Egypt tours with a Nile cruise: how to combine Cairo and the river

Egypt tours with a Nile cruise in the middle are the way most people see the country for the first time, and for good reason. Cairo has the pyramids and the museum, the south has the temples and the tombs, and the river is the only comfortable way to move between the southern sites. The question is not whether to combine them but how: how many days, in which order, and what should already be paid for before you land.

Why the cruise sits in the middle

Egypt is really two trips. Cairo and Giza in the north, with the pyramids, the Sphinx and the Grand Egyptian Museum. Then Luxor and Aswan, nearly 700 kilometres to the south, with Karnak, the Valley of the Kings, Edfu, Kom Ombo and Philae strung out along the river. The two halves do not overlap, and neither one is worth skipping.

The Nile cruise solves the southern half. The temples sit on the riverbank in the order the ship visits them, so you unpack once, sleep on board, and wake up at the next site. Doing the same route by road means hotels in two cities, a long drive between them, and the same sites seen from a car park. That is why almost every Egypt tour, whoever sells it, has a cruise in the middle of it.

How many days you need

Six days. Two nights in Cairo, a flight south, three nights on the river from Aswan to Luxor, and a flight home. It is tight but it covers everything that matters, and it is the shape of our six day package.

Seven days. The same, with Abu Simbel added on the morning after you board in Aswan and one more night in Cairo at the end so that the flight home is not a rush. Abu Simbel is a three hour drive south of Aswan and the day starts before dawn. The day is long and, as the itinerary says, worth every minute of it. That is the seven day package.

Ten days. Cairo, the cruise, then three nights at Hurghada on the Red Sea with nothing scheduled, and a last night in Cairo. Built for families and for anyone who wants the sightseeing followed by a rest. That is Egypt family travel, where children under six travel free and six to eleven pay half.

If you have more than ten days, you are past the point where a fixed package fits. Alexandria, the White Desert, Siwa, a longer cruise, more nights in Cairo: that is a tailor made itinerary, and we build it around your dates rather than ours.

Cairo first, then fly south, then sail

All three packages run the same way: land in Cairo, see Giza and the museum, fly to Aswan, board the ship, sail down to Luxor, fly home from there. There are three reasons for the order.

The first is jet lag. Cairo’s sights are a full day but a forgiving one, and you sleep in the same hotel two nights running. The cruise, with its early starts at the temples, comes once you have settled.

The second is Abu Simbel. It is reached from Aswan, so if the cruise starts there the trip south fits on the first river morning without a detour.

The third is the river itself. From Aswan to Luxor the ship travels with the current, which is the three night direction. The four night cruise runs the other way, Luxor up to Aswan, and we can build a package around that too. We wrote up the difference between the two in Luxor to Aswan or Aswan to Luxor.

Flight or train between Cairo and the south

Every package includes the domestic flights, because they turn a full day of travel into an hour in the air. Cairo to Aswan is about ninety minutes, Luxor to Cairo about an hour, and the airports at both ends are small and quick.

The overnight sleeper train is the alternative, and some people like it for the experience. It saves a hotel night but costs most of a day, and the cabins are basic. We use it when someone asks for it, not by default.

What a package should already cover

This is where Egypt tours differ most, and where the cheap ones get expensive. Ours include:

• Someone meeting you inside Cairo airport, before immigration, and a private transfer to the hotel.
• A five star hotel in Cairo with breakfast, and a five star cruise ship on full board.
• Both domestic flights.
• Every transfer, every ferry and every local vehicle between the airport, the hotel, the ship and the sites.
• A licensed Egyptologist with you at every site, privately, not shared with a coach.
• Every entrance fee named in the itinerary, and bottled water on tour days.

What is not covered, on ours or on anyone’s: your international flights, the Egyptian entry visa, drinks beyond those served with meals, optional tours such as the balloon over Luxor, and tipping. We explain how tipping works before you travel, and we do not add it to the bill.

When you compare packages, the entrance fees are the line to check. Giza, the museum, Karnak, the Valley of the Kings, Edfu, Kom Ombo and Philae all charge separately, and a package that leaves them out is quietly several hundred dollars dearer than it looks. We set out what a cruise on its own costs, and what that price already includes, in how much does a Nile cruise cost.

The ship makes the biggest difference to the price

The Cairo half of a package costs much the same whichever way you do it. The cruise half is where the price moves, because the same three nights can be on a standard, deluxe or luxury ship and the programme does not change between them. Our packages are priced on five star ships, deluxe class on the six and seven day trips. Ask and we will move you up or down a class, and quote the difference before you decide.

Who a package is wrong for

If you only want the river, book the cruise on its own. The three night, four night and seven night programmes are written out day by day, and we arrange the flights to and from Cairo around them if you want us to.

If you have been to Egypt before, a package will repeat the pyramids and the museum. Tell us what you have already seen and we will build the days around what you have not.

And if your dates do not fit the ship’s sailing days, do not bend the trip to fit a package. Ships leave Aswan on Wednesdays and Fridays and Luxor on Saturdays and Mondays, and there are around 250 of them, so there is nearly always one that fits your week. Send us your dates and we will tell you what is sailing.

The three packages are here: six days, seven days with Abu Simbel and ten days with the Red Sea. For anything longer or different, tell us what you have in mind.

For the cruise part of the trip, we have written up how to book a Nile cruise step by step, from the sailing day to the questions to ask before you pay.