21 Day Egypt Tour Packages

Comparing Our Three 21 Day Egypt Tour Packages

All three are small groups of at most 16, with licensed Egyptologist guides, domestic flights, one night in Alexandria and four nights all-inclusive in Hurghada. Prices are per person in a twin room, Gold tier, 1 May to 30 September; the room-and-season tables are on each tour page.

Cairo and Alexandria: Days 1 to 7

Cairo gets a full week, split into two visits. The first two days are the plateau and the museum — Giza, the Sphinx and Saqqara on one day, and on the two cruise-ship and dahabiya routes the Grand Egyptian Museum with the complete Tutankhamun collection; on the felucca route the original Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square. The third day is the medieval and Coptic city: the Citadel of Saladin, founded in 1176, with the Alabaster Mosque of Muhammad Ali inside it; the Hanging Church, Abu Serga and Ben Ezra; and Khan el-Khalili.

Then Alexandria, with a night there so that the second day is not a round trip: the Catacombs of Kom el-Shoqafa, Pompey’s Pillar, Qaitbay’s fort where the lighthouse stood, the Roman theatre at Kom el-Dikka and the Library. Back in Cairo, a day at Saqqara, Memphis and Dahshur puts the Step Pyramid and the Bent and Red Pyramids in order — a century of experiment before Giza — and on the two longer-cruise routes a seventh day goes to the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization and the Manial Palace.

The Red Sea First, Then the Nile

The cruise-ship and dahabiya routes fly you to Hurghada on day eight for four nights all-inclusive — three free days on the water before the temples begin — and then drive you to Luxor to board. It is a better order than it sounds: you arrive at Karnak rested. The felucca route reverses it, doing Lake Nasser and the Nile first and Hurghada afterwards, with the White Desert as the finale.

The Nile, Three Ways

On the 21 Day Egypt Tour Package you have four nights on a 5-star cruise ship from Luxor to Aswan: Karnak and Luxor Temple on boarding day; the Valley of the Kings, the temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahari and the Colossi of Memnon on the West Bank; then Edfu, the best-preserved temple in Egypt, built by the Ptolemies between 237 and 57 BC, and Kom Ombo on the way south; and Aswan — the High Dam, the Unfinished Obelisk, and Philae rebuilt on Agilkia Island.

The Egypt Grand Tour With Dahabiya & Lake Nasser sails the same four nights on a dahabiya, a two-masted sailing boat with a handful of cabins that moors at islands and villages the ships cannot reach, with drinks included on board.

The Best Egypt Itinerary 21 Days does the Nile the old way: two nights on a felucca from Aswan, the Daraw camel market on the way, Kom Ombo and Edfu reached from the bank, then two nights in a Luxor hotel for the West Bank and Karnak. It is the least expensive route, and the only one that ends in the White Desert.

Lake Nasser: Three Nights to Abu Simbel

Every route includes the Lake Nasser cruise. On the two longer-cruise routes it sails from Aswan to Abu Simbel and back, so you see the two temples of Ramses II and Nefertari from the water as well as on foot, and you fly to Cairo from Aswan afterwards; on the felucca route it runs one way, from Abu Simbel to Aswan, at the start of the southern leg. In between are the relocated temples of Nubia: Qasr Ibrim, the only site on the lake still where it was built; Amada, the oldest temple in Nubia, moved 2.6 kilometres on rails in one piece; Wadi es-Seboua with its avenue of sphinxes; and Kalabsha beside the dam. They were saved from the rising water in the UNESCO campaign of the 1960s and 70s and can only be reached by boat.

Travelling Solo on a 21 Day Egypt Tour

Three of the routes have solo versions with single rooms and cabins and smaller groups: the 21 Day Egypt Tour for Solo Travelers on the cruise ship, the 21 Day Egypt Tour With Dahabiya & Lake Nasser for Singles on the dahabiya, and Solo Egypt Travel 21 Days on the felucca route with the White Desert. If you would rather split three weeks between two countries, the 21 Day Best of Egypt and Jordan Tour Package gives Jordan a week — Petra, Wadi Rum and the Dead Sea — before the Nile.

Built Around Who You Are Travelling With

Egypt Best Vacations is run by Essam Ali, an Egyptologist based in Luxor who still leads tours himself, and holds three consecutive TripAdvisor Travelers’ Choice Awards, for 2024, 2025 and 2026. Groups are capped at 16. Three weeks is a long time to travel with a guide; the guiding is what people write to us about afterwards.

The pacing is built in. The Hurghada days and the free day are rests, not filler; the two cruises are as much time on deck as time in temples. Families find the cruise-ship route the easiest; couples usually choose the dahabiya; older travellers prefer the ship’s cabins and routine. The felucca route suits people who would rather sleep under stars twice — on the river and in the desert — than in a fifth-floor cabin.

Accommodation Tiers

Gold and Platinum are our own tier names for the level of hotel and ship on each route. The Lake Nasser ship, the Hurghada resort and the desert camp are the same across tiers.

Get a Quote for Your 21 Day Egypt Tour Package

Three routes, $3,099 to $4,395 per person, departing every day. Tell us your dates, your party and which Nile you want — ship, dahabiya or felucca — and we will send an exact quote within a day with the room-and-season pricing for your tier. Winter departures and the Abu Simbel sun-festival dates of 22 February and 22 October book out early.