Our luggage was set outside our door at 4:30am for departure to airport at 5. We took a domestic flight to Aswan. Cindy slept on the flight and Norm read. Upon arrival we were transferred to the docks and boarded the Solaris II on the Nile. We were met by our guide and were taken sightseeing in Aswan, population of 700,000, which controls the major traffic flow on the Nile. There are about 300 boats that travel back and forth on the Nile between Aswan and Luxor (which was also once the capital of Egypt and was conquered by the Nubians between 750-650BC). Perfume and papyrus shops abound everywhere. We drove over the original Aswan Dam, built in 1902 during the British occupation. Then we visited the High Dam which displaced 1.5 million Nubians as a result of the flooding, similar to the 3 gorges dam in China. The government constructed housing for them to move. The Abu Simbel Temple had to be moved also, to save the ruins. The Dam also created Lake Nasser. As we approached, there was a monument representing a Lotus flower, symbol of Upper Egypt, commemorating Egypt and Russian cooperation for building the dam. Nasser had asked America and Europe to assist with the project and was denied at the time, except for the then Russia. This was probably due to the fact the Egypt had a revolution just before to free itself from British rule. It took 10 years to build and was completed in 1971. Much of the agriculture business was lost as a result of the hydro-electric dam, so industry changed to aluminum and iron.