Picking great hotels in Egypt (or even just deciding to go there!) is not the easiest thing in the world. It’s hard to balance safety, location, and level of luxury. In 2017, Egypt was been hit by a devalued currency and lack of tourists – which means you can easily upgrade to a nicer hotel for less than you’d expect! Here are some great hotel options for various places in Egypt – in Sharm el Sheikh, Cairo, Luxor, and Aswan. Great Cairo Hotels in Egypt In Cairo, you’ll basically want to do two things: go to the Pyramids and go to the Egyptian Museum. I’d highly recommend staying by the…

Egypt was a country I was a bit concerned to travel to, but then a bit not concerned. The Western media is constantly talking of death, etc, in the country, but everyone I’d talked to said it was pretty safe and easy to get around (lol I clearly did that wrong). I did know that for safety’s sake, I was going to generally upgrade this trip. So I knew going in that it was going to be a bit more expensive that it could be, but I was also hoping it was safer. In all, in 13 days in Egypt, I spent $1,604.49. How did that work out?

Aswan was definitely another place I took a bit of a vacation from my vacation. In the interest of safety (and because it’s still relatively cheap in the US), I booked myself into a slightly nicer hotel – I stayed at the Movenpick Aswan. I knew I wanted to stay at least a couple of extra nights in Aswan so that I could head down to Abu Simbel. And I knew I’d likely want some time to regroup before deciding what was next, to catch up with the blog, and to plan for the travels ahead. The hotel is giant and is on an island in the middle of the…

One experience I hear people rave about in Egypt is going to the temples at Abu Simbel. This is the incredible temple that Ramses II built from himself and his wife Nefertari. And if you don’t recognize the name, you might recognize the images. The incredible thing about Abu Simbel is that it was going to be completely submerged by the High Dam, so UNESCO, something like 61 countries, and Egypt all worked together to move it where it wouldn’t be lost. Seriously – they moved an entire GIANT temple block by block and bit by bit! I cannot even imagine how they did it. Apparently, they even essentially made…

If you’re reading this blog, you’re probably aware that I’m a giant nerd. But this is your fair warning that this is a nerd alert kind of post! When I was researching Egypt, I found out that Agatha Christie wrote Death on the Nile while sitting at The Terrace Restaurant at the Old Cataract Hotel. I also learned that the hotel and restaurant are still open, and they serve high tea. For the first time in my life, I took the time to sit down and have high tea. While overlooking the Nile at sunset. While reading Death on the Nile. Seriously, it was perfect! It was another reminder of…

On our last day of the cruise, we docked in Aswan and had a morning tour of the Temple of Philae, the unfinished obelisk, and the High Dam. We started at the unfinished obelisk, which is in an ancient granite quarry. You can see where the ancients were carving out the obelisk, but you can also see the giant crack that started and is the reason it was left unfinished. It was also cool to see the smaller crack where you could see they tried to repair it (so the assumption is the smaller crack predated the large one). Ultimately, they didn’t pull the obelisk out of the quarry. This…

We woke up in the morning and had docked overnight in the town of Edfu, and went to go see Edfu Temple. It’s frequently called Horus Temple, as it’s a temple dedicated to the god Horus. It was another early start – we were leaving the boat at 7:30am! Our guide arranged for us to take a horse carriage (“an Egyptian Ferrari”) to the temple. This is their standard practice and standard for the tour. But for me, I was sad to use the horse carriage. The horse did not seem well-treated – I could see its ribs, and the driver would whip it along when the driver thought it…