Day 3 Aswan - Qubbet el-Hawa and Philae S&L

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A reasonably early start today. After breakfast we were straight on to a Felucca and made our way over to Qubbet El-Hawa, or Nobles' Tombs. Our first tombs!!

Mike warned us about the stairs we could look forward to but when I saw them I thought, "Ahh it's not too bad, I can do that easy". Little did I realise that a lot of the steps themselves were quite tall so, for a shorty like me, the top could not come soon enough! Great work out for my legs though and completely worth it once you turned back around and saw the view of Aswan from on high! We made our way to the very end of the lineup so we could work our way back and it was an interesting path - we were essentially walking around the 'rim' of the hill. I was feeling very adventurous and of course, taking in the view to our left. It was spectacular as we rounded the bend and could see the Nile stretch off in to the horizon. Postcard perfect!

We saw the tombs of Mekhu, Sabni, Harkhuf and the tomb-chapel of Pepinakht-Heqaib which was very impressive!
Being a month ago now, I have a somewhat patchy memory of the individual tombs but I do remember feeling very invasive going in to these places that were dug and decorated and supplied to last for all eternity without interruption, but the opportunity to see what they contained was definitely special.

We were told about the Ib (heart), the Sheut (shadow), the Ren (name), the Ba (soul), the Ka (spirit) as well as the Akh that belonged to the person who was buried and which each performed different tasks to ensure they survived forever.

The Ba and Ka I found particularly fascinating. The Ba, represented as a bird with a human head (which still freaks me out), would leave the body for the spirit world and would come back for visits but only if it was able to recognise the body - thus the need for the mummy's mouth to be open to allow exit, and their facemasks for recognition. Also, the Ka, represented as the two connected arms with raised hands forming a kind of 'U' shape (hard to explain) which was the spirit of the person and needed constant replenishing to keep them going. As insurances they organised different ways for this to occur. The initial plan was that followers of the person would present food and drink on an offering table. The essence was taken from the products and the priests were able to divide them up as they saw fit after this. Eternity being a long time, this was not always guaranteed to happen so on the walls of the tombs were carvings of food and drink which were to represent unlimited supplies that could keep the Ka going if the offerings ceased. As well as this, the speaking of the person's name replenished their Ka, so their name was carved in to the walls and at the entrance as well. All of this was pretty amazing and when you think about it, Tutankhamen is doing very well because his is a name that very often crosses peoples' lips!

On top of all of this, if the Ba and Ka were to reunite, they would form the Akh (which I've just discovered was depicted as a crested ibis), who was essentially a being in the afterworld who represented the person and helped to replenish the Ka and maintain Ma'at. Now to me, it's all very creepy and absolutely fascinating. Is it horrible to say that I "can't wait to die" so I can find out for sure what the deal is?! I feel very sorry for all these poor people that were buried with all the ingredients to ensure they survived for eternity and that have had their sacred space looted, desecrated, dug up for research etc. These thoughts also make me a hypocrite, I think, because I truly loved seeing all the wonders made available to us by these means!!

All of this was told to us by Mike as he stood on one side of an offering table while we gathered on the other - an interesting classroom setting for sure!! We made our way through these tombs, some enabling the whole group to enter, while others required that we go in by groups of 5 as they were so small. We were unable to enter the tombs of Sarenput I and II, which was a shame! We came to the end and made our way down via a different route - no stairs but a walk down a sandy trail which was fun but ensured my shoes were filled with sand by the time we reached the bottom of the hill. I was literally walking "in" the desert!

Not long after we were back on the Felucca and, after a bit of a cruise and some tea again, we were back on the Corniche and making our way to another quaint hidey-hole restaurant near the Souk for an early dinner. I ordered mango juice again - I just couldn't resist, but I was disappointed to discover that it wasn't fresh like I'd had the night before. For some strange reason I ordered yet another dish with no clue as to the contents, very unlike me! That dish was Shish Taouk, which turned out to be very edible skewered chicken pieces in some kind of marinade, definitely garlic in there! I was suitably impressed by my ability to yet again avoid something dodgy and of course, we had all the sides of rice, salad, dips etc so it was a lovely, very filling, meal and the service was fantastic.

As an aside - to give you an idea about the depth of the talks we received from Mike - the itinerary included Plantation Island today and we literally ran out of time. We had spent damn near all day up at Qubbet El-Hawa! Pretty good effort, I must say.

After our early dinner, we had enough time to skip up to our room to acquire some extra layers before we were loaded on to the bus to head to Philae Island for the Sound and Light show. The bus took us to the ferry port, where we transferred to ferry and in total darkness, apart from a few house lights on the horizon, chugged over to the island. It was quite pretty to look back at the town and it's lights while seemingly in the middle of a big black lagoon (look out for the monster!). I managed to blind a couple of my fellow crew members by accidentally having the flash on at one point. I thought the lights would make a nice photo, but sadly not with my camera!

We got to the island, disembarked, went through the bag and security checks amongst quite a large and sometimes very rude crowd. From there the group kind of scattered and I ended up at 'the rope' with a half a dozen or so of us. The show started with an intro, which we stood back and watched, then the rope was lowered and we were able to move forward 100m or so to watch another segment just in front of the entrance. After that part we were allowed to enter the temple and work our way through and out toward the seated area where we sat and watched the rest. It was quite amusing listening to the voice of Isis asking what had happened to her temple and another, male voice, explaining to her how man had moved it to save it from submersion. He then asked to hear her tale of Osiris and so she told us. All of the story telling was done in time to lights shining on different points of the temple, it was all very dramatic, and interesting but the thing that was foremost in my mind was how seriously freezing cold I was. I had my scarf wrapped all about my head so that really only my eyes were exposed and I was still shivering.

Thankfully, the exit wasn't too crowded, the boat trip was fairly quick, as well as the bus trip and before too long we were tucked in our lovely warm beds! I know I was expecting the colder weather but something about being right on the edge of a desert might have fooled me in to thinking that I wouldn't be frozen to the bone! I am aware of how stupid that thinking was so nobody needs to mention it :P

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