6-Day Cairo & Aswan Tour with Abu Simbel, Philae and the Pyramids

When you land in Cairo, a representative meets you at the airport, helps with arrival formalities and escorts you to a private air-conditioned vehicle for the drive to your hotel. Once you have checked in, the rest of the day is free.

Take the chance to rest. This itinerary covers a lot of ground in a short time, from the Giza Plateau to the far south near the Sudanese border, and Day 5 in particular begins very early. A quiet first evening, a good meal and a full night's sleep are the best preparation.

If you want to do a little planning, this is a good moment to set aside what you will need over the next few days: sunscreen, a wide-brimmed hat, sunglasses, a refillable water bottle, comfortable closed shoes and small notes in Egyptian pounds for tips and restrooms. No meals are included today.

After breakfast you set out by private vehicle for the Giza Plateau. The pyramids of Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure were completed about 4,500 years ago as tombs for three kings of the Fourth Dynasty. The Great Pyramid originally rose about 146 meters, and even with its outer casing stripped away it is overwhelming at close range. Nearby, the Sphinx lies in front of Khafre's pyramid, its lion body and human head carved from the living rock of the plateau.

Lunch is at a local restaurant, and then you drive south to Saqqara. Here the Step Pyramid of Djoser, built around 2670 BC, marks the moment Egyptians first built on a monumental scale in stone. Its six stacked tiers show the idea taking shape that would lead, within a century, to Giza. Saqqara also contains many tombs and temples from the Old Kingdom, some with vivid reliefs of daily life.

Your final stop is Memphis, the capital of Old Kingdom Egypt. The open-air museum here holds a huge fallen statue of Ramesses II and a calcite sphinx set among palm trees. A private car returns you to your hotel to rest.

This morning you visit the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, the first museum in Egypt to tell the country's entire story under one roof, from prehistoric tools to modern crafts. Its most powerful space is the Royal Mummies Hall, where the preserved bodies of kings and queens of the New Kingdom rest in individual cases under soft light. Your guide explains how mummification worked and why Egyptians believed it mattered for the afterlife.

After lunch at a local restaurant you continue to the Cairo Citadel, the fortress Saladin built in the 12th century to defend the city. It remained the seat of Egypt's rulers for centuries and today holds several museums and mosques. The most prominent is the Mosque of Mohamed Ali, built in the 19th century in the Ottoman style, with two slender minarets and an interior lit by hanging lamps beneath a soaring dome.

The afternoon ends in Islamic Cairo at Khan el-Khalili, the city's best-known bazaar. Wander the lanes for spices, jewelry, textiles and brass lanterns, and stop for mint tea while you watch the crowds. A private car takes you back to your hotel.

After breakfast a private vehicle takes you to the airport for your domestic flight to Aswan, where a representative meets you on arrival. The change from Cairo is immediate: the air is drier, the light sharper, and the Nile here runs blue between dark granite islands.

Your first visit is the Aswan High Dam, completed in 1970 to end the Nile's annual flood and generate hydroelectric power. From its crest you look south across Lake Nasser, one of the largest artificial lakes in the world, and north along the river that it now controls. Next comes the Unfinished Obelisk, still lying in the granite quarry where ancient masons abandoned it after a crack appeared. Had it been raised, it would have been the largest obelisk ever made, and the tool marks around it show exactly how such stones were cut. Lunch is at a local restaurant.

In the afternoon you visit Philae, the temple of the goddess Isis. Flooded for much of each year after the first Aswan dam was built, and threatened with permanent submersion by the High Dam, it was moved block by block in an international rescue to the higher island of Agilkia, so the visit includes a short boat crossing. Its pylons and reliefs are among the best preserved in Egypt. You then transfer to your Aswan hotel.

Today starts before breakfast is served, so your hotel prepares a boxed breakfast for you to take on the road. A representative meets you and you set off by private air-conditioned vehicle across the desert toward Abu Simbel, about 280 kilometers south of Aswan near the border with Sudan. The drive usually takes around three and a half hours each way, and watching the sun come up over the sand is part of the experience.

Abu Simbel is two temples cut into a sandstone cliff during the reign of Ramesses II. The Great Temple is fronted by four seated colossi of the king, each about 20 meters tall, while the smaller temple honors his queen, Nefertari, and the goddess Hathor. Inside, reliefs show Ramses at the Battle of Kadesh. Twice a year, around February 22 and October 22, the rising sun reaches the inner sanctuary. In the 1960s, as Lake Nasser rose behind the new High Dam, both temples were cut into blocks and reassembled on higher ground, one of the great engineering rescues of the 20th century.

Lunch is included today. After the visit, a private vehicle takes you to the airport for your flight back to Cairo, where a representative meets you and drives you to your hotel.

After the long journey of Day 5, you can take your last morning slowly. Breakfast is at your hotel, and any time before checkout is free for packing or a short walk.

A representative then accompanies you in a private air-conditioned vehicle to the airport for your departure. The pickup time is planned around Cairo traffic and international check-in, so the transfer should feel unhurried. If your flight leaves late in the day, ask your representative about luggage storage at the hotel; anything extra is arranged on request and confirmed separately.

In under a week you will have seen both ends of ancient Egypt's monumental story, from Djoser's first stone pyramid at Saqqara to Ramesses II's colossal facade at Abu Simbel, more than 1,000 years and nearly 1,000 kilometers apart.