Abu Simbel and travelling Indie

I have to admit I felt a bit like a fraud on my way to Abu Simbel. Egypt is perhaps the only place in the world I’ve ever travelled where you’re actually a little punished for being an independent traveller. Prices are cheaper, but it can, in some places, be almost impossible to get from here to there without a tour. Abu Simbel was seeming like it was one of those places.

It’s easy enough to get there if you want to go as a large group. The problem though, everyone told me, is that there is a heaving mass of people all trying to fit into the teeny temple of Abu Simbel at the same time. Oh that, and you have to go as part of the police convoy and there are only two times it leaves 4am and 11am. Almost everyone goes at 4am.

Both of those things me no likey. 3am wake up times and throngs of people so I can’t contemplate the temple both make me cranky. So, I splurged. I mean, really splurged and hired a private driver to get me down there with the 11am convoy. The benefit of this was twofold. One, we headed up the convoy as one of the few private cars, and the second was that we’d be way ahead of the tour groups when we got there which meant I’d have a good half hour to an hour at the temples without anyone there unless I had the misfortune of having one of the Lake Nasser cruises hitting the temple at the same time.

As it was though, it was worth every single extra penny I spent to get down there. Besides watching the desert roll on on both sides of the highway getting down there and seeing the mirages on the horizon making it look like we were going to be driving into the sea anytime soon, the almost good hour I had with Abu Simbel and Nefertari’s temples where I could walk through, take my time and contemplate the ego that would build thing on the Southern frontier and raise himself to godhood was so worth it.

One weird thing was that the police captain rode in my car, which was a bit strange because it felt like I was subsidizing this guy’s gas and A/C on the way down but you tend not to argue with men with submachinegun’s riding shotgun.