EGYPT

I’ve been all over the world, and I have to say: I think Egypt takes the cake.  I mean no disrespect to any of the other countries, because I had such a great time and I made such lasting memories, but I mean… it’s Egypt. The dang Pyramids are there! What could be cooler?

Alex and I decided to go to Egypt during the summer of 2021 simply because it was one of the few countries still open for travel. We never dreamed we would go to Egypt this early in our lives. I mean riding a camel around the Great Pyramids of Giza? That’s a bucket list topper!

We had some qualms, though: mainly, we don’t speak or read Arabic. (Turns out, not a problem: rule #6, most people speak a little English.) We weren’t comfortable driving in Cairo (nor will we ever be: the driving there is CRAZY). And we didn’t have concerns for safety, but we felt that it might be good to have some extra help. We don’t normally do tour guide services because we like to plan everything ourselves, but in this case, I’m so glad we did. 

We used Osiris Tours. The CEO got back to me the same day as my initial inquiry, we chatted about budgeting and what we would like to do, and they curated a travel package that exactly suited our tastes. (Maximum history, heavy sightseeing, minimal shopping.) They booked our hotels, travel from Cairo to Luxor, all museum/temple/tomb tickets, and they outfitted us with a posse rivaling The Entourage: we had a private driver, certified Egyptologists to guide us all day, and–in a move that I thought was overkill but certainly did make me feel safe–private armed bodyguards. And this wasn’t for a whole tour group. This was just for little old me and Alex, two rednecks from Alabama who can’t stop mentioning The Mummy.

(The 1999 one with Brendan Fraser, obviously. Not the Tom Cruise one.)

What We Saw

If you’re thinking about traveling to Egypt, I recommend eight days there. If you do nine, you can see Aswan, which we didn’t have time for and I sincerely regret not seeing. Spend as little time in Cairo as possible (two days tops, one for Giza/Pyramids and one for Cairo) and maximize your time in Luxor. That’s where you’ll see the real deal Prince of Egypt beauty: all the temples, tombs, and palaces.

Sunday: Pyramids, Sphinx, Saqqara

Starting off your trip with the Pyramids is great because it’s like starting your meal with dessert… it’s what we’re all looking forward to, and when you fly into Cairo, you’ll be able to see them from far away. You’re just itching to see them! But believe it or not, the Great Pyramids of Giza will not be your favorite excursion on this trip. I mean… they really are as gigantic and breathtaking as you imagine, and they’re still a bucket-list item… but the temples of Luxor are so beautiful and perfectly preserved and enormous in their own right. So start on a high with the Pyramids. Get up early in the morning to minimize heat stroke and crowds.

Giza is the sister city of Cairo, kind of like St. Paul and Minneapolis. I’ve seen people post stuff like “I was really disappointed that the Pyramids are surrounded by a city.” Like… how do you think they got there? Aliens beamed them down smack dab in the middle of the Sahara? But don’t let these folks discourage you. The Pyramids do back up to the Sahara. They’re kind of the gateway to the Sahara.

Do watch out for grifters. This is not a knock on Egypt or Giza: if you’re in a world-famous site, there will be grifters. And in our case, they weren’t really grifters. They were guys who offered to take our picture and then all of a sudden we were wearing scarves and wait look here’s a camel get on the camel yay take a picture okay now we’re going to take you on a tour around the Pyramids!

On the one hand, I’ve read this is actually a great way to see the Pyramids. On the other hand, camels are so much higher up than you think they would be. Imagine riding a camel through the desert. Nope, you’re imagining a horse’s height. Remember the last time you were too afraid to jump down from a high area because you knew if you fell wrong, you would at the least break your wrist? That’s how high up a camel is. And these sure-footed creatures are clomping down the steep drop-off of the lookout point, and you realize… oh God this is going to be at least two hours. So you ask very nicely to get down and these guys won’t leave you alone until you give them $40… and now you’re mad because ///YOU JUST GOT GRIFTEDDD///

I don’t know, though. Were we really grifted? I got the shot of a lifetime thanks to these guys.

As for the Pyramids themselves, totally worth it to go inside, but be prepared for the weirdest climb of your life. It’s like this four-foot-tall tunnel leading up to the middle of the Great Pyramid, and you have to climb hunched over, like Quasimodo. You won’t find crazy hieroglyphs inside here (that’s Luxor), but you will see the huge granite sarcophagus of Pharaoh Khufu. (Side note: Khufu has this gigantic pyramid for his resting place, but archaeologists have only ever discovered one tiny statue of him the size of my pinkie finger.)

Do I really need to tell you about the Sphinx? It’s as amazing as you think it will be. It’s also just as big as you’re imagining it!

The Saqqara Necropolis is also worth traveling to if you’re in the area. It features the Pyramid of Djoser, the oldest complete building in known history. It dates back to 2686 BC, during the Bronze Age.

Monday: Egyptian Museum, Muhammad Ali Mosque, Grand Bazaar

Remember in The Mummy when Evelyn knocks down all the bookcases? That’s the Egyptian Museum! For the rest of you non-dorks, the Egyptian Museum formerly housed almost all of the mummies of the great pharaohs and queens, as well as the treasures of King Tut. Everything is being transferred over to the Great Egyptian Museum, which is brand spanking new and will open hopefully this year. They had a whole motorcade with specially-built scooters when they transferred the mummies. Check it out.

Getting an introduction to Egyptian history will be helpful for when you go to Luxor, because there are three kingdoms and nine dynasties, and you kind of need a grasp on all of it to really appreciate just how old all this stuff is. In fact, I was going to do a blurb here on the history and mythology of Egypt, but it’s really worth its own separate post.

There are many mosques in Egypt, but the cherry on top (literally, it sits like a big golden cherry on the top of a high hill in Cairo) is the Muhammad Ali Mosque. Even if you aren’t Muslim or even religious, definitely go. It’s a breathtaking building and the atmosphere of holiness is peaceful. Fun fact: this is the famous mosque in the picture of Malcolm X!

Finally, finish the day with a quick trip to the Grand Bazaar. Scroll down to the bottom of this long-winded post for advice on what to buy and how to bargain.

Tuesday: Fly to Luxor, Luxor Temple

Flights to Luxor are pretty cheap, around $100 round trip. And at just over an hour flight time versus the nine hours it takes to get there by train, it’s well worth saving yourself a day of travel.

Luxor is the land of kings and riches. It’s where we get the term “luxury.” Everywhere you look, there are sprawling temples, richly-decorated tombs, and magnificent statues.

The Luxor Temple and Karnak Temple are a little under two miles apart. They face each other and are lined with little stone rams in what is called The Avenue of the Sphinxes.

Wednesday: Valley of the Kings, Tombs, The Colossi of Memnon

This was probably the best day of the whole trip. The Valley of the Kings is where the greatest pharaohs of Egypt were buried. The crazy part about Egypt is you think that everything was dug up in the 1920s. Not true! Archaeologists have only unearthed one percent of what has been recorded about Ancient Egypt. They have mummies literally just coming out of the ground here. Like you’ll pass by a rock in the Valley of the Workers and oh look, there’s the mummified jawbone and bandage. People with inherited homes in Luxor might be living in a little shack (if they move, the government seizes it) but they’ll have a Lamborghini parked in the front because they found some golden statues belonging to Rameses II while digging up a sewage pipe in their backyard. History is truly oozing from every corner in Luxor.

The Valley of the Kings (not including Hatshepsut’s Temple, belonging to the only woman pharaoh of Egypt, which you should also see) is where you’re going to see exquisitely carved hieroglyphs and paintings of Egyptian gods that are 4,000 years old but look like they were painted last year. Not all the tombs are open all the time, but you’ll be guaranteed to see some great ones whenever you visit. My favorite tomb was Rameses VI, which has a really intricate (and accurate!) calendar painting on the ceiling in the form of Nut, the sky goddess, stretching over the tomb with stars and moons on her stomach. 

Also, you can see King Tutankhamun!

The Colossi of Memnon guard the entrance to the Land of the Dead. Luxor is in the green, fertile strip bordering the Nile River, but the Valley of the Kings is located within a mountain range that sharply drops off into desert. The Land of the Living is the green fertile field, the Land of the Dead is the parched desert.

Thursday: Karnak Temple, felucca ride on the Nile

Luxor Temple is definitely the prettier of the two. This is the temple with a huge obelisk (the other one is in Paris) and enormous statues of great pharaohs standing next to tiny statues of their wives (ugh, men!). Karnak Temple is a rich, rusty red, and houses colossal columns in dizzying rows.

Don’t forget to relax on the Nile! The best way to cruise the longest river in the world for a short period of time is in an Egyptian sailboat called a felucca. You can hire someone to sail you down to Banana Island, have a mango at the little café, and make it back by sunset.

Friday: Valley of the Queens, Valley of the Nobles/Workers, Ramesseum

The Valley of the Queens is slightly less magnificent than the Valley of the Kings, with one exception: the Tomb of Nefertari. Forget Cleopatra (please don’t actually she was a political diva who made money moves), Nefertari was the loveliest queen in Egypt. Rameses II aka Rameses the Great aka Ozymandias loved his beautiful wife so much, he built her the most extravagant tomb in Luxor. AND he built her Aswan Temple, where he carved in giant hundred-foot-high hieroglyphs: “Nefertari is the reason the sun shines.” (aww) Check it out:

 Honestly, no picture of video could do justice to just how opulent and detailed this tomb is.

Valley of the Nobles/Workers is the humblest of the necropoli, but it’s the best chance to get up close and personal with buildings that are 4,000 years old. This is where I got to touch a mummy that was just sticking out from under a rock, and I got to touch a wall in the Valley of the Workers… tip your docent well.

You remember that poem you had to read in high school? The one that went like “I AM OZYMANDIAS, I AM KING OF KINGS, LOOK ON MY WORKS, YE MIGHTY, AND DESPAIR” but it’s a knocked-over statue in the middle of the desert? That’s an actual place in Luxor! It’s called the Ramesseum, the temple Rameses II aka Rameses the Great aka Ozymandias built for himself to brag on all his great exploits and conquests. (Which, I mean… they were pretty great. Brag is not necessarily an accurate word. Explain?) This is an English teacher’s fantasy. And nobody goes to this one, except for the nerdy English teachers, so the tickets are super cheap! Definitely hit up the Ramesseum before your trip home.

Saturday: Luxor Museum/Mummification Museum, fly back to Cairo

You have time before you take that hour flight back to Cairo, so before you leave Luxor with tearful eyes, hit up the Luxor Museum and Mummification Museum. Admit it: you want to see the pokey thing they stuck up the mummy’s nose to scramble their brains.

What We Ate

Egypt’s national dish is falafel. For my southern folks: imagine a hushpuppy, except instead of corn meal, you grind up chickpeas. Falafel is usually served in a pita pocket with tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, peppers, and a generous drizzle of tahini sauce. 

I really feel I should brag on where we stayed more than what we ate, because the two are linked. We stayed at the Hilton Luxor for an unheard-of $86 a night (again, it was 2021) and were treated better than Nefertari and Rameses II. We had a view of Hatshepsut’s Temple from our balcony and spent our late afternoons soaking up the curiously larger sun in the infinity pool that overlooked the Nile. At night, we ate rice-stuffed pigeon al fresco five feet from the obsidian waters of the world’s longest and oldest river.

Y’all, I packed so perfectly for this trip. Cleopatra herself could not have packed a more fashionable wardrobe, not even that time when she was rolled up in the carpet. So of course, of course Air France lost our luggage when we had a layover in Charles De Gaulle Airport. Osiris Tours was on it: they didn’t stop calling Air France until our luggage was found, someone had it picked up from the airport and sent down by train, and someone picked it up at the train station and delivered it to our hotel. But because the whole process of finding our luggage took several days, we were left with nothing but the clothes on our backs.

This turned out to be okay, because we got to shop for the softest, silkiest, breeziest Egyptian cotton clothing for cheap, wholesale prices. Remember that part in The Mummy when Evelyn loses all her cute clothes in the river, and she absolutely SLAYS in that Egyptian outfit with the black veil? It was like that. So, if I could offer some words of wisdom:

If you’re switching flights through Air France, be prepared to lose your luggage. Pack everything you NEED in the largest possible carry-on, and you can transition it later when (if?) you get your suitcase. Even if your luggage isn’t lost, don’t pass up the opportunity to buy Egyptian cotton clothing!

On days when we had to repeat outfits, we just washed our sweaty clothes in the bathtub with a little soap, hung it out to dry that evening, and it was perfectly dry and ready to go the next day. That’s the benefit of traveling in the desert!

Egypt is a majority Muslim country, so women dress more conservatively there. In the big cities like Luxor and Cairo, you’re fine wearing whatever you want, but… I don’t know, it seems disrespectful. I saw a lot of Eastern European tourists wearing tube tops and short shorts, but… maybe try to blend in with the locals. Many Egyptians opt for long-sleeve clothing for SPF. When you live in the desert, you don’t want to constantly be applying SPF all day, so most folks wear lightweight cover. In fact, you’ll see a lot of men wearing long, gray tunics called galabiyas. They’re more lightweight and comfortable than a shirt and slacks!

I opted for breezy, flowy shirts that came to my elbows and mid-calf leggings on days when I knew we would be climbing (Pyramids, Valley of the Kings/Queens, etc.). On museum, mosque, or temple days, I wore a shirt and a long or midi skirt. I also packed a lightweight scarf to wear to the Muhammad Ali Mosque. 

Alex wore a lot of nice short-sleeve linen button-ups and dry-wicking khakis. Remember: most men do not dress as casually as guys do in the US. If you’re a male going to Europe, North Africa, or bigger cities in Asia, pack one level down from church clothes. Date night clothes? Idk just don’t show up in a t-shirt, shorts, flip-flops, running shoes, or–God forbid–Crocs. These are reserved for the beach and pool, but not walking around. That is, unless you want a big “I’m an American! Pickpocket me!” sign flashing above your head.

As for shoes, I would recommend a good pair of Tevas or Chacos. Your shoes are going to get super dusty and dirty every day, and it’s really nice to be able to rinse off the dust and dry them. Plus, they’re super comfortable for all the walking you’ll be doing.

I don’t know how else to explain this, but the sun is just bigger in Egypt. Seriously. Pack a good hat and 50-70 SPF. Pack a bathing suit too, because while I didn’t see a lot of Egyptians walking around in bathing suits (again, modesty culture), they know everybody else likes to sunbathe and take a dip in the pool.

Egypt is a tipping country. It’s bad manners not to tip everyone a dollar or two. Like if you don’t tip them, you’re sending them a clear message that they are terrible at their job. It’s impossible and unsafe to carry ALL the tipping money at once, so be prepared to make several trips to the ATM during your visit. For guides and drivers, $20 a day. For hotel staff, $5. For bathrooms and docents, a dollar or two. If you get a case of the Ebenezer Scroogies, remember that Egypt relies on tourism, which has plummeted by 70% in the past decade. A lot of these people are trying to put food on the table. It’s not going to kill you to give folks a dollar.

What We Bought

In Egypt, as in most countries to the east, haggling is encouraged! It’s kind of weird if you don’t haggle. They know we don’t haggle for prices in the States, so in most places they’ll give you kind of an encouraging look like “I’m going to start high; you go low.” You can go 20 dollars below that and meet at a nice point in the middle. That’s safe haggling. Just be careful not to go too low… you don’t want to insult the store owner! The one place where you shouldn’t haggle, I learned the hard way, is a genuine silver store. The owner was very gracious (“My dear, we never haggle for silver. The price is determined by the weight.”), but to this day I feel like crawling under the floor with embarrassment. But everywhere else, especially in the Cairo Grand Bazaar, have fun haggling!

Here are some Egyptian items we stocked up on. Do your research and make sure you’re going to reputable places. Because we used Osiris Tours, we were taken to places that were community partners with the tour company, which was fine with us because we weren’t trying to spend a whole day shopping for each item. We wanted to spend an hour, maybe two shopping for one item after our tours of temples and tombs. (Two hours for tours of the facilities. Artians/store owners will offer you a very thick Turkish coffee or tea, will show you how everything is made, and will not pressure you to buy anything. But, for the sake of making your house look so cool and impressing all your future guests, I recommend buying all of these things.)

• Alabaster jars
• Papyrus paintings
• Perfume
• Egyptian cotton clothes/sheets
• Silver jewelry (get your cartouche! It’s your name in hieroglyphics, and it’s touristy, but who cares!)
• Rugs (we didn’t get one but I regret it!)
• So, so many tchotchkes. Our house looks like The Museum of Antiquities for all the little figurines I bought. Not mad about it.

For more pictures of the French Riviera and travel inspo, follow me on Instagram at instagram.com/ramblinreba!