Egypt's excursions cluster in four bases. Cairo covers the Giza pyramids and the museums, Luxor covers the Valley of the Kings and Karnak, Aswan covers Abu Simbel and Philae, and the Red Sea coast covers the reefs. Day trips start From $129 per person, double occupancy. The 5-day Nile cruise starts From $749 per person, double occupancy.
This page is the map of every excursion we operate, grouped by city, with real durations, honest travel times and a clear line on which entrance tickets sit inside the price and which you pay at the gate yourself. We are based in Egypt, so the team that quotes your trip is the team that meets you at the airport.
Almost nobody flies to Egypt to see one thing. People come to cross a country that runs from the pyramids in the north to the temples more than 400 miles south, and that is exactly where the planning gets hard. How many excursions actually fit into ten days? Which ones are worth a 4:00 a.m. alarm? How do you string them together without burning a whole day in a van? Those are the three questions we answer on WhatsApp every day for travelers flying out of New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas and Los Angeles.
What follows is not a scraped list. These are the excursions we run ourselves, with the practical detail Americans keep asking us for: how long each one really takes, whether the entrance ticket is in the price, and what the 2026 gate fee is when it is not. If you would rather not assemble anything yourself, all of this is already solved inside our multi-day Egypt tour packages, which bundle the guiding, the hotels and the domestic Egyptian flights into one program. One thing we never sell, quote or arrange is your international airfare, and you will find that stated plainly everywhere on this page.
Before going city by city, here is the whole country in one table. Each base has a signature excursion, a realistic time cost and a starting price where we sell a fixed product for it. Use it to decide where your days go, then read the section below for the detail.
| Base | Signature excursion | Typical duration | From (USD, per person) | Program that covers it |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cairo and Giza | Giza pyramids, the Sphinx and the Grand Egyptian Museum | 1 full day | Quoted on request | 10-day Cairo, Luxor and Aswan tour |
| Luxor | Valley of the Kings, Karnak and Luxor Temple | 1 to 2 days | From $299 | 2-day Luxor tour |
| Aswan | Abu Simbel and the Temple of Philae | 1 to 2 days | From $129 | Abu Simbel day trip |
| Red Sea (Hurghada) | Reef and island boat day on the coast | 1 day | Quoted on request | 12-day grand tour |
| The river itself | Nile cruise between Luxor and Aswan | 5 days, 4 nights | From $749 | 5-day Nile cruise |
Prices are per person based on two people sharing a double room, in US dollars, and are always prefixed From because the final figure depends on your dates, your hotel category and your group size. Monument entrance tickets are paid in Egyptian pounds at the ticket office unless a specific excursion states otherwise, and the ministry can revise them. We confirm the exact figures in your written quote.
Cairo is where nearly every Egypt trip starts, and it deserves at least two days rather than the single rushed one most people budget for. In one morning you can stand in front of the Giza pyramids, the only one of the seven wonders of the ancient world still standing, and by the afternoon be inside the Grand Egyptian Museum a short drive away. That pairing is the most requested excursion we run, and it is the one we push for day one, because it calibrates everything that comes after it.
What you see: the pyramids of Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure, the panoramic viewpoint out in the sand where all three line up for the photograph everyone wants, and the Great Sphinx with the valley temple below it. How long: three to four hours, and it is dramatically better first thing in the morning, before the heat builds and the coach groups arrive. Entrance: the Giza plateau ticket is 700 EGP, about 14 USD, paid at the gate. Going inside the Great Pyramid itself is a separate ticket at 1,500 EGP, roughly 30 USD, and it is an optional add-on that is never included in our prices. It is a hot, low, crouching climb up a narrow shaft into an undecorated chamber, so talk to your guide before you commit to it. Camel and horse rides on the sand are sold by independent operators at the plateau and are not part of our price either.
What you see: the largest archaeological museum in the world devoted to a single civilization, sitting roughly a mile and a half from the plateau, with a grand staircase of colossal statuary and a view back toward the pyramids from the upper level. The piece that stops everyone is the Tutankhamun collection, more than 5,000 objects shown together, with the gold mask and the jewelry as the end of the route. How long: budget two to three hours as a minimum. Travelers who give it 45 minutes always tell us afterward that they regret it. Entrance: extra cost, paid at the ticket office, and we confirm the current figure when we quote you.
The original downtown museum still holds an enormous collection and a completely different atmosphere: dense, old-fashioned and crowded with statuary standing shoulder to shoulder. It works well as a half day when you are already staying central, and it is the better choice for travelers who like museums that have not been rebuilt around a modern visitor flow. Entrance: 550 EGP, about 11 USD.
What you see: the Step Pyramid of Djoser, the oldest stone pyramid on earth and the direct ancestor of everything standing at Giza, plus the open-air museum at Memphis, Egypt's first capital, with its recumbent colossus of Ramesses II. How long: half a day, and it pairs naturally with Giza in one long combined excursion if you start early. Entrance: Saqqara is 600 EGP, about 12 USD. The Memphis ticket is an extra cost paid at the ticket office.
What you see: the Citadel of Saladin with the alabaster Mohamed Ali Mosque on the skyline, then the Khan el Khalili bazaar for spice alleys, copper workshops and mint tea in a cafe that has been pouring it for generations. How long: an afternoon running into the evening, and it is the best light in the city. This is the half of Cairo most visitors skip entirely because they spend both of their days on the pyramids. Entrance: extra cost at the Citadel, paid at the ticket office. The bazaar itself is free to walk. Dress note: shoulders and knees covered for the mosque, and women should carry a scarf.
What you see: the Hanging Church suspended over a Roman gate tower, the Ben Ezra Synagogue and the narrow lanes of Old Cairo, all within a few minutes of each other. How long: two hours, and it slots neatly into the same day as the Citadel. Entrance: the churches are free to enter and the museum ticket is an extra cost paid at the ticket office.
If Cairo is only your first stop, both the 7-day classic tour and the 10-day Cairo, Luxor and Aswan program open with these same excursions and then move you south by domestic flight, which is included on both.
Luxor gets called the world's largest open-air museum and for once the cliche holds up. The Nile splits the city into two halves that do completely different jobs. The east bank holds the temples of the living, Karnak and Luxor Temple. The west bank is the city of the dead, with the Valley of the Kings, the terraces of Hatshepsut and the Colossi of Memnon. No other stop in Egypt packs this much history into so few square miles, which is why we argue hard against giving it a single day.
What you see: three royal tombs inside the Valley of the Kings, cut deep into the rock and still carrying their painted ceilings, then the temple of Hatshepsut stacked in symmetrical terraces against the cliffs at Deir el-Bahari, and finally the two Colossi of Memnon that have watched the floodplain for more than 3,300 years. How long: a full morning, roughly five hours door to door, and you want to be at the valley gate when it opens. Entrance: the Valley of the Kings ticket covers three tombs at 750 EGP, about 15 USD. Hatshepsut is 440 EGP, close to 9 USD. Certain headline tombs inside the valley carry their own separate ticket, an extra cost paid at the ticket office, and photography permits inside some tombs are also charged separately.
Mobility note: the valley is a hot, treeless bowl and the tombs are entered down sloping ramps and short flights of steps. It is manageable at a slow pace and there is a shuttle from the gate to the tomb cluster, but it is not a flat walk.
What you see: the largest religious complex of the ancient world, built and rebuilt across roughly 2,000 years, with the hypostyle hall and its 134 columns as the moment everyone stops walking and just looks up. How long: two hours done properly. Entrance: 600 EGP, about 12 USD. Go early or go late. The middle of the day is punishing here and there is very little shade.
What you see: a compact temple sitting right in the middle of the modern town, at its best after dark when the colonnade is lit and the temperature finally drops. How long: about 90 minutes, and it is the ideal evening bookend to a morning on the west bank. Entrance: 500 EGP, roughly 10 USD.
What you see: the whole west bank from the air at first light, with the mortuary temples, the green strip of the floodplain and the desert wall behind it. How long: a pre-dawn pickup and about 45 minutes airborne. Cost: this is a separate optional activity run by licensed balloon operators, quoted on request, and it is not inside any of our standard tour prices. Flights are weather dependent and are canceled outright when the wind is wrong, so put it on your first Luxor morning rather than your last.
What you see: the temple of Hathor at Dendera, which has the best preserved painted ceiling in Egypt, and the temple of Seti I at Abydos with its famous king list. How long: a full day by road from Luxor, which is why most first-time itineraries skip it and most second-time visitors come back for it. Entrance: extra cost at each site, paid at the ticket office.
Luxor can be squeezed into one brutal day, but two is the right answer. Our 2-day Luxor tour covers Karnak, Luxor Temple, the Valley of the Kings and Hatshepsut with a licensed Egyptologist, From $299 per person, double occupancy. Domestic Egyptian flights are not part of that product, so it suits travelers who are already in Upper Egypt or who are arranging their own internal transport. If you would rather have the internal flights handled inside one program, look at the 8-day classic tour instead.
Aswan is the calmest place on the Egyptian Nile, where the river widens out between granite boulders and palm islands and the pace drops by half. It is also the base for the single most staggering excursion in the country. Abu Simbel is the pair of temples Ramesses II had carved into a cliff face, which UNESCO cut into blocks and lifted to higher ground in the 1960s to save them from the water rising behind the dam. Standing under four seated statues that top 66 feet, after crossing the desert at dawn, justifies the trip on its own.
What you see: the Great Temple of Ramesses II and the smaller temple of Nefertari, plus the relocation site itself, which is an engineering story worth hearing on the spot. How long: a long day. Departure is before dawn, the road runs about three hours each way across open desert, and you are back in Aswan by mid-afternoon. Entrance: 822 EGP, roughly 16.50 USD, paid at the gate. Price: our Abu Simbel day trip starts From $129 per person, double occupancy. Domestic Egyptian flights are not included on this product.
What you see: the same two temples without the clock running, in the late afternoon and the early morning when the light is at its best and the site is nearly empty, plus the evening sound and light projection onto the facades, which the day trip cannot reach because it has already driven home. How long: two days with a night close to the temples. Entrance: the same 822 EGP gate fee, and the evening show is an extra cost paid at the ticket office. Price: the 2-day Abu Simbel tour with hotel is quoted on request. Domestic Egyptian flights are not included on this product either.
What you see: the temple of Isis on its island, reached by motorboat, which was itself moved stone by stone during the same rescue campaign, and the High Dam that made all of that moving necessary. How long: half a day for the two combined. Entrance: Philae is 550 EGP, about 11 USD, and the boat out to the island is arranged at the jetty. The High Dam ticket is an extra cost paid at the ticket office.
What you see: a colossal obelisk still lying in the granite quarry where it cracked before it could be raised, which explains how the ancient masons actually worked, and a modern museum covering the Nubian culture that the reservoir displaced. How long: two hours for the pair. Entrance: extra cost at each, paid at the ticket office.
What you see: a sail among the granite islands at golden hour, with a stop in a Nubian village for hibiscus tea in front of houses painted blue and ochre. How long: two to three hours in the late afternoon. Cost: quoted on request. It is the slow counterweight to the Abu Simbel alarm clock, and it is the afternoon our travelers most often say they wish they had booked.
Aswan is also where the Nile cruises start or finish, so these excursions chain naturally onto the boat. If you would rather do the southern temples on the road, the Aswan and Luxor overland tour links Abu Simbel, Philae, Kom Ombo and Edfu with the Luxor west bank, From $499 per person, double occupancy, and again without domestic flights.
The Red Sea is the other Egypt: coral walls, water the color of a swimming pool and beach hotels that exist to slow you down after a week of temples. Hurghada is the easiest base, and a small number of excursions account for most of what our travelers book there.
The first is the island and reef boat day. You leave the marina in the morning, anchor over the reef for snorkeling stops, and spend hours on white sand out in the gulf before coming back in the late afternoon. It is the day that turns an Egypt trip into a proper break, and it works especially well with kids and teenagers who have hit their limit on hieroglyphs. Bring reef-safe sunscreen and a rash guard, because there is no shade out there at all.
The second is more ambitious: the day trip to Luxor from Hurghada. That is roughly four hours of road in each direction to see the Valley of the Kings and Karnak in one very long push. We will be straight with you about it. It starts in the dark and it ends in the dark, and it is tiring. But if your hotel is on the coast and you do not want to move rooms, it is the only way to see pharaonic Egypt without restructuring the whole trip. If Luxor genuinely matters to you, sleep there instead and give it two days.
Hurghada also runs quad safaris into the desert, buggy rides and Bedouin dinner nights, which are the right call when there are teenagers in the group, plus submarine and glass-bottom boat trips for anyone who does not want to get in the water. And because the coast works year round, it is the useful joker for July and August, when Luxor and Aswan turn brutal. If you want the beach built into the itinerary rather than bolted onto it, the 12-day grand tour already ends in Hurghada, with the domestic Egyptian flights included.
If you take one thing from this page, take this. The best excursion in Egypt is not a day trip at all. It is the stretch of river between Luxor and Aswan, done by boat. You sleep on board while the ship moves, you never repack, and you step off each morning in front of a different temple. More of our travelers come home talking about the cruise than about the pyramids.
The standard cruise runs 5 days and 4 nights on a full board basis, with guided visits included at Karnak and the Valley of the Kings at the Luxor end, the temple of Horus at Edfu, the double temple of Kom Ombo shared between Sobek and Horus, and Philae and the High Dam at Aswan. Between Luxor and Edfu the boat passes through the lock at Esna, which is worth being on deck for. Edfu is the best preserved pharaonic sanctuary in the country and Kom Ombo sits directly on the water, which is exactly why a boat reaches both so comfortably and a road trip does not. We sail it in both directions.
Upstream, starting with the heavyweight Luxor sites while you are freshest and finishing in the quiet of Aswan. Full board and guided visits with a licensed Egyptologist. From $749 per person, double occupancy.
Downstream, building toward the Luxor west bank at the end. The same temples, the same board basis, a different rhythm. From $749 per person, double occupancy.
Cairo, the cruise and every transfer in a single closed itinerary, with the domestic Egyptian flights already inside the price. Quoted on request
Note on flights: the two Nile cruises are sold as standalone products and do not include domestic Egyptian flights. The multi-day programs of 7, 8, 10 and 12 days do include them. No product we sell includes an international flight of any kind.
Torn between booking separate excursions and buying one closed program? For a first trip to Egypt the answer is almost always the program with the cruise inside it, because it removes travel days, internal transfers and about six separate decisions you would otherwise have to make yourself. Cabins on the better boats also go early for the December to February window, so the cruise is the piece to lock down first and the day trips are the pieces you can still add later.
Americans typically have between one and two weeks, and the honest constraint is not money, it is days. This table maps the trip lengths we actually sell onto what you get to see, and tells you whether the internal Egyptian flights sit inside the price.
| Trip length | What it covers | Domestic flights | From (USD, per person) | Product |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 day | Abu Simbel from Aswan, both temples, back the same afternoon | Not included | From $129 | Abu Simbel day trip |
| 2 days | Luxor only: Karnak, Luxor Temple, Valley of the Kings, Hatshepsut | Not included | From $299 | 2-day Luxor tour |
| 2 days | Abu Simbel with an overnight and the evening show nearby | Not included | Quoted on request | Abu Simbel over 2 days |
| Overland | Abu Simbel, Philae, Kom Ombo, Edfu and the Luxor west bank by road | Not included | From $499 | Aswan and Luxor tour |
| 5 days | Nile cruise, full board, guided visits between Luxor and Aswan | Not included | From $749 | 5-day Nile cruise |
| 7 days | Cairo and Giza plus the Nile cruise. The efficient first Egypt. | Included | Quoted on request | 7-day classic tour |
| 8 days | The 7-day route with Abu Simbel added | Included | Quoted on request | 8-day classic tour |
| 10 days | Cairo, Luxor and Aswan at a slower pace, more time per site | Included | Quoted on request | 10-day Egypt tour |
| 12 days | Everything above plus the Red Sea at Hurghada | Included | Quoted on request | 12-day grand tour |
Under 5 days on the ground realistically means Cairo and Giza only. With 7 days you cover Cairo and the cruise. From 8 to 10 days you add Abu Simbel and some breathing room, and at 12 days the Red Sea fits in too. Prices are per person, double occupancy.
The reason day counts matter so much is that Egypt is long. These are the transfer times we build our itineraries around, so you can sanity check any plan before you commit to it.
Your own flight into and out of Egypt is yours to book. We do not sell it, quote it or coordinate it, and we do not tie your program to a specific airline or arrival time. Once you have your dates, send them over and we build the internal schedule around them.
Inclusions vary by product, and the exact list is printed on every quote before you pay anything. Across our excursions and multi-day programs, this is what the price normally covers.
This list matters more than the one above, because it is where the surprises come from. Read it before you compare our quote against anybody else's, because a cheaper number usually means one of these lines has quietly moved into the small print.
These are the published fees on the official ministry platform, converted at 1 USD to 49.79 EGP. Bring Egyptian pounds. Card machines at the gates exist but they are not dependable, and the dollar figures below are for your budgeting only. Where a site is not listed with a figure, the ticket is an extra cost paid at the ticket office and we confirm it in your quote rather than printing a number we cannot stand behind.
| Site | City | Fee (EGP) | Approx. USD |
|---|---|---|---|
| Giza plateau (pyramids and Sphinx) | Cairo | 700 | about $14 |
| Great Pyramid interior (optional add-on) | Cairo | 1,500 | about $30 |
| Egyptian Museum, Tahrir Square | Cairo | 550 | about $11 |
| Saqqara | Cairo | 600 | about $12 |
| Grand Egyptian Museum | Cairo | Extra cost, paid at the ticket office | Confirmed in your quote |
| Valley of the Kings (3 tombs) | Luxor | 750 | about $15 |
| Karnak Temple | Luxor | 600 | about $12 |
| Luxor Temple | Luxor | 500 | about $10 |
| Temple of Hatshepsut | Luxor | 440 | about $9 |
| Temple of Horus, Edfu | Between Luxor and Aswan | 550 | about $11 |
| Kom Ombo | Between Luxor and Aswan | 450 | about $9 |
| Abu Simbel | Aswan governorate | 822 | about $16.50 |
| Philae Temple | Aswan | 550 | about $11 |
| High Dam, Nubian Museum, unfinished obelisk | Aswan | Extra cost, paid at the ticket office | Confirmed in your quote |
| Citadel of Saladin, Memphis, Coptic Cairo museum | Cairo | Extra cost, paid at the ticket office | Confirmed in your quote |
Fees are set by the ministry and can be revised without notice, so treat these as budgeting figures rather than a promise. Add the gate fees for the sites on your route to the tour price and you have your real all-in number, which is the calculation most operators would rather you did not do.
October through April is the comfortable window, and December and January are the coolest and the busiest. February and March are our own favorites: warm days, cool evenings, and the light on the west bank at its best. May through September is hot, and in Luxor and Aswan that means genuinely extreme afternoon heat, so summer itineraries shift the temple visits to the early morning and the evening and lean harder on the Red Sea, which stays pleasant year round. Ramadan moves about eleven days earlier each year, so tell us your dates and we will tell you whether it falls inside your trip and what it changes about opening hours and restaurants.
Monument tickets are sold in Egyptian pounds. Card terminals are installed at many gates and they work most of the time, which is not the same as always, so carry cash for the day's tickets. ATMs are reliable in Cairo, Luxor, Aswan and Hurghada. Change money at a bank or an official exchange rather than on the street, and keep small notes for restrooms and for tips.
Most US passport holders use the Egypt e-Visa, which is 30 USD for a single entry and 65 USD for multiple entries, applied for online before departure. Your passport should have comfortable validity beyond your travel dates and at least one blank page. We are not a visa agency and we do not process it for you, but we will tell you exactly what your itinerary requires. Multiple entry only matters if you plan to leave Egypt and come back during the same trip.
Your guide and driver collect you at your hotel or your cruise ship at an agreed time, usually early. The vehicle is yours alone for the day. Your guide buys nothing on your behalf at the gates unless you ask, so you always see what a ticket costs. We do not build mandatory shopping stops into the day, which is the standard complaint about cheap Egypt tours, and if you do want a papyrus workshop, an alabaster place or a perfume shop, say so and we will fit it in. Lunch stops are at restaurants we use ourselves, and vegetarian or gluten-free eating is straightforward here once your guide knows in advance.
Closed shoes with grip for the Valley of the Kings and the plateau, a hat, sunglasses and more water than you think you need. Shoulders and knees covered for mosques and churches, and a scarf for women at mosque entrances. If anyone in the party has knee trouble, claustrophobia or limited stamina, tell us at the quote stage rather than on the morning. The Great Pyramid interior and some of the deeper tombs are the two places where it matters, and there is almost always a good alternative at the same site.
Egypt is easier with kids than most people expect, mainly because the vehicle is private and the pace is yours. The reliable winners are the camels at the plateau, a felucca in Aswan and the reef day on the Red Sea. The reliable loser is a run of back-to-back temple mornings. We build a pool afternoon into family itineraries and nobody has ever complained about that decision.
We are an Egyptian company running our own excursions with our own guides, not a reseller passing your booking to a third party. Our travelers have left 12 reviews averaging 5.0, and they are about the agency and about our guide Shady Said rather than about any single tour. When you write to us you are writing to the same office that will meet you at arrivals.
Send us how many days you have on the ground, who is traveling and what you most want to see. You get back a written day-by-day plan, a per person price based on two people sharing, and a straight answer on which entrance tickets you buy at the gate. No obligation, and we will tell you honestly when an itinerary is too tight to enjoy.
WhatsApp is the fastest way to reach us, on 201032295513. If you prefer to write, use the form below and it lands in the same office.
Tell us your travel dates, the number of travelers and the cities you want. We reply with a written itinerary and a per person price. Your international flight is not part of what we quote.
