First Cataract

I regret not sailing the first cataract of the Nile in a felucca.  The white sails contrast vividly with the landscape, sky and water along a shallow point of the river, just below Aswan Low Dam.

Instead we rode atop a motorboat like this couple.

I've rarely felt as serene.  We passed the "firehouse" that marked Aswan as a major trading post in ancient times.

Aga Khan III (Rita Hayworth's father-in-law) wintered in Aswan.  Before he died in 1957, he built a mausoleum on the west bank of the Nile, just like the pharaohs. His fourth and last wife (Miss France 1930) placed a fresh rose on his grave every day she was in Egypt (or had a gardener do so in her absence) until her own death in 2000.  Somebody needs to make a movie about their romance.

A caravan of camels could be seen on the shadowed west bank as we neared a Nubian village.

Even the electrical towers looked beautiful in the late afternoon sun.