Top Attractions in Aswan & Nubia
Explore the headline places in the Aswan & Nubia cluster.
The Temple of Kalabsha, Lake Nasser
A Ptolemaic and Roman temple moved block by block to New Kalabsha on Lake Nasser in the early 1960s, usually reached by a short boat ride from near the High Dam.
The Nubia Museum, Aswan
Aswan's museum of Nubian history, opened in 1997 with more than 3,000 pieces, and the place that explains why Philae, Kalabsha and Abu Simbel were moved.
Felucca Sailing on the Nile
The traditional lateen-sailed boat of the Nile — an hour of it at Aswan is the cheapest good thing in Egypt.
The Nubian Villages of Aswan
Painted houses, domed roofs and a distinct language and cuisine — the Nubian settlements on the west bank and the islands at Aswan.
Elephantine Island
The island in the middle of the river at Aswan — Egypt's ancient southern frontier post, with a Nilometer, a ruined town and two Nubian villages on top of it.
The Unfinished Obelisk
A thousand-tonne obelisk still lying in the quarry where it cracked — the best evidence anywhere of how Egyptian stone was actually worked.
The Aswan High Dam
The dam that ended the Nile flood, created the largest reservoir in Africa, and rewrote Egyptian agriculture, archaeology and politics in a decade.
Abu Simbel
Two temples cut into a cliff near the Sudanese border, and then cut out of that cliff again and moved, block by block, to higher ground.
Philae Temple
The temple of Isis, taken apart and rebuilt stone by stone on a different island to save it from the dam — and the last place in Egypt where the old religion was still practised.
