My trip to Egypt

Egypt was on my radar for many years but for some reason I never seriously planned for it. Finally in 2025, I felt that it's time to visit the pyramids and the sphinx and the mummies that we have read so much about in textbooks and watched many movies on.

I am a detailed oriented planner when it comes to international vacations which means that I need to determine which cities to visit (and in what order), what to do in each of those cities, what would be the ideal way to move from one city to another. I even try to map the days very well based on the opening times of different attractions and the distances between those attractions. And all this is possible because of many travelers who post reviews on websites, because of Google maps that allows me to figure out the distances and the best ways to move from one attraction to another. And because of vloggers who love to detail their days and journeys in these exotic places. 

So after going through my usual haunts like Trip advisor and Google maps and reviews on the websites of these attractions I came to know That the key places to visit are 1. Cairo for the pyramids of course and the Grand Egyptian Museum. 2. Luxor for the Valley of Kings and the Luxor and Karnak temples. 3. Aswan for the Philae Temple and 4. Abu Simbel Temples

Now I had 9 days/8 nights in hand and I wanted to cover Cairo, Luxor, Aswan and Abu Simbel and none of these cities are really close by which means I would either need to fly or take Nile cruise or do a road journey. 

Ideally Nile Cruise is the best way to see everything from Luxor to Aswan to Abu Simbel. The cruise runs between Luxor and Aswan and it runs in both directions so you can board it from either of the cities and Abu Simbel temples are three to four hours by road from Aswan. 

Luxor and Aswan can be reached by a direct short flight from Cairo, however there is no direct flight between Luxor and Aswan. Interestingly there is also an extremely short flight between Aswan and Abu Simbel. 

So most folks fly from Cairo to either Luxor or Aswan in morning and board a Nile Cruise. After boarding cruise, you are taken on guided tours of the temples in that city.  The cruise then starts moving and covers Kom Ombu and Edfu temples tours and last day it docks in second city for you to see more temples :)

While most reviews told me how nice their Nile cruise was, most of those reviews also had links to which Nile Cruise I should buy - so it was very clear that reviews were biased. Interestingly when it comes to Egypt it was very difficult for me to find true reviews - what I mean by that is the reviews were either too good or too bad - I was not getting a balanced view of the cities or the attractions.

But I kept digging and then I landed on detailed vlogs of folks explaining why Nile Cruise may not be a great idea especially in the peak season:

1. In peak season as many as 300 ships are on Nile running on diesel which means that air is thick with diesel smoke and you can't really open the windows and enjoy the beauty of the river. 
2. The Diesel Gen sets have to run whole night to generate power because when the ships dock there is no power source for them and if by any chance your room is next to the generator room you would not be able to sleep. 
3. Last and not the least was the fact that most of these cruises run on the similar timetable which means they dock at attractions at the same time - this translates into hundreds and hundreds of tourists at the attractions at the same time.

Keeping this in mind I decided to not book the Nile cruise which means I now had to figure out how to cover 4 cities using only flights and road. This is the day-wise itinerary that I finally came up with.

1. Land in Cairo - Our flight was delayed so we really couldn't do anything on day 1
2. Visit Giza Pyramids and Sphinx and spice & attar shopping
3. Day trip to Alexandria 
4. Visit Grand Egyptian Museum and National Museum of Egyptian Civilization to see actual mummies
5. Early morning flight to Aswan. visit Aswan Dam &Philae Temple during the long layover. Then board another flight to Abu Simbel. Visit Abu Simbel Temples around 3 PM. Attend the sound and light show as well. Stay overnight in Abu Simbel
6. Early morning flight back to Aswan. Road trip to Luxor via Kom Ombu and at Edfu Temples. 
7. Visit Luxor and Karnak temples
8. Visit Valley of Kings and Hatshepsut Temple
9. Early morning flight to Cairo and then flight back home same afternoon. 

This itinerary allowed me to completely eradicate the tiring road journey between Aswan and Abu Simbel. Most folks leave their hotel or cruise ship at around 4:00 AM so that they can reach Abu Simbel around 7:30 am,  visit the temples and then start back by say 10:30-11 am and be back on the cruise ship or hotel by 4:00 PM. The temples get very hot during the day so it is advisable to finish your trip by 11:00 AM. This also means that you have thousands of tourist in these temples during that same 3-4 hour window. 

As we were landing in Abu Simbel around noon, we saw queues of people waiting to get into the temples. But we decided to check into the hotel first and get some shut eye before reaching the temples around 3 PM and there were probably only 20 other tourists in the area. So not only did we avoid the road journey, we also got the temples to ourselves. Staying in Abu Simbel at night also allowed us to see the amazing sound and light show and I would recommend it to everyone. 

We had to take a road journey from Aswan to Kom Ombu  to Edfu to Luxor. It was about 8 hours in total including time spent at temples (~ 5.5 hours on road). But because there were 2 attractions on the way, the journey was broken into 3 segments and it didn't really feel that long.  And since our visit times to Kom Ombo and Edfu didn't align with cruise ships, we got to see these two also in peace. 

Overall I felt it was the best itinerary for our needs given the time we had and our priorities in terms spending more time at Abu Simbel and in Luxor. However Nile Cruise is also a wonderful way to see everything without having to go through the stress of taking flights in Egypt which is a very chaotic place - especially the airports. 

Once the itinerary was locked and I had booked the international flights and hotels in Cairo and Luxor , I needed to execute on the domestic flights and the hotel in Abu Simbel and attraction tickets and the Egypt tourist visa. When I went to apply for the e-visa I was informed by the Egyptian official website that I will need the services of a travel agent in order to be issued a visa and if I try to get a visa on arrival they will need the contact of the travel agent who is there to pick me up. 

This was new to me I had never used a travel agent in my life except maybe first time when I needed Schengen visa and I did not know the VFS process for same. And it was kind of a blow to my ego - I mean I am the planner, so why do I need a travel agent!!! But since the visa website told me I had to get one and thanks to a friend's referral we were able to get services of a really good one. The travel agency was able to help us with domestic flight bookings, the hotel in Abu Simbel, the entry tickets to all the attractions, guides for each of these attractions. In addition they also arranged for all our pickups  & drops and 2 day trips by road.

Data oriented person that I am, I did the math to see how much more expensive the travel agent would be versus booking everything on my own and there was a significant difference but in hindsight this extra cost was totally worth it. 

If it is your first time to Egypt, it is useful to have somebody to do arrangements for you. For instance, it's not easy to Uber in Egypt. It is not easy to use public transport either so simple pickup and drops can become a hassle if you are on your own. You do need guides for each of these attractions otherwise you would miss out on the overall experience and I'm sure finding good guides on your own is not easy. The cars for both short and long journeys were also very comfortable. Overall I am glad that we use their services. 

In the upcoming posts I will detail my experience in each of these places along with some pictures even though the pictures don't do justice to this chaotic yet amazing country with its thousands of year old monuments and attractions and mummies.