Yeah, I know I’ve been dragging my legs to finish posting up my set of Egypt pictures. There’s still two more sets after this one, so I’ll try to finish them as soon as I can :p Luckily for me, I wrote down the events of each day as it passes in a book just for this purpose, might as well put that to good use yeah?

Anyway, back to the travelogs! Last post was about the cruise along the Nile. After a long day’s cruise, the boats made a stop at another temple site. From far, one could easily spot the sight of the temple of Kom Ombo.

We reached there quite early, around 3pm or so, and the tour wasn’t supposed to start until 5pm. This ‘leisure time’ is supposed to allow the tourists to tour the riverside bazaar and gently hint them to spend more money. A well-coordinated tourism strategy, I say.

Since I’ve had enough of bazaars and all, I decided to enjoy a nice quiet evening with a hot cup of tea at the top deck. Since most of the people are out shopping, now there aren’t that many people on board. It was so calm, even birds started coming down to snack.

At first they were quite afraid of me, but I thought of something that might work. Before we left Malaysia, I brought with me a pack of mixed Famous Amos cookies. I took a piece, crushed it into tiny little crumbs, and laid them down. The result can be seen below.

Yup, the birds love them cookies alright. I later went back into my cabin for a short nap and then it was time to assemble for the temple tour.

The Temple of Kom Ombo, as we were told, is different from the other temples because instead of being dedicated to one god, it serves two. Legend has it that in Kom Ombo resided two gods, the falcon deity Horus, and the crocodile deity Sobek. They were bickering over who has the right to rule Kom Ombo, despite the fact that they are siblings.

Upon realising this, the Pharaoh back then decided to build this temple as a dual complex to please both gods. On a certain relief on the wall showed both Horus and Sobek blessing him for bringing peace to the two brothers. In the relief shown here you can see Ibis and Horus blessing the pharaoh by pouring ‘Life‘ and ‘A Million Years‘ all over him.

Unfortunately, most of the temple has been destroyed by Earthquakes, the Nile and even later builders who used the stones for their own construction projects. This temple complex also has an interesting structure.

It looks like an ordinary well, but in truth, it’s a Nile-O-Meter; a device that measures the water level of the Nile. It also served as a holy bath for the pharaoh before any temple ritual.

It was a short tour, but it was very enlightening - in a way that’s absolutely boring to write in a blog. We headed back to our ship for dinner before we moved out to our final destination.

---

The Egypt Travelogs Series:

1. Cairo (The Great Pyramids)
2. Road to Alexandria (Asfour Crystal Palace, Lion Park Animal Hospital)
3. Alexandria (Qaitbay Citadel, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Montaza Palace Gardens)
4. Return from Alexandria (Local fruits and produce)
5. West Luxor (Temple of Karnak)
6. East Luxor - Part One and Two (Colossi of Memnon, Ramesseum, Temple of Hatshepsut, Alabaster factory)
7. The Nile - Part One and Two (Edfu Bazaar, Life along the along the Nile)
8. Kom Ombo (The Twin Temples of Kom Ombo)
9. Road to Abu Simbel (Shooting star, desert skies)
10. Abu Simbel - (The Greater Temple of Abu Simbel)
11. Aswan - (Unfinished Obelisk, Felluca ride)

---