Abu Simbel bringing visitors to the Abu Simbel temples, but it also has importance for the irrigation projects in the parts of the desert situated near the reservoir. Lake Nasser is navigable, so Abu Simbel is also reachable from the lakeside. A few cruise ships navigate the lake upstream of the Aswan Dam. The village is reachable by air via the Abu Simbel Airport. Abu Simbel is located in one of the warmest and driest regions of Egypt. In the summer months, the high temperatures are easily 40 °C on average. Despite the great temperature differences between day and night, temperatures in
Rock relief parts of the country, generally those away from the main centres of population, as Abu Simbel was. There are a group of figures surrounding an image of Mentuhotep II, who died in 2010 BC and was the first pharaoh of the Middle Kingdom. Before they were cut away and moved, the colossal figures outside the Abu Simbel temples were very high reliefs. Other sculpture outside temples cut into the rock qualifies as rock reliefs. The reliefs at Nahr el-Kalb commemorate Rameses II, and are at the furthest reach of his empire (indeed beyond the area he reliably controlled) in modern