This island is located 500 meters from the Philae Island and was chosen to relocate the Philae temple complex on it, that can be visited during your tours in Egypt and the Egyptian government, in cooperation with UNESCO, carried out the process of rescuing the temple and moved it to Agilica Island in 1972.
The Agilika Island is the island where the famous rescue took place as the Temple of Philae has been moved from the old location at the Philae Island to the new -higher in altitude- Agilika Island.
The new and largest dam that was built in Aswan to store the water of the Nile and generate electric power, so precious for the economy of Egypt, would have badly submerged all the monuments and archaeological evidence scattered in that province. The United Nations gathered to raise funds, study, and implement difficult and complicated projects to rescue the most important sites. In addition to the legendary Abu Simbel temples, the works would have involved the Island of Philae, with the special care they moved the Ptolemaic and Roman-era temple of Philae on a small island at a higher altitude, where the Nile could not have sunk that valuable architectural heritage of more than 2000 years. Already the first Aswan High Dam that was built at the end of the 19th century by the British, had resulted in the disadvantage during earlier periods in which the locks worked at full speed, the floods reached the temple of Isis and for several months of the year, the water invaded the island enough to be able to float with the feluccas even between the columns of the temple, as some old photographs may show.
The process was done perfectly that even the green areas and the granite stones were moved to create the same scene as if the temple of Isis was never been moved from its original place.
Agilika island is one of the most important things to do in Aswan where you can also visit Philae Temple during your Tour to Philae Temple, High Dam, and the Unfinished Obelisk through Aswan day tours and Egypt day tours many temples, Pyramids and sites: