Day 175: Aswan - Touching down in Egypt

Upon arriving at Cairo at 3am, we had to change from the international terminal to the domestic terminal to catch our plane to Aswan. We were told by the ground crew about a shuttle bus that would take us from the international terminal to the domestic terminal. “Ten minutes” they said and even guided us to the exact spot where the bus would stop. About 15 minutes passed, there was still no sign of the bus. Another gentleman told us that the bus would come in ten minutes. So we waited again. I asked the locals if we could walk to the domestic terminal, and they said no. An hour passed and the bus did not show up. We ended up taking a taxi. It was only a 3-minute drive! That was our first experience with the concept of “African time.”

us waiting for the shuttle bus that never came

landed at Aswan

Our hotel, Memnon, was just OK for one night. It was smoky, dirty and noisy. The only plus side was the location. It's right on the bank of Nile river, and our room faced the Nile. Oh my, the color of the Nile river was deep dark blue. It's quite a sight with feluccas floating on the Nile and the trees lining the river bank.


We came to Aswan as a stop-over to go to Abu Simbel, so we left promptly and happily the next morning.

Katy keeping the flies out of our food - many, many flies

me sampling the water pipe

the suq at night

a Chinese motorbike, but the Chinese logo is up-side-down - probably assembled in Egypt

an interesting decoration for the main entrance at a Nubian house