After a long night train from Cairo, we finally reached Aswan. To hit the ground running, I immediately took a taxi to the Unfinished Obelisk. Afterwards, I was so tired, and so decided to swim at the hotel pool, which overlooks the Nile. Typical to the “service” standard that was in Egypt, no towel attendants were in sight. Due to the lack of tourists the cafe was shut down. (We ordered lunch with a lone employee who had appeared, but it took over 2 hours for us to finally see them again with that food!) And the pool was missing the grates covering pump stations that were right in front of the pool ladders to get in/out of the pool. But even this lack of safety and service, the cool water felt amazing in the heat.
After hopping over the open grate to get out of the pool I decided to wait for my lunch by reading in one of the lounge chairs. It was reading The Martian and was absolutely enthralled. But, not wanting to keep my nose in a book, I decided to also stroll along the edge of the Nile, taking it all in. In the far distance I spied a felucca, an Egyptian sailboat, and started taking photos of it. I knew that there weren’t many boats sailing due to the lack of tourists. And I had been well warned that you’d be harassed and followed by desperate felucca captains, horse carriage drivers, shop keepers, and taxi drivers while walking the corniche. However, I didn’t expect what happened next.
I was the ONLY tourist in the area near the Nile. The captain saw me from far away, taking photos. He quickly chased me down calling up prices, offers, and pleading with me to come down and take a ride with him. After explaining I didn’t need or want a ride (as my group was taking one in a few hours) he still followed me and I ended up having to retreat back to the pool. His sail, like a shark’s fin peaking up from the Nile floated back and forth nearby for a long while, still calling out. After a while he gave up and sailed away. I wanted to take another photo, but thought better of it.
This was a sad example of how desperate Egyptians have become due to the lack of tourism these last 6 years since the revolution.
Travel Missteps is an every-other week series on how sometimes part of the journey is making mistakes and getting lost.
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