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The Old Cataract Hotel in Aswan, featured in the film based on Agatha Christie's Death on the Nile.

High Tea at the Old Cataract in Aswan

From the Nile, the Old Cataract Hotel looks grand, perched on the granite bluff above. If you’ve seen Death on the Nile, it will also look familiar. My oldest daughter enjoys sipping tea in old world hotels, preferably while wearing a big hat, looking mysterious. Uniformed guards at the gate inform us we have to [...]

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A to Z of Sophie’s World

Travel ABCs are going about the travel blogging circuit these days. Fun idea! Always interesting to know the personality behind a blog. Thanks for the tags,Jenna and Michael. Here’s my travel ABC: A: Age of first international trip: At 11, I went to New Orleans with my mum and brother to visit our aunt. It [...]

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Reading the past with the Rosetta Stone

The British Museum is one of my favourite museums in the world. Yet, like many museums in the western world, the British Museum should probably return some of the artefacts to their country of origin. One of these is the Rosetta Stone, a stele from 196 BC. It belongs, if not in Rosetta, at least [...]

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The largest ancient religious site in the world

Situated right outside Luxor, Karnak Temple is the largest ancient religious site in the world. An impressive avenue of ram-headed sphinxes connects it with Luxor Temple. Karnak is a place of records: everything here seems to be the biggest and tallest. Its scale defies description. The first pylon (gate) alone is 42 metres high (like [...]

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On the road in Egypt

Getting up at 0345 is not particularly child-friendly. Luckily, my daughters are easygoing. They look forward to sailing the Nile and seeing Egypt. A six-hour flight later, we land in Hurghada. Now, I won’t knock Hurghada, because I didn’t see all of it, but apart from beautiful beaches, grand resorts along the Red Sea coast [...]

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Boating up the Nile – in the 1800s and today

It’s early January on the Nile. Early morning as well. The girls are still asleep. I’m alone on deck. Going down river (north) is windier. The pages of my note pad is blowing fiercly, at times lightly whipping my face. It’s bitterly cold.

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Elephantine and Nubians

By Aswan in the River Nile is Elephantine Island. It houses temple ruins (including the ruins of a step pyramid), two nilometers (structures measuring the water level during flooding season) and a luxury Mövenpick hotel. Most interestingly, though, Elephantine has a considerable Nubian population, living in three villages on the island.

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