Since this morning, a blanket of lead has been suffocating Aswan, up there, high above Egypt. On the Nile, a handful of felucca sailors have decided to defy Amon, the god of the wind. In the absence of divine wind, they row their boats, dripping with heat under their djellabas. Silently, the boats glide along the Nile, in sync with the sleepy city. Finally, a life-saving breeze springs up. Barely perceptible in the late afternoon, it strengthens as the sun sets, gently guiding the ever-recurring ballet of feluccas carrying tourists...<\/p>\n
The Old Cataract's terrace has always been the best place to enjoy the show. Unfortunately, the famous palace is currently closed for complete renovation. Like a skeleton dried out by the sun - you have to be in the right mood - its carcass towers over the city. In the absence of a historic hotel, the Nubian House Restaurant, on the heights of Aswan, also offers a lovely panorama. \"The terrace is very pleasant for groups of a few dozen people, who can enjoy a mint tea at sunset,\" explains Nahed, a tourist guide. In the distance, the white triangular sails skirt around Elephantine Island, bristling with reeds and reflected in the river. A real show! On the left bank, a gigantic golden dune, the beginnings of the great desert, plunges straight into the water. It's easy to understand why so many people, from Agatha Christie to Fran\u00e7ois Mitterrand, have fallen under the spell of Aswan.<\/p>\n
The contrast with the right bank of the river is striking. The city continues to grow, with anarchic concrete cubes gradually colonising the hills. Clearly, its originality lies elsewhere, in the unique atmosphere generated by its geographical location on the borders of the Arab world and Black Africa. Amid the hustle and bustle of traffic along the corniche and the welcome coolness of dusk, the muezzins - gradually replaced by CDs and even more surely by cassette tapes - echo from minaret to minaret.<\/p>\n
As night falls, the souk emerges from its general lethargy. People are shouting, haranguing, haggling, being polite to each other and arguing quite a bit too... Mountains of spices or multicoloured pigments, karkade (dried hibiscus flowers) or fragrant mint, embroidered galabiyas and... T-shirts to the glory of Ramses II. The best rubs shoulders with the worst, in a deluge of fried fish and incense. A real souk! A market that has benefited from a recent facelift, with cobbled streets and brightly-polished shops. Less authentic, of course, but infinitely cleaner... You can stroll around in peace and quiet, stopping for a moment in front of a delightful Art Deco station. All around, as far as the corniche where lovers stroll, without much effusion, caf\u00e9s offer mint tea and hookah. On the horizon, the dune sparkles with a thousand multicoloured light bulbs.<\/p>\n
It was in Aswan that man really tamed the Nile. The first dam was built in 1902, but soon proved too small. A second, much larger dam followed in 1971, creating Lake Nasser, which flooded the desert for more than 500 kilometres. This lake brought a flood of good news, starting with the water supply for an ever-growing population. But it also brought its share of inconveniences, not to say quasi-sacrileges: destroyed villages and displaced populations from ex-Nubia - a desert region now divided between Sudan and Egypt - to whom the recent Nubia Museum pays tribute. The museum is open to the public and can be used for a very exclusive cocktail party for several hundred people.<\/p>\n
Nubian culture can also be discovered in the 'traditional' village of Sihil, just a few minutes' boat ride from Aswan, starting with a delightful stroll along the Nile, between reeds and black rocks gleaming in the sun. The fishermen cast their nets, as they should; the nomads give their dromedaries a drink, as they should too; and children perched on wooden planks approach the boats as closely as possible, singing, in French if you please, \"Il \u00e9tait un petit navire\" (\"There was a little ship\"), which is a little rarer... It's no longer a show, it's poetry, a recoloured film with the charm of sepia, a bygone era turned upside down into a festival of contemporary images. Then the village appears, with its famous whitewashed houses, their bright colours and geometric decorations. Some have been transformed into restaurants, with a dried crocodile hanging over the door as a sign of welcome!<\/p>\n
But Lake Nasser is also home to a host of stones and monuments that have been swallowed up forever. The world-famous temple of Philae should have been one of them, had UNESCO not decided to save it, as a thumbing of the nose at blasphemous modernity. Forty thousand blocks were cut up and moved to a neighbouring island so that the \"Pearl of Egypt\", dedicated to Isis, could live on... We boarded the boat five kilometres south of Aswan, in the small port of Shellal. The teuf-teuf boat first rounded gigantic blocks of granite before Philae proudly and powerfully unveiled its columns. The emotion is there, perhaps identical to that felt by Bonaparte when he discovered this marvel two centuries ago... Even so, his soldiers couldn't resist leaving graffiti on its walls... Already!<\/p>\n
Faced with this masterpiece, Kalabsha has a hard time emerging from the shadows. It is, however, one of the four sites where a dozen other temples rescued from the waters have been grouped together. Not quite as spectacular as Philae, but much quieter - deserted, to say the least! Only the chirping of a few sparrows nesting brazenly in these three-thousand-year-old buildings breaks the silence.<\/p>\n
250 km south of there, carried by the blue waters of Lake Nasser, the imagination wanders to another masterpiece: Abu Simbel. A symbol of the omnipotence of Ramses II, this temple was also dismantled stone by stone and rebuilt 65 metres higher. Luxor, the other highlight of the Nile Valley, nestles a little further north, a three-hour drive from Aswan, or 30 minutes by plane, depending on your preference...<\/p>\n
One charter plane follows another on the airport runway, while the line of cruise ships stretches for miles along the corniche. Sometimes there are so many of them that they are obliged to anchor abreast, even in packs of five... Despite everything, Luxor has retained the atmosphere of a small provincial town. The only thing you can do is get lost in the traditional souk, but your heart will be in the right place, because the stalls selling fresh fruit and vegetables are lined with sheep's heads, laid out on trays, with their eyes and all... But it's undeniably more authentic than the souk reserved for tourists, with its tasteless Egyptian wares.<\/p>\n
Hundreds of horse-drawn carriages take visitors along the corniche lined with shops and restaurants, between the two jewels of the ancient Pharaonic city: Luxor temple, right in the centre of town, and Karnak temple, three kilometres away. The temple of Luxor captivates visitors with its harmonious dimensions, giving the traditional plastic expression of ancient Egypt something almost cosy. Those who are unhappy will regret the absence of one of the two obelisks framing the first pylon, the wall that marks the entrance to the temple. Given to France in 1830, it now sits at the centre of the Place de la Concorde in Paris. At the very least, it has helped to popularise Egypt in France! But Luxor is only a foretaste of the immensity of Karnak.<\/p>\n
As in the days of the priests who officiated here some 3,000 years ago, the view between the temple and the river is once again unobstructed, and for the past few weeks the coaches have been asked to park elsewhere. For all that, the site has not regained its serenity. \"Keep the gazelles moving, the zebus on the move...\". The tourist guides lead their \"herds\" with dexterity, at a trot, or even a gallop if they could... A visit in two hours! A souvenir photo in front of the sphinxes guarding the entrance to the monument, the same thing in front of the colossus of Ramses II, the impassive gaze of the turbaned guards... All that remains is the hypostyle hall planted with 134 enormous, pot-bellied columns, where the ghost of Hercule Poirot lurks, and you find yourself looking up at the capitals of this petrified forest, in case a stone has the bad idea of coming loose. Just as she did in a scene from \"Death on the Nile\", the film based on the novel by Agatha Christie.<\/p>\n
Away from the crowds, the magic happens as soon as you get off the beaten track and lose yourself in this maze of scattered blocks stretching over 120 hectares. There, totally oblivious to the bas-reliefs, a herd of goats lazes in the shade of a palm tree; further on, a wall of hieroglyphs awaits budding Champollion. At the far end, planted like an exclamation mark: an obelisk. A magnificent sight. The plantations that surround Luxor are another playground. \"Incentive agencies organise team-building activities here, either by bike or on a donkey\", explains Naher, a guide in Luxor. Taking advantage of the easy banks, the Nile has made itself at home, strutting its stuff in a king-size bed, sometimes several kilometres wide. Palm trees, date palms, banana trees, sugar cane, wheat, maize, pulses... everything grows in profusion thanks to the silt deposited by the floods of the past, creating a bucolic setting as if frozen in centuries gone by.<\/p>\n
From rickety carts pulled by courageous donkeys, to almost biblical shepherds tending their flocks of sheep, farmers in djellabas digging furrows under the ploughshares of improbable ploughs, or simply a few laughing children pounding the countryside in their bare feet... encounters in Egypt are always authentic.<\/p>\n
No doubt, from their necropolis in the Valley of the Kings, on the other side of the Nile, the pharaohs, or at least their souls, were ironic about this tourist rush. For it was within the nearby mountains that the demigod monarchs were buried. Beyond the ribbon of plantations, the scenery becomes mineral, the heat stifling. Not a blade of grass, not the tiniest palm tree, but sand, more sand and rock.<\/p>\n
In this valley, which looks more like a circus, archaeologists have uncovered around sixty royal tombs, most of which have been looted over hundreds of years. As for the mummies that slept there, they have been transferred to museums in Egypt or elsewhere in the world. At least, we hope so... The spectacle is no less unique, even if the place could do with a little more silence.<\/p>\n
Around ten tombs are open to the public, opened on alternate days. In each case, a long, sloping passageway cut into the rock leads to a room known as the sarcophagus, where artists thousands of years old have covered the walls with sublimely coloured hieroglyphs. \"The most beautiful tomb, that of Seti I, has been closed for several years because it was deteriorating almost visibly. Failing that, the tombs of Ramses I, IV and IX are good alternatives,\" says Maher. However, it is at the gates of Tutankhamun's tomb that the crowds flock. Its decorations are disappointing and its treasures have been transported to Cairo. But it retains a unique aura thanks to the legend surrounding its discovery in 1922. And above all, the pharaoh's mummy is still present in its sarcophagus, visible behind the glass of a display case...<\/p>\n
The most beautiful tomb, however, is not here. It is located a few kilometres away, in the Valley of the Queens, because there is also a Valley of the Queens... This is where Nefertari's final resting place is located, in the image of Ramses II's wife: marvellous. Fragile, it opens its doors only exceptionally, subject to complex authorisations and several thousand euros in fees, to accommodate 100 to 150 people at most. But it's a unique experience, and a lasting memory of real privilege for all those who have the good fortune to enter.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"