Classic Egypt & Nile cruise holiday

Most of our Egypt holidays with a Nile cruise get underway in Cairo because the capital offers the best options for flight arrivals. Typically, you’ll spend a few days in Cairo to visit the Pyramids of Giza, the Grand Egyptian Museum, and the Great Sphinx, before taking the overnight train down to Aswan. There you can join either a small ship cruise or, for those wanting the most traditional version and happy skip a few creature comforts, a sail-powered felucca cruise.

In Cairo, depending on the holiday itinerary, you’ll sometimes have some free time. You might pay a repeat visit to the Grand Egyptian Museum (sited conveniently close to the pyramids and home to over 100,000 artefacts including a solar barque and the contents of Tutankhamun’s tomb) or admire the Citadel of Saladin in Islamic (also known as Medieval) Cairo.

The sleeper train into Aswan arrives early in the morning, giving you plenty of time to explore sights including the Philae Temple and the High Dam. Early starts are a fixture of Egypt holidays, allowing you to beat the worst heat of the day as well as the crowds.

As a rule, Nile cruises are always all-inclusive. However, on arrival in Aswan you may be invited to share an evening meal with a local Nubian family, and learn about their lives and culture. “We’ve been visiting the same house and family literally for decades,” notes Antony Barton. “Our payment goes directly to them and their employees. And the same goes for many of our excursions – the camel and caleche (horse-drawn carriage) drivers we use, they’re all local people.”

Very few Egypt holidays go to Cairo only. Beyond the capital, most of the country’s most impressive archaeological sites line the banks of the Nile River, Egypt’s lifeblood. A Nile cruise is an opportunity to explore some of the greatest treasures of the ancient world, from vast temples to pharaonic tombs.

But as our guide to choosing a Nile cruise explains, much of the pleasure from this kind of trip is actually to be found in simply watching riverbank scenes drift slowly past: children playing or helping to wash clothes at the water’s edge, feluccas drifting past in the breeze, farmers tending their fields with ploughs pulled by black buffalos. You can’t get a true sense of Egypt just from admiring its antiquities.

The Temple of Edfu, on the west bank of the Nile, is dedicated to Horus, the God of the Sun. While cruises continue to moor up here, many of our partners have paused their organised excursions to the temple. The reason is that, for the one-kilometre distance to the temple, it is traditional for tourists to use a horse-drawn caleche (carriage). But there have been concerns for a long time that drivers are seriously mistreating their horses, whipping them, overworking them in the heat, and not giving them enough to eat or drink.

“It contravenes Explore Worldwide’s animal welfare policy,” says Antony Barton. “In other places such as the Monastery of Saint Simeon and Luxor we use caleches but these are people we’ve known for decades, who we know care for their animals well. They are properly rested, not overworked and not whipped. You can immediately tell the difference.”

At Luxor, visitors to the Valley of the Kings are now often shuttled around in electric vehicles. “That’s a solution we would like to see the authorities introduce in Edfu,” continues Antony. “The distance from the port is so short that it’s ideal for a shuttle service. The horses are appallingly badly treated so as far as we’re concerned a low carbon alternative would tick all the boxes.”

Around 50km north of Aswan, the departure point for many Nile cruises, the temple at Kom Ombo is unusual in being dedicated to two gods, rather than just one. The first is Haroeris, the falcon god, and the other is Sobek, the crocodile god. It’s thought the dual dedication is because there were once many crocs in this section of the Nile. In centuries past, Nile crocodiles had the run of the river, but now it’s rare to see them north of the Aswan High Dam. You’d probably still want to think twice about swimming though.

Nile cruises will often finish in Luxor, once the seat of power for the pharaohs. Today the principal attractions here include the spectacular Luxor Temple with its Avenue of Sphinxes and huge statues of Ramesses II, and the Valley of the Kings. The tombs of past rulers of Egypt, including Tutankhamun and Hatshepsut, have been carefully excavated, and can be explored with local guides who will explain the mummification process, and burial practises, among other topics.

Another interesting excursion in Luxor, one many tourists miss, is to see the Workers’ Tombs in Deir el-Medina. Here you can learn about the lives, and deaths, of the artisans who sculpted the tombs of their masters in the Valley of the Kings. It can make a welcome break from the busier sites around Luxor.

After mooring up on the west bank of the Nile, take a 45-minute camel ride across the desert to one of Egypt’s largest Coptic monasteries. St. Simeon’s was built in the seventh century but was abandoned from the 13th century onwards. The approach is stunning; the monastery sits at the end of a valley and emerges from the ground like an immense crumbling sandcastle.

This is not the type of Egypt holiday where you’re simply ticking off the must-see landmarks. You will see them, of course, and much more besides. But while the pyramids and ancient tombs are wonderful, it’s likely that what you’ll be recounting to friends years later will be the little moments in between: cocktails after dinner on the outdoor deck; returning waves from the riverbank; sharing stories with your Nubian hosts over a plate of stewed okra, or the sensation of bouncing along on the back of a camel towards a desert citadel.