FIGJAM'S Epic Adventure: Egypt Tour, Abu-Simble 'King Ramsus 2nd is another FIGJAM!'

2/9/09

2000 (local time)

ABU SIMBEL! Ill be honest, I don't know much about it, this is all I have read about it;

“Abu Simbel is possibly the most awe-inspiring temple of all ancient Egypt. The 4 giant statues of Ramses 2^nd, originally carved in the 13^th Century BC, stare out from their amazing rock cut facade looking over Lake Nasser from the western bank. It is as if they have stood their since time began. Amazingly, they have stood in their current place of residence since engineering. With the construction of the Aswan Dam and the creation of the massive artificial Lake Nasser the Temple was in danger of being submerged. At a cost of $40 Million US the Temple was cut into blocks averaging 20 tones each and relocated 65m higher and 200m back from the river Nile. It is incredible experience alone to gaze upon this ancient temple, yet it is doubly amazing when this relocating is taken into account.

So waking up at 3am in the morning was pretty ridiculous but it was ok, because the 3hour bus ride went really quickly as I was dreaming about hot girls (which is pretty rare of a Muslim country). So we arrived, and I was still very groggy from the massive sleep, but stepping out of the air conditioned bus into 40 degree heat made me wake up.

My first glimpse of Abu Simble was had and I was speechless, the statues were huge! And too be cut into the mountain was utterly jaw dropping.

The funny thing about Abu Simble is that it is all statues of the same king. King Ramses the 2^nd, this guy must have... loved himself. I'm pretty sure that myself and old mate King Ramses would have gotten along quite well, as we have some things in common.

Inside Abu Simbel was just as amazing as outside, the walls were covered in Ancient Hieroglyphics and famous carvings.

You couldn’t definitely tell that he loved himself, always being represented as having a chiselled body riding in the cart of a horse throwing a spear into his enemies.

The other temple at Abu Simbel was that of Queen Nefertari, again it is quite funny that on the entrance of the Queen Nefertari temple there were 6 statues, and only 2 of them are of Queen Nefertari, which means that 4 of them are of old mate King Ramses! (I like his style)

It was just unbelievable looking at these temples from the outside as well as the inside, unfortunately your unable to take photos inside, but I bought a post card full of pictures of the inside, so at least I wont forget.

We stayed in Abu Simble for about 2 hours, and even though I could have stayed there longer, I was so buggered and hot that I was looking forward to a nice sleep in an air-conditioned bus on the way home.

For the rest of the day, not much was planned, but we were getting on the Felucca to start our sailing up the Nile! Cant Wait!

Steve aka King Ramsus the 2^nd! OUT!