Egypt Beyond the Pyramids

I had been to Egypt twice before, but only to Cairo to see the pyramids and explore the Egyptian Museum of Antiquities. Now I realize that just isn’t enough.

At the Great Temple of Abu Simbel, also known as the Temple of Ramses, four gigantic figures of Egypt’s longest reigning Pharaoh tower 66 feet high and are set against a 108-foot-high façade recessed into the side of a cliff. Fred J. Eckert

“How could I have been so foolish as to have missed this until now?” I asked myself one day while 785 miles south of Cairo visiting Abu Simbel, down near the Sudan border, in an area where the ancient Egypt of the pharaohs once stood looking out toward the ancient Kingdom of Nubia.

As I looked up at four colossal sandstone statues of the great Egyptian King Ramses II seated upon his throne wearing a huge double crown signifying reign over both Upper and Lower Egypt, I felt the same way I felt the first time I gazed upon such wonders as the pyramids, the Great Wall of China, the Taj Mahal, or the effigies of Easter Island.

I had been to Egypt twice before, but only to Cairo to see the pyramids and explore the Egyptian Museum of Antiquities. Now I realize that just isn’t enough. To truly appreciate Egypt, you have to look beyond the pyramids.