River Cruising
Egypt & the Nile
Temples and tombs docked right outside your balcony, most days the ship barely leaves the water.
Overview
Sailing Egypt & the Nile
A Nile cruise moves slower than it sounds. Ships sail overnight and dock by morning, so most days you wake up already at the next temple instead of spending the day in transit. It is usually paired with a pre- or post-cruise stay in Cairo for the pyramids, since the Nile sailing itself runs between Luxor and Aswan, hundreds of miles south.
Best time to sail: October – April
Where to Sail
The routes within Egypt & the Nile
The trip really has two halves: the river itself, and the Cairo add-on almost everyone pairs with it.
Luxor to Aswan
The classic Nile sailing, four to seven nights past temple complexes and tombs that are usually a short walk from the dock.
Cairo & Giza extension
Almost always booked as a few nights before or after the river portion, since the pyramids sit far north of where the Nile sailing runs.
Did You Know
Why Egypt & the Nile is worth it
A Closer Look
What Egypt & the Nile actually looks like
The Great Hypostyle Hall, Karnak
134 massive columns, most covered floor to ceiling in hieroglyphs, a short walk from where Nile ships dock in Luxor.
The Sphinx and the Great Pyramid, Giza
The pyramids sit well north of the Nile sailing itself, which is why almost every trip pairs a Cairo extension with the river portion.
The Temple of Isis, Philae
Moved block by numbered block to Agilkia Island in the 1970s, now lit for evening sound-and-light shows at the dock in Aswan.
Photos: Vyacheslav Argenberg, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0 · Kallerna, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 · Gary Todd, Wikimedia Commons, CC0
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