Egypt Day 8-- Abu Simbel & the Temples of Ramses and Nefertari

We got up and left by dawn to take a morning flight to Abu Simbel. We boarded a bus and headed for the Temple of Ramesses II and his first/favorite wife Nefertari. (She's the only one who got a temple built just for her, anyway!) This is a World Heritage site which was rescued from the water before they built the dam in the 1960's. They took both of these structures and numbered every single block of stone and rebuilt it almost exactly above where it was- which was later covered by the water!!! This was a HUGE undertaking and so interesting!! They put it together exactly as it was found-- even the head that had fallen over at the entrance-- instead of putting it back on the body of the statue, they left it where it had originally fallen! I found a picture of Neftis (me!) in the temple of Nefertari-- I'm standing next to her! We headed to the airport to catch a flight back to Aswan. We checked into the beautiful Movenpick Elephantine Resort which is located on Elephantine island-- aptly named because the rock formations look a lot like elephants and elephant tusks. (We saw some of them on our boat ride later!) We relaxed in our rooms for a bit and unpacked and then we headed back out on a boat ride to a Nubian village where we explored their lifestyle and traditions and we visited a family's home there as well. Every Nubian home has an alligator as a pet-- they believe it is good luck! This home had 2-- a baby which we got to hold and an older, not so nice looking and larger one, who was luckily caged! They are so menacing looking!) The Nubian village homes and buildings were very brightly colored unlike the sandstone tan everywhere else in Egypt was. The home we visited had sand floors and there was a lot of outdoor areas both upstairs and downstairs-- it was all open and not really enclosed anywhere, except for the bedrooms and kitchen. The lady of the house was doing henna tattoos and Linda got one-- she's so cute and adventurous-- she'll do anything! She was always the one bartering and buying everything everywhere we went! And, she found some cool things, too! We saw a random herd of camels running through the town and got to see all of their artisanal goods everywhere! The art definitely looks more African and they had a lot of masks for sale! We were treated to a Nubian style dinner, but I honestly couldn't tell the difference from any of the other food we've had here! It was again very filling and too much!! We enjoyed a sunset boat ride back to the hotel. It's the first day of Ramadan so we learned all we ever wanted and didn't want to know about that! The crescent shaped moon is the reason why they put them on all of their minarets on their mosques. Ramadan is figured by the lunar calendar and is 10 days later every year, so it can occur any time of year-- it just happened to be while we were in Egypt! They have lights and decorations set up everywhere in celebration all over the country! They've been setting up for it since we got to Egypt. The majority of the people are Muslim, so everyone celebrates it-- even the Nubians-- who are Muslim as well. This trip has definitely been an education for me and NOTHING like I'd expected. It has been a cultural experience like none other!