Aswan and the Unfinished Obelisk

The discovery of this obelisk in a granite quarry near Aswan gave significant clues as to the construction methods used to create obelisks in ancient Egypt. This particular obelisk cracked during construction and was therefore abandoned before completion, to be discovered centuries later.
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We had thought the pyramids were crowded with tour groups, but it wasn't until our venture into the Nile valley that we truly experienced the mass tourism that is Egypt. Talk about crowds! (Although, as you will see, we generally strategically compose our photographs to exclude the hordes.)

The Egyptian economy is heavily reliant on a steady stream of tourists; in an effort to ensure that the tourism industry remains bouyant, the government spends oodles of money on the employment of tourist police to provide security to tourists and avert terrorist attacks, which (unsurprisingly) tend to have a negative impact on tourist numbers. As a result, tourists are only allowed to travel on government-approved public transport routes, accompanied by plain-clothes and/or uniformed tourist police.

Chiselled out of solid granite, obelisks were erected as one solid piece of rock. To do this, softwood was inserted into holes along the edges of the desired shape, and water added to expand the wood, thus cracking the granite along predetermined lines.
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One such route on offer to tourists is the overnight train from Cairo to Aswan. Here in Egypt's southernmost city deep in the Nile valley, we visited the Aswan High Dam and Lake Nasser, the Temple of Philae and the Unfinished Obelisk.