well over 100 degrees and NO (and I am serious) shade. Was the trip worth it, absolutely! We drove from the airport to the drop off spot of the temples. We had about a 20 min walk/hike to our destination which was a pretty steep hill. But once you get over the big hill- WOW, it was amazing. This was place where Ramses II (Ramses the great) and Nefartari lived. It was carved out of the mountain and just the sheer size of this temple was just majestic. How they could do this is simply amazing. Will try to post a picture of this one to give you an idea of what we saw.

After we were finished in Abu Simbal, I had almost melted, and we boarded the charter to Cairo. This time I was named “Anna” and Brad was “Mr.Assad”. Flying time was only about 90 mins and we got to Cairo, picked up our bags and got on a very cold bus and went to the Marriot to check in before the pyramid sound and light show. Cairo was about 86 degrees and it felt chilly compared to where we were earlier. Traffic was horrible when we arrived in Cairo and it took us a long time to get to the hotel- traffic is very interesting over here- the horn is not for emergencies or to warn people, the horn is communication and everybody uses it, constantly. The horn says to other drivers and pedestrians, “hey guy, I am here, I know you are cutting me off but I want you to know I am not slowing down” or “hey Mr. Pedistrian crossing 8 lanes of traffic on the freeway with no speed limit, I know that I am driving without my lights on at night, but I still see you from afar and am not going to slow down, but instead I am going to honk to let you know I know you are there even though you are not even going to look at any of the oncoming traffic”- I am not joking. There are technically lanes of traffic, but they are only there for decoration. We took some video on my camera of traffic in cairo.
We got to the hotel, dropped off our carry-on in the room and hopped back onto the bus for the sound and light show. This was a really neat show. You sit in front of the three great pyramids of Giza and the Sphinx while the Sphinx talks to you in his native language; English. Everything is lit up with colorful lights and the story of Egypt is told.
This lasted for about an hour before the next show started where the Sphinx told the story in his native language of French…what a great multi-lingual sphinx!

Got back to the hotel and since we had not eaten since 7 in the morning decided to have lunch and dinner at 8pm. I was a little upset about the lack of food and beverage stops today, but all was forgotten once I had a nice cheese pizza in front of me- yes, the ancient Egyptians, loved pizza. Off to bed for another action packed day!