Day 1    Arrive in Cairo                                                         Wednesday

Upon your arrival at Cairo International Airport you are met by your English-speaking Tour Manager and assisted through immigration and customs.  You are then transferred by coach to your hotel where you have a hearty breakfast.  (In view of the fact that your room will only be available at 12:00, your luggage remains on the coach while you undertake a morning excursion.)

You are ten joined by your English-speaking guide (who will accompany you for the rest of your stay) and you travel to the Pyramids and Sphinx at Giza standing on a desert plateau some 15 kms out of Cairo, immutably majestic as they have been for thirty-five centuries and amongst the biggest manmade edifices on earth.  You will have an opportunity to enter the second biggest pyramid to marvel at how the ancient Egyptians managed to build these huge edifices with blocks of granite weighing many tons without using mortar, but nevertheless so perfect that a human hair cannot pass between the blocks.  You will also have an opportunity to stand within a stone’s throw from the ancient Sphinx, representing a lion’s body with a man’s head and dating back to antiquity.

You then check into your hotel.  The remainder of the day is at leisure.

Dinner at the hotel.

Overnight: Intercontinental City Star *****

Day 2    Cairo                                            Thursday

Breakfast at the hotel.

After breakfast you visit the Egyptian Museum one of the world’s most famous museums which contains a magnificent collection of antiquities, including mummies, sarcophagi and the fabulous treasures discovered in the tomb of the famous King Tutankhamun on 22 December 1922, as well as the Citadel of Salah al-Din built between 1176 and 1182 AD and now providing a panoramic view of Cairo from the Moqattam Hills.  The Citadel complex includes the Alabaster Mosque and the bustling Khan el Khalili Bazaar the biggest of Cairo’s main markets, in operation since the 1390s and one of the most famous oriental bazaars in the world – offering plenty of bargains, particularly in leather goods, and brass and glassware, as well as objects inlaid with mother-of-pearl and other beautiful jewelry.  Try your hand at haggling a price!

Dinner at the hotel.

Overnight: Intercontinental City Star *****

Day 3    Cairo/Luxor/Nile Cruise                                    Friday

After breakfast you check out of the hotel and are transferred to Cairo Domestic Airport for your flight to Aswan.

Upon your arrival at Aswan Airport you are met and transferred to your luxury Nile Cruiser. You then visit the world-famous Aswan High Dam, an engineering miracle when it was built in the 1960s.  Today it provides irrigation water and electricity to the whole of Egypt.  From the top of the ± 3 km long High Dam you can gaze across Lake Nasser, the huge reservoir created when the High Dam was built, at Kalabsha Temple in the south and the huge power station in the north;

You also visit the Philae Temple dismantled and reassembled on Agilika Island (about 800 km from its original home on Philae Island) in the wake of the High Dam.  This temple, dedicated to the goddess Isis, is in a beautiful setting which has been landscaped to match its original site.  Its various shrines and sanctuaries which include a temple to Hathor, a Birth House and two pylons, celebrate all the deities involved in the Isis and Osiris myth.

Then on to the Granite Quarries and the Unfinished Obelisk: The Unfinished Obelisk still lies where a crack was discovered as it was being hewn from the rock – hewn on three sides, the fourth still attached to the quarry bed.  Possibly intended as companion to the Lateran Obelisk now in Rome, it would have measured 120 feet in height and weighed over 1150 tons when complete.  It is a concrete example of how the ancient Egyptians went about fashioning these graceful monuments.

Lunch on board.

In the late afternoon you enjoy a round trip in a felucca viewing the Botanical Gardens on Plantation Island.  Almost the whole of Plantation Island consists of a botanical garden filled with exotic plants and trees imported from all over the world.  You also view the Aga Khan Mausoleum.    The Aga Khan spent every winter in Aswan and was buried here in this magnificent mausoleum modeled on the Fatimid tombs in Cairo.

Dinner and overnight on board.

Day 4    Nile Cruise                                        Saturday

Breakfast on board.

Then commences your cruise down the historic Nile, that “gigantic serpent that winds so fabulously, so ungraspably, back through history”.  En route you visit Kom Ombo where you visit the Temple of Haroeris and Sobek, a magnificent Ptolemic temple in a dramatic setting on high ground beside the Nile and surrounded by sugar cane fields.  Dedicated jointly to Haroeris, the Grand Doctor, and Sobek, the crocodile god, the temple is famous for its twin entrances, halls and sanctuaries.  Sculptured wall reliefs include one showing ancient surgical instruments, bone saws and dental tools.  Three mummified crocodiles found near-by are now in the Chapel of Hathor.  You also disembark at Edfu where you visit Edfu Temple the best preserved cult temple in Egypt, dedicated to Horus, the falcon-headed god, it was built during the reign of six Ptolomies.  The main building, which includes a great hypostyle hall, was uncovered by Mariette in the 1860s.  There are numerous reliefs including a depiction of the Feast of the Beautiful Meeting, the annual reunion between Horus and his wife Hathor, and a particularly fine ceiling relief of the goddess Nut in the New Year Chapel. Then on to Esna where you cross the locks.  Lunch  and dinner and overnight on board.

Day 5    Nile Cruise - Luxor                                    Sunday

Breakfast on board.

You arrive in Luxor early noon.  In the afternoon you visit the magnificent Karnak Temple probably the greatest place of worship in history.  (The temple includes many magnificent temples dedicated to Amun, his wife Mut and their son Khonsu, the moon deity.  The main features are the Avenue of the Rams, representing Amun, symbol of fertility and growth.  Within the temple are, inter alia, the Chapels of the Thebes Triad dating to the time of Seti II and the Temple of Ramses III, the obelisks of Thutmosis ! and of Queen Hatshepsut, the remains of the Holiest of Holies and further on the Hall of Ceremonies dating back to Thutmosis III.) and …

Luxor Temple built by the two Pharaohs Amenhotep IIII and Ramses II, the temple was dedicated to Amun-Ra, whose marriage to Mut was celebrated by the ancient Egyptians annually when a sacred procession moved from Karnak to the Luxor Temple.  To be viewed are, inter alia, statues of Ramses II, double rows of huge columns with bud papyrus capitals, further double rows of pillars, the Sanctuary of the Sacred Boat and the four-columned Holiest of Holies; the Sanctuary of the Sacred Statue.

Dinner and overnight on board.

Day 6    Luxor – Cairo - home                                Monday

After breakfast on board you check out and then visit the Valley of the Kings containing tombs of roughly 64 famous Egyptian kings including Tutankhamun, Seti I, Amenhotep II, Thutmosis III and Ramses III.  These tombs were hewn into the sheer rock faces of the valley so as to safeguard them against grave robbers; Queen Hatshepsut’s Temple (Dier el-Bahari) built by Queen Hatshepsut to perform the rights of the nether world.  The temple comprises three impressive rising terraces split by a road and the Colossi of Memnon, the only remains of a temple commemorating King Amenhotep III.  The statues are 19,2 metres high.

You are then transferred to Luxor Airport for your flight  back to Cairo and subsequent flight to Johannesburg (Flight MS 839, departing at 01:25 on Tuesday, arriving 09:25 on Tuesday)

The tour price:  R15 200 per person sharing accommodation

Single Supplement: R2 150 per person not willing or able to share accommodation

Included in the price:

• - Air tickets Johannesburg / Cairo / Johannesburg (Economy Class)
• - Air tickets Cairo / Aswan and Luxor / Cairo (Economy Class)
• - Accommodation in 5-star hotels in Cairo and Alexandria
• - 5***** Deluxe Nile Cruise
• - Meals as indicated in the program
• - Transport in a luxury air-conditioned coach
• - Services of an English-speaking guide (qualified Egyptologist)
• - Tipping – All tips except that in respect of the guide and the occasional toilet attendant

Not included in the price:

• - All expenses of a personal nature including telephone calls, drinks, video camera fees, laundry, etc.
• - Cost of passports, visas, etc.

Visas:

South African citizens need to apply for a visa to enter Egypt.  This visa is issued free of charge.  However, Selected Tours & Destinations, charges a handling fee of R200-00 per visa application.

Visa requirements:

• - A valid passport (valid for a minimum period of six months after the intended return date)
• - One passport photo
• - One application form (obtainable from Selected Tours & Destinations)