On our way home!

After recovering from my tummy bug we cycled down to Luxor Temple and shame on us, McDonalds for a strawberry milkshake! Yum. On our return to the camp Katie and Alex rolled up from Cairo and Jon had to reload / mend 3 of the campers laptops! In the evening Jacques and Linda made us all a great Curry as another farewell meal before we headed off to Aswan with J&M. We stopped at the Temple of Horrus along the way which was remarkably in tact with the ceiling and walls highly decorated and some paint still clearly visible.

By the time we reached Aswan Linda was feeling poorly so we went to bed when we reached Adams Camp where Mandy and Linda provided a slap up feast for the mosies getting over 100 bites between them.

We arrived in good time for our convoy escort to Abu Simbel at 11am and were 2 of 5 vehicles. The convoy departure area was surrounded by armed guards who for the first time that we've seen in Egypt, actually looked like they were guarding us and watching out for threats. The convoy left on time (another Egyptian first) and we felt like royalty as we swept out of town passed police stopping traffic at the junctions.

The trip down was uneventful and slowish at 70-85kph until we passed the last check point about 50km before Abu when the tail end coach pulled alongside us flashing and getting very worked up that we should go faster. We ignored them and after a few minutes he zoomed passed and we and Pumbaa (J & M's Landcruiser) were on our own.

We arrived all of 2 minutes after the coach and parked up on the edge of Lake Nasser right next to the temple. The two convoys per day run at 4am and 11am and almost everyone takes the early one which is on its way home by 10am so we had the temples to ourselves. They are the highlight of the temples so far. They have not been vandalised or worn with weather and look as vibrant and beautiful today as they would have done thousands of years ago.

We awoke the next day as dozens of coaches started loading up to take people back to Aswan. We were still having breakfast when half the coaches left on the 9am convoy so we joined the 10am convoy as we turned for home. We were put at the front and within 5 kms had been overtaken by all the coaches bar one and were on our own.

We had a pleasant trip back and then visited Aswan High dam which you had to pay for to walk on but could drive over for nothing! You were only allowed to walk on a small section and we had soldiers yelling at us for walking on the wrong bit / the wrong way etc etc. The dam itself is very disappointing as it is so small, with a 500 km lake behind it you expected a really tall impressive dam.

Our last night with J&M was at the Mossie breeding ground Adams Home, but this time we were covered up and inside well before the hordes had woken for the night.

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