Aswan in two days: Philae, the High Dam, Abu Simbel

Aswan is where Egypt stops being a river valley and starts being Africa. The Nile widens and fills with granite islands, the desert comes right down to the water, and the light goes hard and clear in a way it never quite does further north.

Two days here covers Philae, the High Dam, the quarries and Abu Simbel — and Abu Simbel is the reason most people come.

The Temple of Isis at Philae on its island in the Nile near Aswan

Philae — the temple that was moved

The Temple of Isis sits on an island, and you reach it by motorboat across open water, which is already better than arriving at a temple by coach.

It is not on its original island. When the High Dam was built, Philae's home would have been permanently submerged — it had already been partly underwater for months each year since the older dam of 1902. In a UNESCO operation through the 1970s the entire complex was dismantled, block by numbered block, and rebuilt on Agilkia, a neighbouring island reshaped to match the original topography. What you walk through was taken apart and put back together within living memory.

The other thing to know is what happened here at the end. Philae was one of the last functioning temples of the old religion, still operating well after Egypt became Christian, and it carries the last dated hieroglyphic inscription anywhere — cut in the late fourth century AD. Three thousand years of a writing system ends on this island. Later, part of the temple was converted into a church, and you can see Coptic crosses cut into pharaonic walls.

Go in the morning if you can, or come back for the evening sound and light show, which is one of the better ones because the setting does most of the work.

Abu Simbel — and the honest logistics

Abu Simbel is roughly 280 kilometres south of Aswan, near the Sudanese border, and reaching it is the whole planning problem.

By road it is about three hours each way across empty desert, traditionally leaving very early. Cheapest, longest, and you arrive when the site is at its busiest and hottest.

By air it is a short flight from Aswan with a fixed window on the ground. Considerably more expensive, dramatically less tiring, and the flight itself over Lake Nasser is worth something.

What you find is two temples cut into a cliff by Ramesses II: the great temple with four seated colossi of the king, each around twenty metres tall, and beside it the smaller temple for his wife Nefertari — notable because her figures on the façade are carved at the same height as his, which is close to unheard of.

And these too were moved. In the 1960s the entire cliff face was cut into more than a thousand blocks and reassembled sixty-odd metres higher, inside an artificial hill built to hold it. Standing inside the great temple, the mountain around you is concrete. That does not diminish it — it is one of the more remarkable things engineering has done for archaeology.

The colossal seated figures of Ramesses II at the great temple of Abu Simbel

The sun festival, 22 February and 22 October

Twice a year the rising sun reaches straight down the axis of the great temple and lights the seated gods in the sanctuary, 60 metres inside the rock.

The original alignment was a deliberate piece of astronomy, and the relocation preserved it, though the modern dates fall a day off the ancient ones as a consequence of the move.

If you want to be there for it, book far in advance — it draws large crowds, accommodation in Abu Simbel village is very limited, and the flights fill. If you cannot, do not organise your trip around it: the temple is extraordinary on an ordinary Tuesday, and you will see it more comfortably.

The rest of Aswan, which people underrate

The High Dam. Not beautiful, and worth twenty minutes anyway. It created Lake Nasser, ended the annual flood that had governed Egyptian life for five thousand years, and forced the rescue of Philae and Abu Simbel. Standing on it is standing on the reason the previous two sections exist.

The Unfinished Obelisk. In a granite quarry on the edge of town lies an obelisk still attached to the bedrock, abandoned when it cracked. Had it been raised it would have been the largest ever cut. What makes it exceptional is that you can see the method — the trenches, the pounding marks, the work stopped mid-task. No finished monument tells you how it was made; this one does.

Elephantine Island and the Nubian villages. Sail across in a felucca. The villages are painted in blues and ochres, the pace is different, and it is the least monumental and most human afternoon available in Upper Egypt.

A felucca at sunset. The single best hour in Aswan, and it costs almost nothing. Granite boulders, white sails, the light going orange. Do it on your first evening rather than saving it.

The unfinished obelisk lying in its granite quarry at Aswan

Two days, in order

• Day one, morning: Philae by boat, then the High Dam and the Unfinished Obelisk on the way back.
• Day one, late afternoon: felucca to Elephantine and the Nubian village, and stay out for sunset.
• Day two, very early: Abu Simbel, by air if the budget allows and by road if not. Back in Aswan by early afternoon.
• Day two, evening: the sound and light show at Philae, or an early night, because you will have earned it.

That is a full, well-shaped two days. Trying to compress it into one means Abu Simbel and nothing else, which is a long way to travel for a single site.

Nubia, and what the dam cost

There is a part of this story the temple rescues tend to eclipse, and Aswan is the place to notice it.

When Lake Nasser filled, it did not only threaten monuments. It flooded Nubia — the homeland of a distinct people with their own language and culture, stretching south along the river into what is now Sudan. Somewhere in the order of a hundred thousand Nubians were resettled, most of them moved to new villages built for them well away from the river their entire way of life had been organised around.

The temples were cut up and lifted to safety with international money and enormous publicity. The villages were not, and there was no UNESCO campaign for them.

You can see the consequence in the bright painted houses of the Nubian villages near Aswan, which are welcoming and genuinely worth visiting — and which are, in most cases, resettlement architecture. Ask, and people will tell you where their grandparents lived, and that it is under the water you sailed across to get here.

None of this is an argument against the dam, which gave Egypt reliable irrigation and electricity and ended a flood that could ruin a year. It is simply the other half of the ledger, and it is rarely on the itinerary.

Feluccas and granite boulders on the Nile at Elephantine Island, Aswan

Practical notes

• Aswan is hotter than Luxor. Reliably a couple of degrees warmer and drier. In summer this is a serious consideration; between November and March it is close to perfect.
• Take your passport for the Abu Simbel road, and for any domestic flight.
• Start Abu Simbel early whichever way you go. The site faces east — morning light on the façade is the photograph, and by midday it is flat and hot.
• Agree felucca prices before boarding, including how long you are out for.
• Cash. Aswan runs on it more than Cairo does.
• Aswan is the natural end of a Nile cruise, which is the least tiring way to arrive — your hotel moves overnight and you wake up here.

The Aswan High Dam holding back Lake Nasser