Sunday we packed up to leave Alexandria and stopped at the
Royal Gardens (Montzah Gardens) and the Library of Alexandria before leaving
for Cairo. We visited two beautiful palaces and got to take pictures of the
Mediterranean Sea.
Palace for the Queens
Royal Palace - Even the last president, Mubarak, was still staying here when he was in power
The Library of Alexandria was total nerd love for me. We got
a tour of how the library was built for natural light and sound, and learned
about all the cool things inside the library like a printer that prints a full
book including the pages and cover in as little as five minutes. They also have
the only supercomputer in a public library and accessible by the public. We got
to see some of their museums including the ancient manuscripts and artifacts
museum.
Such a happy nerd!
While at the library, one of the girls noticed a pain and
bruise on her ankle. It started to swell pretty rapidly and she was taken to
get a cast because she had hurt her ankle while sleep walking! We’ve had some
interesting stories about sleep walking and sleep talking on the trip. It has
been quite entertaining! Before officially leaving town we stopped at the same
restaurant as the night before and had a large seafood lunch/dinner.
Of course, I had to get another Turkish Coffee
We took a bus to Cairo, boarded a plane, and flew to Aswan
very late in the evening.
Monday has been quite the struggle with only four hours of
sleep (we didn’t get in until 2 a.m. from our travels). We visited the High Dam
built by President Naser and finished by President Sadat. It is the biggest dam
in Egypt and used to control the flooding of the Nile as well as the main power
source for Egypt. It contains enough blocks to build 17 Great Pyramids
(2,300,000 blocks) and preserves Egyptian history by being shaped like a
pyramid. We also visited the memorial between Egypt and the Soviet Union.
The other visit of the day was to the Philae Temple. The temple
was located on Philae Island but after being flooded from the building of the
High Dam, the temple was cut into pieces and relocated to Agilika Island. We had a short boat trip to the island.
The beautiful designs and pictures inside the temple
More bus snacks!
After our visits we boarded our CRUISE!!! The ship is
magnificent! We had lunch which was absolutely delicious and then took a much
needed nap! At 5 p.m. we went out on a sail boat on the Nile to watch the sun
set. We sang a Nubian folk song and enjoyed the nice weather. Nubians are the
local people of this area. They had villages up and down the Nile around Aswan,
but their villages were destroyed from the creation of the High Dam.
With Phil, Jamison, and Alex on the sail boat. Check out those life vests!
As for my title, we actually saw a lawn mower at the high
damn memorial that had to be plugged in. It looked like the man was vacuuming
his grass.
I’m currently writing this in my room as I wait for dinner
to be served. Tonight we plan to go shopping in Aswan at the local markets. Our
cruise will take off at dawn tomorrow and we will make one stop and then head
to Luxor!
Hope all is well back home!
Tess
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