Recommendations for Egypt tour companies

Have you watched Rick's episodes on Egypt? We booked with the company mentioned in the episodes--Egypt and Beyond. We were very happy with their service. Other companies have been mentioned on this forum. Do a search for Egypt and you'll find others.

After visiting Egypt, I would highly recommend using a tour company; whether that be a private tour or group tour. We have traveled with group tours before and have traveled independently. In my opinion, Egypt is not a country where most people would feel comfortable and have a lot of success traveling independently. We would have spent half our days being lost and trying to figure out how to get where we wanted to go!

We did a private tour of Egypt with Go Luxor tours and we highly recommend them. You do not want to drive in Egypt! If you look under my profile I have a photobook with all the details. We went last October.

I have been to Egypt twice and STRONGLY recommend taking a tour over trying to do it on your own.

I lived in Saudi Arabia for five years working for the Army Corps of Engineers, I had Egyptian friends in Riyadh. They advised me several things.
1) Never eat or drink street food or drink
2) Only dine in four star or equivalent restaurants
3) Never drink water or other drink from bottles unless you open the bottle or the waiter opens it in front of you.
4) Go with a tour group
5) Don't go into areas that you don't know are safe.

They told me a story about why the airport checks taxis leaving the airport for the name of the driver and taxi company, name of the passenger(s) and destination, since people were being take by taxis into the desert, robbed and in some cases physically abused. Some died.

In the late 90s terrorists attacked a bus of German and Swiss tourists at the tomb of Queen Hatchetp in Luxor. Now all tour groups have armed guards.

I am looking at taking my wife to Egypt, she hasn't been and we like the Gate 1 tours. Reasonable prices and good ratings.

Viking has a river cruise with tour that I have heard is good as well.

Thank you for all the advice. We will be booking a tour given what all of you have said and what I have been reading. Is Abu Simbel temples worth extra time and money?

Abu Simbel is worth it. I didn't do it last time, but plan to do when we go.

Do not miss Abu Simbel! My favorite!

We just booked a 14 day tour of Egypt with Gate 1 that includes two river cruises (one from Aswan to Luxor and the other of Lake Nasser to Abu Simbel). Hotels are all five star except one that is four star+
It was on sale and airfare from NYC RT and price was $3200 per person.

We are on the 3 January Tour.

Egypt is one country I would not want on my own. There are just too many barriers with language, culture and security.

I have traveled twice with Djed Egypt -- https://www.djedegypt.com -- and I would travel with them again in a heartbeat. They arrange private tours, combining logistical ease of a tour with the flexibility of solo travel.

A few highlights:

• It is a private tour. Our tour consisted of me, my friend, our guide, and our driver
• You can customize your itinerary and accommodations as you wish. Sometimes we stayed in 5-star hotels and sometimes in 3-star hotels. It's totally up to you.
• They have a fleet of four dahabiyas. (A dahabiya is a sailboat with a maximum of 10 passengers. I would definitely recommend a dahabiya over a big cruise ship.)

I wrote an extensive review of our experience with Djed in 2020 here: https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/beyond-europe/experience-in-egypt

A review from another member of the forum is here: https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/two-wonderful-weeks-in-egypt-a-travel-report

Pictures are here: https://mariematthews.smugmug.com/Egypt and here: https://mariematthews.smugmug.com/Egypt-and-Istanbul

I would definitely recommend visiting Abu Simbel. We spent the night in Abu Simbel, and I enjoyed the our simple hotel and the Nubian hospitality almost as much as I enjoyed the temple. I am so glad we didn't do just a day trip to Abu Simbel.

We went with Scenic USA which is actually an Australian company with offices in the US. fabulous tour and accommodations. We had a boutique cruise ship for our group of 22 (24?). Most companies do the Nile cruise on larger boats (200 people). Also check out Odysseys Unlimited which is another great tour company. And definitely go to Abu Simbel. Here is a link to my Egypt Shutterfly book -

https://www.shutterfly.com/share-product/?shareid=0820cbe4-985d-4601-8b03-649815cc44f3&cid=SHARPRDWEBMPRLNK

I apologize to Elle for contributing nothing. BUT, the replies to this post really make me want to go Egypt.

We are traveling with Djed in November for all the reasons Marie describes above. Search prior posts for "Djed" for further info. I'll provide a review after.

P.S. This is my 1000th post. Do I get a prize? :D

Yes, absolutely do Abu Simbel! We were wowed! We have traveled with Gate 1 four times and would have gone with them to Egypt, but their tour dates did not work for my school break schedule. We only chose a private tour because we needed to customize the dates. That being said, we appreciated being on a private tour because as we were leaving each site, the big bus tours were just rolling in. We were able to get there before the larger group tours. The small vans that the private companies can drive you around in get through town much faster! Once you see the traffic, you'll understand why.

We are independent travelers but felt we needed a tour for Egypt. We booked Egypt with an extension to Jordan with Odysseys Unlimited and were so impressed with our trip, the guides were excellent, hotels superior class. I highly recommend this trip with Odysseus Unlimited!

Thanks everyone for all the suggestions - we will be booking a tour. We are looking at going in November due to schedules and it looks like it is a good time of year to go - not too hot but before the peak season. We will do Abu Simbel and Luxor with a brief stay in Cairo. We are going to try to spend a few days in the Red Sea since my husband and I are scuba divers. So....we shall see!

I have been snorkeling in the Red Sea (north or Jidda, Saudi Arabia) and it was fantastic.

I traveled to Egypt earlier this year (Jan/Feb 2022) with two good friends. We used Djed Egypt Travel to arrange our trip. They worked with me to design the itinerary that we wanted, and then drove and guided us throughout Egypt for two weeks. They were wonderful to work with, flexible, knowledgeable, kind and efficient. I found the price that we settled on (based on our itinerary and choice of hotels) to be very reasonable. Here is my (yeah, somewhat lengthy!) trip report: https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/two-wonderful-weeks-in-egypt-a-travel-report. I'd be glad to answer any further questions that you might have. And, yes, do go to Abu Simbel! I loved that Djed Egypt Travel drove us there one morning, we visited the temples in the afternoon, spent one night in a hotel there, and left Abu Simbel the next morning. With a night there we did not feel rushed in our visit or exhausted as we might have doing it as a very long day trip.

Elle, Sarah Murdoch would be my choice. She has me sold. I do not believe she has her 2023 dates for Egypt published yet. I believe (from her videos) that she will be working with her Egyptian guide, Hoda, again. Sarah herself may not join this particular tour in 2023 - but you never know.

I have been to Egypt with Sarah Murdoch and Imprint Tours. It was amazing. Their local guide Hoda Afifi is very good. I can recommend them without any reservations. I think they just added more seats to Sarah's tour this fall. I plan to travel with Imprint in 2023 to Japan.

It is great to recommend tour companies, but no one mentioned cost.

Shop around, compare what you get for $$$.

Hard to beat Gate 1.

I was pleasantly surprised with Djed's pricing. Without going into too much detail, I'll just say that the pricing came out roughly the same as what we were looking at with Road Scholar or Odysseys Unlimited, except that with Djed we got three weeks instead of two weeks, better hotels, private guides, and a dahabiya instead of a big cruise ship. We received a much better experience for our money. (I am not knocking either Road Scholar or Odysseys Unlimited -- my friend and I have had excellent experiences with both.) Also, when we arranged our trip in 2021, Djed gave us a credit for everything we missed when our trip was interrupted during the Covid shutdown in March 2020.

Compare prices
Gate 1 Crown of Egypt two week tour with TWO cruises (3 days each) INCLUDING airfare from NYC. $3600 pp and we got a discount because of a sale. Hotels are at a minimum four star.

I won't argue that Gate1 is cheaper, but Djed was a better match for our style of travel and we felt that we received an excellent value for our money. Both are good; just different experiences.

Djed added anything we wanted onto the itinerary -- including a full day at Saqqara, Abydos and Dendera, the tomb of Nefertari ($100+ ticket) in Luxor, a balloon ride, a camel ride, a felucca dinner cruise, and more. The only add-ons during the trip were tickets for a few things we were openly undecided about when we booked the trip -- like going inside the Great Pyramid at Giza (I went inside; my friend didn't), some of the extra tombs (Tutankhamun, Ramses V/VI, and Seti I -- we opted for Ramses V/VI and I kinda wish we had done Seti I) at the Valley of the Kings, and a second visit to the temples at Abu Simbel (I did the second visit; my friend didn't). They gave us the ticket prices for the extras when we booked the trip, but we didn't decide until we were actually at the sites.

If I recall correctly, we paid $3K for the first trip and $1200 for the second trip -- plus international air fare. Of course, our intention was to do just one trip, but Covid made a hash of that. I think of the second trip as a completion of our first trip, even though we repeated some things and added some other things. Between the two trips, we had:

• 8 nights in Giza/Cairo (6 nights at Mena House overlooking the pyramids and 2 nights at airport hotels)
• 8 nights in Luxor (5 at a guest house on the west bank, 3 nights at the Winter Palace -- very different, but both wonderful)
• 5 nights on the dahabiya (we had 4 passengers total on the first trip; surprisingly, we were the only two passengers on the second trip. Of course, that is not the norm. When we disembarked in Aswan, 10 passengers -- max capacity -- boarded for the return trip to Luxor.)
• 1 night in Abu Simbel (at a small Nubian lodge on Lake Nasser that I enjoyed almost as much as the temples)
• 2 nights in Aswan (Old Cataract Hotel -- astoundingly luxurious with a gorgeous view but not my favorite place)

So, that's 24 nights, almost half of which were in historic/iconic, 5-star hotels, with a custom itinerary and private egyptologists and drivers throughout the trip. We also had 4 domestic flights to and from Cairo/Luxor/Aswan.

Djed wasn't the rock-bottom cheapest option, but we were super happy with our choice. I would travel with Djed again without hesitation. (Just writing about it makes me want to go back and do it all again.)

Definitely take a tour unless you can read and speak Arabic. Also I would not recommend driving, there are few traffic lights, very congested and the sites are quite far apart. We used Roads Scholar and loved it. Excellent hotels, intelligent guide, fabulous itinerary. Do not miss Alexandria and Abu Simbul. We had many small flights and the river cruise on the Nile. Highly recommend this.

Do not try to drive in Egypt, unless you love demolition derby.

My first taxi ride in 1983 from the Cairo airport to the Ramasees Hilton was unbelievable. We missed about 20 collisions by inches.
My send trip to Egypt was on tour and we were transported to our hotel in a tour bus. That was the way to go.

@geovagriffith - on our trip to Egypt, we got into a little fender bender leaving the airport and then again on the way back to the airport. It was nuts. We also got into a little collision in our horse-drawn carriage - we locked carriages with another nearby driver!

It is great to pick a tour tailored to your interests.
Comparing tour companies and what they have to offer is a must. We do it every time.

We looked for an East African Safari and I found safari's from scores of tour groups.

The most expensive were as much a $16,000 per person. Abercormbe and Kent is tops, but even in quality is not always that much better than tours half that price.

I found a really cheap week long safari, but it required you to bring you own sleeping bag. Apparently, camping like in the Army was the way that one went. Even though it was $900 per person, it wasn't for me.

Also, some safaris were 17 day long with a visit to Mombassa beach. Sorry, I live on an island on the ocean, don't want that.

We found our perfect one through Good Earth Tours, we are in country 10 day (Kenya and Tanzania) with 8 days in actual safari.

Our accommodations are the highest available with a private guide for four persons. Cost about $4500 pp.

Sorry to keep picking everyone's brain but ....have another question - can anyone recommend getting to the Red Sea for a few days - who to book through, etc. We have decided on Djed but they do not book any Red Sea excursions. I am interested in diving (my sil snorkels) but I will do either. Any suggestions??? Thanks again for everyone's input -

Well - our trip was amazing! We went with Djed and could not have been happier. They made a very personalized trip for us as I wanted to visits Abydos and Dendera but also made sure that we got to Abu Simbel. The trip on the Dahabiya with only 12 other guests was amazing. Our guides were also amazing and really helped ensure a great trip. My husband and I may be doing a week dive trip in 2024 and adding an extension to Luxor (he did not go with me) and Aswan which we will book with Djed. There were no hiccups, the hotels were great and we got to see everything on the list.

Thanks for reporting back! Glad you had a great trip! And let me know if you go back to dive in the Red Sea. It is at the top if my to dive list, just waiting for the right opportunity.