My husband has always wanted to go to Egypt, and it was top of his list. Whilst we hadn’t planned to travel (very far) in 2025, we brought it forward, just in case. We didn’t have the time or necessarily energy to really explore the country, and so we did the bare minimum. Three days in Cairo, and two in Luxor. For our purposes, it was enough. We didn’t get to Alexandria, or El Alamein (I wanted to visit the grave of my great-uncle who was killed there in WWII), or do a Nile cruise. Maybe another time.
Cairo is huge and busy and dirty, with lots of traffic, but we are used to Asia, and this didn’t bother us. We had read a lot about how difficult it is to travel in Egypt, and how aggressive the hawkers and touts can be. Actually, we didn’t find that. I made all the bookings myself. I got a lot of information from my sister-in-law who had been just a month or so earlier. Having an esim with local data was critical to this. We relied on Uber to get us to and from the pyramids and the Grand Egyptian Museum, which had been open for only a month. Uber worked brilliantly. So too did a local taxi airport transfer service (Rimo tours) I found online when booking our hotel. We used them for early morning pickups and all airport transfers. Even in Luxor, where there is no Uber, the local taxis would agree a price (based on advice from our hotel). At a dropoff, they then provided a QR code for their whatsapp contact details, and we could text them later and tell them we were ready to be picked up. Completely seamless, and we had no problems at all.
We stayed in Cairo at the beginning of the trip, and Giza at the end, and actually enjoyed the travel between the two areas, when we could see some more of the city. We visited the pyramids on our own, without a guide. There is a main entrance, but our taxi driver took us to the Sphinx entrance, which I had thought was closed. It was not. The signage is poor, but the locals directed us to the nearby ticket office (just around the corner), and as we were there early in the morning, there was virtually no queue either.
There are also free shuttle buses around the major parts of the Pyramid complex – the Sphinx, the pyramids, and various viewing points. Visiting without a guide was very easy. We spent about three hours in the huge complex.
Anyway, energy was flagging. Canny Uber drivers were camped out in the carpark at the entrance, meaning our wait time to go back to our hotel was about two minutes. Though a note – not all “Comfort” Ubers in Egypt meet the same standards as “comfort” elsewhere in the world.
So we spent our first afternoon relaxing by the Nile, as we had the night before on arrival. Our hotel had outdoor cafes and bars, but actually, it was a bit windy and cool! Warning: December in Egypt can be cold. Layers are important! Also, the noise from some (maybe just one) of the boats on the Nile was quite diabolical one night. Ear-plugs were deployed. But I am very glad we stayed there. I grew up learning and hearing about the Nile River, and it was really special to stay in a hotel on an island in the middle of the river itself.
The next day we visited the Grand Egyptian Museum. News of its opening the month before had been broadcast all around the world, and the crowds the first few weeks were phenomenal. By the time we went, however, the government had introduced ticket limits and time frames. I booked tickets from home, for the first entrance of the day, a civilised 8.30 am. We got there early, stood shivering in the morning queue before the gates even opened, chatting to other visitors. Then we entered the museum. Even before they opened the exhibition galleries, there was plenty to see. And seeing it without crowds was magnificent and awe-inspiring. It is a huge building, with a cavernous entrance area – though it needs to be with all those enormous statues of Ramesses II! We went straight to see the Tutankhamen exhibition, with virtually no queue at all to see the famous mask , and we found ourselves in other sections of the exhibition viewing treasures completely alone. We then explored the other galleries at leisure, though the crowds were building by late morning. There is so much to see, it really depends on your stamina, back health, and good shoes. There were restaurants and cafes and ice cream stalls catering to the tired and hungry, and we took advantage of those too.
Then we flew to Luxor. Another hotel by the Nile, this one with sunsets, and peaceful feluccas sailing by, and slightly warmer temperatures.
We arranged a tour through the hotel for the Valley of the Kings, and our guide filled in a lot of gaps about timelines, cultural practices, etc and enriched our visit to the tombs of the pharoahs. I’m sure the information is all online, but getting the information there and then was invaluable. Guides can’t enter the tombs – they are crowded enough already. But they can tell you in advance what to look out for, which ones to visit, etc. The detail of the decoration, the beauty of the art work, the wonderful preservation of the tombs over 3000 years, and the fact that this site was used for 500 years is all extraordinary.
Our tour also included a visit to the nearby mortuary temple of the Pharoah Hatshepsut. I loved her story. A woman couldn’t be Pharoah, but the heir was only a boy, so first she ruled as a regent, then took over by dressing as a man and becoming Pharoah Hatshepsut. She ruled for 21 years, over 3500 years ago. The setting for her temple is magnificent, and the building is the most recognisable in Luxor.
We visited Luxor and Karnak Temples on our own. These were both quite magnificent, and we walked and walked at the larger of the two, Karnak Temple, exploring the enormous open air museum complex.
There is so much information online, we didn’t regret not having a guide, although one would have saved us a few steps (or few thousand steps)! You can actually walk between the two temples, but it is a long way, so we decided to go to Luxor Temple in the late afternoon around sunset after a rest. That was the right decision.
Egypt is mind-boggling – the sheer age of the monuments, their grandeur, and the length of such sophisticated civilisations are extraordinary. I’m so glad we were able to go together.
A Separate Life 