Best Activities in Egypt
August 23, 2023
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about Best Activities in Egypt
From:
$1610
4.9
Tour Details
| Duration |
10 Days / 9 Nights
|
|---|---|
| Tour Location |
Cairo / Luxor / Aswan / Abu Simbel
|
| Tour Type |
Daily Tour
|
| Pickup |
Cairo Airport or Your Hotel
|
Authentic 10 Day Cairo & Nile Cruise Tour Round Trip
This 10 day Cairo and Nile Cruise round trip starts and ends in Cairo, combining two nights in the capital with seven nights aboard a Nile cruise sailing from Luxor to Aswan and back as part of a complete collection of Egypt Vacations. It covers the Pyramids of Giza, the Grand Egyptian Museum, the Valley of the Kings, Karnak and Luxor Temples, Hatshepsut Temple, Edfu, Kom Ombo, the Aswan High Dam, Philae Temple, and Abu Simbel, with a final day touring Old Cairo's Egyptian Museum, Coptic churches, and Khan El Khalili Bazaar before departure.
Every major site between Cairo and Aswan is included in sequence: Day 2 opens at Giza, the cruise boards in Luxor on Day 2 evening, reaches Aswan by Day 5, visits Abu Simbel on Day 6 by overland bus from Aswan, then returns north through Kom Ombo and Luxor before flying back to Cairo on Day 9. The Egyptian Museum, Hanging Church, Amr Ibn Al-Aas Mosque, Ben Ezra Synagogue, Al Muizz Street, and Khan El Khalili Bazaar round out the final full day.
Why Book This Tour
- Round-trip Nile cruise from Cairo to Luxor and Aswan with return domestic flights included
- Private Egyptologist guide across all major archaeological sites
- Entrance fees included for all temples, tombs, museums, and historical attractions
- Abu Simbel reached by direct overland excursion from Aswan
- Old Cairo, Coptic Cairo, and Khan El Khalili included on the final touring day
- Fully Nile-focused itinerary with no Red Sea or beach extension
Included
- Meet and assist service at Cairo International Airport
- 2 Nights of accommodations in Cairo hotel
- 7 Nights of accommodations on a Nile cruise
- Meals are provided as mentioned in the itinerary
- Private Egyptologist guide throughout the itinerary
- All transfers by private air-conditioned vehicle
- Entrance fees to all attractions mentioned in the itinerary
- Domestic flight Cairo → Luxor, Luxor → Cairo
- One bottled water during sightseeing tours
- Our assistance during your stay
- All taxes and service charges
Excluded
- International flights to and from Egypt
- Egypt entry visa
- Travel insurance
- Tips for guides, drivers, and cruise staff
- Personal expenses and optional purchases
- Optional domestic flight upgrade to Abu Simbel
Highlights
Giza Attractions
- The Pyramids of Giza
- The Sphinx of
- Valley of Khafre Temples
- GEM
Cairo Attractions
- The Egyptian Museum
- The Hanging Church
- Amr Ibn Al Aas Mosque
- Ben Ezra Synagogue
- Al Muizz Street
- Khan el Khalili
Luxor Attractions
- The Valley of the Kings
- Karnak Temple
- Luxor Temple
- Hatshepsut Temple
- Colossi of Memnon
Aswan Attractions
- The High Dam
- Philae Temple
- Kom Ombo Temple
- Edfu Temple
- Abu Simble temples
Itinerary
-
Your representative meets you at Cairo International Airport and transfers you privately to your 5-star hotel, where this 10-day Cairo Nile cruise round trip begins.
Nile Dinner Cruise
Step aboard a lit river boat as Cairo's skyline reflects off the water around you. The evening runs two hours of Tanoura spinning and belly dancing alongside a full buffet, the cleanest possible introduction to the city before the ancient sites begin, and a perfect preview for travelers who want to explore all 10-day Egypt tour packages.
Meals
Dinner
-
After breakfast, your guide drives you to Giza. By evening, you fly to Luxor and board your 5-star floating hotel for the round-trip Nile cruise south.
The Great Pyramids of Giza
Stand at the base of Khufu's pyramid and look up: at 146 metres, it held the title of tallest structure on earth for 3,800 years. Your guide will put you inside the builder's logic, not the mythology.
The Sphinx
Your guide walks you to the viewpoint where the Sphinx's full profile emerges from the plateau. The erosion patterns across its haunches are still debated by geologists, worth asking about.
Valley of Khafre Temples
You'll enter a corridor of Aswan granite pillars that were polished, not carved, a technique Egypt would not use again. The scale of the blocks is disorienting at close range.
Grand Egyptian Museum
Continue your journey at the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM), walk the grand staircase past 87 statues of Ramses II, before reaching the Tutankhamun galleries. Your guide identifies which objects came from which tomb chamber the detail changes what you're looking at.
Meals
Breakfast, Lunch
-
Wake up on the Nile. Breakfast is served on deck as Luxor's West Bank cliffs come into view.
Valley of the Kings
Step into the Valley of the Kings, and your guide will unlock the sequence of three tombs included in your ticket and explain which to prioritise by ceiling quality and depth. The painted ceilings of Ramses VI's tomb reach 60 metres above the floor.
Colossi of Memnon
Stand before the towering Colossi of Memnon, you'll stand between the two seated figures of Amenhotep III, each one carved from a single quartzite block hauled 700 kilometres from Cairo. The scale only becomes clear once you see a person standing beside one.
Hatshepsut Temple
Walk up three colonnaded terraces cut directly into the cliff face of Deir el-Bahari. Your guide explains why Thutmose III had Hatshepsut's face removed from nearly every relief and how Egyptologists pieced it back together. If you're considering extending your temple experience beyond the standard route, our luxury Nile cruise with Dendera & Abydos temples adds two of Egypt's most atmospheric sites, rarely visited, deeply rewarding.
Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
-
The cruise docks at Edfu in the morning. You reach the temple by horse-drawn carriage from the riverbank, a short, loud, narrow-street ride that lands you in front of one of Egypt's most intact pylons.
Edfu Temple
Visit the grand Temple of Horus in Edfu, your guide leads you through the outer court, where a granite falcon the height of a man guards the sanctuary entrance. The reliefs around the inner hypostyle hall document the mythological battle between Horus and Set in sequential panels readable left to right like a story.
Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
-
The cruise arrives in Aswan overnight. Breakfast on deck before your guide picks you up dockside.
High Dam
Visit the modern engineering wonder, the Aswan High Dam, stand on the crest of a 111-metre wall of concrete, and look at two completely different landscapes on either side. Lake Nasser stretches 500 kilometres south into Sudan. Your guide explains how the dam's construction forced the relocation of Abu Simbel a context that changes what you see the next morning.
Philae Temple
A short motorboat crosses to Agilkia Island, where the Temple of Isis was dismantled block by block and rebuilt above the waterline after the dam flooded its original site. The approach across the water is part of the experience; the temple appears to rise directly from the Nile. Travellers who want to continue south on the water rather than return north can explore our Lake Nasser dual waterway cruise from Egypt, which approaches Abu Simbel entirely by boat, and an access angle this round-trip tour does not offer.
Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
-
An early start. You leave the cruise by bus before sunrise for the 3-hour overland drive south, which is Abu Simbel as a dedicated morning excursion from Aswan, not a cruise endpoint.
Abu Simbel Temples
Journey to Abu Simbel Temples, where the four seated colossi of Ramses II cut into the cliff face, are each 20 metres tall. Your guide explains the solar alignment: twice a year, sunlight reaches the inner sanctuary to illuminate the statues of Ramses II, Ra-Horakhty, and Amun while leaving the figure of Ptah, god of the underworld, in permanent shadow. The UNESCO relocation project moved both temples 65 metres uphill and 200 metres inland to save them from Lake Nasser. The engineering is as impressive as the archaeology.
Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
-
The cruise sails north through the night. Kom Ombo sits on a bend in the river, the temple is visible from the deck before you dock.
Kom Ombo Temple
Discover the Temple of Kom Ombo, the only temple in Egypt built as a perfect mirror image: two sanctuaries, two sets of columns, two sets of ritual rooms, one side dedicated to Sobek, the crocodile god, the other to Horus the Elder. Your guide points to the medical relief carvings near the rear wall, surgical instruments, not rituals, which make this site unlike anything else on the cruise.
Meals
Breakfast. Lunch, Dinner
-
The cruise moors on the East Bank overnight. This is your return stop in Luxor, the same city you boarded from, seen now from the opposite bank and in a different order.
Karnak Temple
Your guide walks you into the Great Hypostyle Hall, where 134 columns rise so close together the sky almost disappears. It took more than 2,000 years and 30 successive pharaohs to build what you're standing inside, each one adding a court, a pylon, or a sanctuary without removing what came before.
Luxor Temple
Continue to the Temple of Luxor, the temple sits at the end of the Avenue of Sphinxes, 3 kilometres of ram-headed figures that once connected it to Karnak. At the entrance, one obelisk still stands where Ramses II placed it; the other was given to France in 1833 and now stands in Place de la Concorde in Paris.
Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
-
Breakfast on board, then check out and transfer to Luxor Airport. Your domestic flight returns you to Cairo, completing the round trip of this 10-day Cairo Nile cruise round trip itinerary. Your guide meets you on arrival for an afternoon across Old Cairo.
The Egyptian Museum
Home to over 100,000 artefacts across two floors. Your guide cuts through the volume and focuses on the objects with the most direct connection to what you saw at Karnak, Luxor, and the Valley of the Kings.
The Hanging Church
Built above the gatehouse of the Roman Babylon fortress in the 5th century, this church gets its name from the fact that its nave is suspended over a passage between two Roman towers. The wooden ceiling is carved in a geometric pattern that has not changed in 1,500 years.
Amr Ibn Al Aas Mosque
Discover the Amr Ibn Al-Aas Mosque, Egypt's first mosque, built in 641 AD, the year the Arab army captured Cairo. The current structure is a later rebuild, but the site is original. Your guide explains why this location, directly across from the Babylon fortress, was chosen.
Ben Ezra Synagogue
Originally a Coptic church, sold to the Jewish community in 882 AD. The synagogue sits on the site where, according to tradition, Moses was hidden as an infant. The medieval genizah discovered here in 1896 contained 300,000 documents, one of the most important manuscript finds in history.
Al Muizz Street
Cairo's oldest surviving medieval street runs through the heart of Islamic Cairo past Mamluk-era mosques, mausoleums, and gates. Your guide names the key buildings and explains the architectural progression from Fatimid to Mamluk across a 1-kilometre walk.
Khan El Khalili Bazaar
Cairo's main souk has been active since the 14th century. The lane structure is unchanged. Coppersmiths, spice merchants, and jewellers still occupy roughly the same quarters they did 600 years ago.
Meals
Breakfast, Lunch
-
Breakfast at your Cairo hotel. Check out and private transfer to Cairo International Airport.
Departure
Bid farewell to Egypt, taking with you unforgettable memories and stories to share with family and friends. For travellers who want to push beyond the river entirely, Egypt has one more world entirely in reserve: the Sahara. Our Nile cruise & Sahara desert adventure combo combines the same Luxor–Aswan cruise with a Bahariya Black Desert safari, two landscapes that feel like different planets, one trip.
Meals
Breakfast
Notes:
* You can let us know if you'd like to customize your tour itinerary to meet your needs. We value your input and aim to accommodate your requirements.
Frequently Asked Questions
The tour includes 2 nights at a 5-star Cairo hotel, 7 nights on a Nile cruise sailing Luxor to Aswan and back, 1 return night in Cairo, domestic flights Cairo–Luxor and Luxor–Cairo, a private Egyptologist guide throughout, entrance fees to all named sites, and all meals as specified full board on the cruise, breakfast at Cairo hotels, and a Nile dinner cruise on arrival night.
This is the only itinerary that operates as a true round trip. You fly south to Luxor, board the cruise there, sail to Aswan and back to Luxor, then fly home from Luxor to Cairo. There is no one-way drop-off in Aswan and no Red Sea extension for the entire 10-day stay on the Nile and in Cairo.
Abu Simbel is visited on Day 6 as an overland morning excursion by private air-conditioned bus from Aswan, a 3-hour drive each way. It is not reached by flight and is not a cruise endpoint. The temples of Ramses II and Nefertari are visited with a private guide before returning to the cruise for lunch.
The cruise runs 7 nights, boarding in Luxor on the evening of Day 2. It sails south through Edfu and Kom Ombo to Aswan (Days 3–6), includes the Abu Simbel day excursion from Aswan (Day 6), then returns north through Kom Ombo to Luxor (Days 7–8). Every night is spent aboard. All meals during the cruise period are included.
Yes, the outbound flight from Cairo to Luxor on Day 2 and the return flight from Luxor to Cairo on Day 9 are both included in the tour price.
What to Pack
Hat
Backpack
Comfy Shoes
Powerbank
Medical Kit
Comfy Clothes
Sunglasses & Sunscreen
Personal Hygiene Products
Valid Passport For 6 Months
Tour Locations
Tour Prices
From Jan 2026 to Apr 2026
- Solo $3750
- 2 - 4 Pax $2350
- 5 - 8 Pax $1970
- 9 - 16 Pax $1900
From May 2026 to Sep 2026
- Solo $3240
- 2 - 4 Pax $2040
- 5 - 8 Pax $1680
- 9 - 16 Pax $1610
From Oct 2026 to Dec 2026
- Solo $3940
- 2 - 4 Pax $2460
- 5 - 8 Pax $2090
- 9 - 16 Pax $2010
Xmas 21 Dec - 7 Jan Easter 29 Mar - 11 Apr
- Solo $4710
- 2 - 4 Pax $2860
- 5 - 8 Pax $2480
- 9 - 16 Pax $2410
Cairo :
Cleopatra Hotel – Cosmopolitan Hotel – Pyramids Park Resort or similar
Cruises:
MS Radamis II – MS Royal Ruby I – MS Medea – MS Nile Quest or similar
From Jan 2026 to Apr 2026
- Solo $3870
- 2 - 4 Pax $2400
- 5 - 8 Pax $2030
- 9 - 16 Pax $1960
From May 2026 to Sep 2026
- Solo $3340
- 2 - 4 Pax $2080
- 5 - 8 Pax $1720
- 9 - 16 Pax $1650
From Oct 2026 to Dec 2026
- Solo $4040
- 2 - 4 Pax $2500
- 5 - 8 Pax $2130
- 9 - 16 Pax $2060
Xmas 21 Dec - 7 Jan Easter 29 Mar - 11 Apr
- Solo $4880
- 2 - 4 Pax $2940
- 5 - 8 Pax $2570
- 9 - 16 Pax $2490
Cairo :
Hilton Pyramids Golf – Mövenpick Media City – Helnan Dreamland Hotel or similar
Cruises:
MS Royal Isadora – MS Blue Shadow II – MS Nile Style – MS Concerto Plus or similar
From Jan 2026 to Apr 2026
- Solo $5850
- 2 - 4 Pax $3530
- 5 - 8 Pax $3150
- 9 - 16 Pax $3070
From May 2026 to Sep 2026
- Solo $4690
- 2 - 4 Pax $2870
- 5 - 8 Pax $2500
- 9 - 16 Pax $2430
From Oct 2026 to Dec 2026
- Solo $6400
- 2 - 4 Pax $3850
- 5 - 8 Pax $3470
- 9 - 16 Pax $3400
Xmas 21 Dec - 7 Jan Easter 29 Mar - 11 Apr
- Solo $7550
- 2 - 4 Pax $4510
- 5 - 8 Pax $4110
- 9 - 16 Pax $4040
Cairo :
Hilton Heliopolis – Hyatt Regency – Triumph Luxury or similar
Cruises:
MS Acamar – MS Movenpick Royal Lotus – MS Le Fayan – MS Esplanade or similar
From Jan 2026 to Apr 2026
- Solo $8740
- 2 - 4 Pax $5110
- 5 - 8 Pax $4710
- 9 - 16 Pax $4640
From May 2026 to Sep 2026
- Solo $8110
- 2 - 4 Pax $4790
- 5 - 8 Pax $4400
- 9 - 16 Pax $4330
From Oct 2026 to Dec 2026
- Solo $9960
- 2 - 4 Pax $5800
- 5 - 8 Pax $5390
- 9 - 16 Pax $5320
Xmas 21 Dec - 7 Jan Easter 29 Mar - 11 Apr
- Solo $11620
- 2 - 4 Pax $6750
- 5 - 8 Pax $6330
- 9 - 16 Pax $6260
Cairo :
Four Seasons Nile Plaza – St. Regis Cairo – Nile Ritz – Marriott Mena House or similar
Cruises :
MS Farah – MS Historia Nile Cruise – MS Tamr Henna – Sonesta Moon Goddess or similar
