The Overnight Train to Aswan

The main event we had planned for Terry and Amy's tour of Egypt was a river cruise on the Nile between Aswan and Luxor, two cities in the southern part of Egypt.  They are indicated by the light green arrows on the map below.  Note the narrow green line of vegetation along the Nile river.  The remainder of Egypt is rather barren dessert.

Luxor is about 325 miles from Cairo and Aswan an additional 125 miles.  A large number of cruise boats ply the waters between the two cities, stopping at a few ancient temples along the way.  The secret to a successful Nile cruise is getting onto a quality boat that is sailing to fit your schedule.  This meant that we would be starting from the southern port of Aswan and sailing north to Luxor.

The trip between our winter apartment in Cairo (red arrow) and the southern cities can be made either by rail or air.  We chose an overnight train from Cairo to Aswan and a flight back from Luxor.  The sleeper train offers an interesting experience for most Americans who seldom travel by rail.  The train to the south  approaches Luxor around dawn and then offers three or four hours of countryside views before reaching Aswan in the late morning.

 After finishing our day in Dahshur (previous post) we arrived back at the apartment and packed for the next four days.  Mohammed, our driver who had handled the airport transportation earlier, picked us up and we headed for the nearby Giza train station.

 

Our guide, Roshdy, does not like to risk being late so we had plenty of time to sit in the station sipping a cappuccino while we awaited the 8:00 p.m. tourist train.  A number of French and Spanish tourists joined us in the waiting area.

We boarded the train at 8:00 p.m. and were assisted by our porter, Abdul, who would take good care of us until we reached Aswan.

Shortly after departing, Abdul brought our dinner which was a quality hot meal as airline/rail food goes.  He returned later with tea and after that he folded down the top bunk and put my ladder in place to reach it.

In the morning, Abdul woke us with a knock on the cabin door and then brought us a breakfast which Linda describes as "bread, bread, bread and then some bread."  It did include some cold meat and cheese too.(improvements since our last train trip)

I took advantage of the morning daylight to catch a few pictures of local life as we passed through the farmland and stations.

Arriving at the station in Aswan, we were checked in by the Tourist Police.  It is not clear what purpose this log serves but I am sure it gives work to several police and bureaucrats.  Our travel agency arranged for us to be met and transported to our riverboat, the M.S. Farah, a recently remodeled craft.

We presented passports, testified to a lack of Covid and were assigned rooms.  It was then time for our first meal in the ship's dining area.  With that completed, our tour began.

Additional photos can be found at this Flickr album.