14 Days in Egypt: Hurghada Beaches and Nile Cruise

Nothing is scheduled. The reef sits close enough to shore across most of Hurghada that a mask and fins will show you plenty, and the boat trips leave in the morning if you want to go further out.

Overnight: Hurghada
Included visits: None
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: A day sail to Giftun Island with snorkeling stops and a beach landing
Important notes: Reef-safe sunscreen is worth bringing. Coral is protected — standing on it carries fines.

A second free day. If you would rather be off the water, the eastern desert starts a few kilometres inland and the 4x4 trips run out into it.

Overnight: Hurghada
Included visits: None
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: 4x4 desert safari with a Bedouin village stop, camel ride and sunset
Important notes: Desert trips are dusty and unshaded — take a scarf and sunglasses.

Another open day. The submarine trips are the one option that suits people who would rather not swim: you descend in a fixed-route vessel and see the reef through the viewing ports without getting wet.

Overnight: Hurghada
Included visits: None
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: Submarine excursion over the reef; glass-bottom boat

Your last free day before the river. Worth using it lightly — the transfer south is early and the first afternoon in Luxor is a full one.

Overnight: Hurghada
Included visits: None
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: Anything from the previous days, arranged through your representative

After breakfast you drive west across the desert to Luxor, roughly four hours. You board the ship and have lunch on arrival. The afternoon covers the East Bank: Karnak first, which needs a couple of hours, then Luxor Temple on the corniche a few kilometres south. Dinner is on board.

Overnight: On board in Luxor
Included visits: Karnak Temple, Luxor Temple
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: Luxor Temple again after dark, when it is lit; the sound and light show at Karnak
Important notes: Karnak is large and mostly unshaded — hat and water. The drive is through open desert with one rest stop.

A full day on the water. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are all on board, with the farmland, palm belts and villages of the Nile Valley passing either side. If you would rather be ashore for part of the morning, the Luxor Museum is an option before departure — a small, well-lit collection that includes two royal mummies and a cache of statuary found buried beneath the Luxor Temple courtyard.

Overnight: On board
Included visits: None
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: Luxor Museum

Another day under way, through the stretch most people remember afterwards — sandstone cliffs closing in, sugar cane and palm running down to the water, and the desert edge visible behind. The ship has a sundeck and a pool for the hours when the sun is high.

Overnight: On board
Included visits: None
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner

After breakfast you go ashore. A motorboat carries you to Agilkia Island for Philae Temple, dedicated to Isis and rebuilt block by block here when the dams raised the water. The Unfinished Obelisk follows, still lying in the granite quarry where a flaw opened along its length, the ancient tool marks visible on the stone. In the afternoon a felucca takes you around Elephantine Island and the botanical gardens of Kitchener's Island.

Overnight: On board in Aswan
Included visits: Philae Temple, Unfinished Obelisk, felucca sail
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: The Nubian villages by motorboat; the High Dam
Important notes: Philae involves a short boat crossing at each end.

The morning is free unless you have booked Abu Simbel, which leaves before dawn for the three-hour drive south. Both temples Ramses II cut into the cliff — the great one for himself, the smaller for Nefertari — were sawn apart and lifted sixty-five metres uphill in the 1960s ahead of the rising lake. The ship sails north in the afternoon to Kom Ombo, where you go ashore for the double temple: one half for Sobek the crocodile god, the mirrored half for Haroeris, Horus the Elder.

Overnight: On board
Included visits: Temple of Sobek and Haroeris at Kom Ombo
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: Abu Simbel by road or short flight, booked in advance
Important notes: Abu Simbel is six hours of driving plus the site. Confirm the sailing time with reception before booking it.

A horse-drawn carriage takes you from the mooring into Edfu after breakfast for the Temple of Horus — roof intact, enclosure walls intact, the most complete pharaonic building standing anywhere in Egypt, with the Horus and Seth story carved in sequence along the inner walls. The ship then sails north for Luxor, crossing the Esna lock during the afternoon. Dinner is on board.

Overnight: On board in Luxor
Included visits: Temple of Horus at Edfu
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Important notes: Small notes are useful for the carriage drivers at Edfu. The lock crossing is slow and worth watching from the deck.

If you have booked the balloon it lifts off before sunrise and returns in time for breakfast. You disembark with your luggage afterwards. The West Bank fills the morning: three tombs in the Valley of the Kings, cut deep into the limestone with their painted ceilings intact; Hatshepsut's mortuary temple, terraced into the cliff at Deir el-Bahari; and the two seated Colossi of Memnon. You then drive back east to Hurghada, around four hours, with dinner at your resort.

Overnight: Hurghada
Included visits: Valley of the Kings, Temple of Hatshepsut, Colossi of Memnon
Meals: Breakfast, packed lunch, dinner
Optional experiences: Dawn hot-air balloon over the West Bank; the tombs of Tutankhamun and Seti I, ticketed separately
Important notes: The longest day of the trip. Uneven ground and warm, still air inside the tombs — closed shoes are worth wearing. Lunch is a packed box for the road.

Your last full day, unscheduled. Anything from the earlier options can still be arranged through your representative if you want one more day on the water.

Overnight: Hurghada
Included visits: None
Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner

Breakfast at the resort, then a transfer to Hurghada Airport timed around your flight. Late checkout can usually be arranged for a fee if you fly in the evening.

Included visits: None
Meals: Breakfast
Important notes: Allow three hours before an international departure.