Eight days in Cairo, Luxor and Hurghada gives you the two halves of Egypt that travellers usually have to choose between: the monuments and the sea. Three nights in Cairo bracket the trip, one night in Luxor covers both banks of ancient Thebes, and three all-inclusive nights in Hurghada leave you free to dive, snorkel, or do nothing at all.
Your second day pairs the Giza Plateau with the Grand Egyptian Museum, which stands about two kilometres from the pyramids. You see the tombs in the morning and the treasures taken out of them in the afternoon, including the complete Tutankhamun collection — shown together for the first time since Howard Carter cleared the tomb in the 1920s.
In Luxor you cross to the West Bank for the Valley of the Kings, the Temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahari and the Colossi of Memnon, then take Karnak and Luxor Temple on the East Bank. Karnak alone covers around 100 hectares, making it the largest religious complex ever built.
Hurghada is four hours down the coast road from Luxor, which is what makes this combination work in a single week rather than a fortnight. After Hurghada, your last day in Cairo is a different Egypt again: Coptic Cairo inside the Roman fortress of Babylon, the Citadel of Saladin above the city, and the alleys of Khan el-Khalili before your flight home.
Every touring day is led by a licensed Egyptologist, not a general guide — which is the difference between being shown a wall and having it read to you.
Most eight-day trips to Egypt make you pick a lane: monuments or coast, Cairo or the Nile. This one doesn’t, because these three places sit in a line you can actually travel in a week.
Cairo holds the beginning and the end of the story. The Giza Plateau and the Grand Egyptian Museum on day two; Coptic Cairo, the Citadel and Khan el-Khalili on day eight. Four thousand years apart, forty minutes across town.
Luxor is the densest concentration of standing monuments anywhere on earth. One night is short, but it is enough for both banks if the day is planned properly — West Bank tombs on arrival, East Bank temples the next morning.
Hurghada is the recovery. Three nights on the Red Sea after four days of early starts, on an all-inclusive basis so nothing needs deciding. The reef sits close to shore, so a snorkel trip is a morning rather than an expedition.
If you would rather sail than swim, our Nile cruise itineraries cover Luxor to Aswan instead of the coast.
Your Egypt Best Vacations representative meets you inside the arrivals terminal at Cairo International Airport with a signboard, and assists you through visa and passport formalities. You are then transferred by private air-conditioned vehicle to your hotel in Cairo or Giza.
The rest of the day is yours to rest before the itinerary begins.
Overnight: Cairo
Meals Plan: No Meals Included
After breakfast your Egyptologist guide collects you for the Giza Plateau. You begin at the pyramid of Khufu (Cheops), the last surviving wonder of the ancient world, then continue past Khafre (Chephren) and Menkaure (Mycerinus) to the panoramic viewpoint where all three line up against the desert.
From there you go down to the Great Sphinx and the Valley Temple of Khafre, where the granite pillars and the causeway that once carried the king’s body up to his pyramid still stand.
Lunch at a local restaurant, then to the Grand Egyptian Museum, about two kilometres from the plateau. The Grand Staircase climbs past six floors of royal statuary toward a window that frames the pyramids themselves, and the Tutankhamun galleries hold the complete contents of the tomb — the full burial assemblage displayed as one collection for the first time. Seeing the tombs in the morning and their contents in the afternoon is the whole point of pairing these two on one day.
Transfer back to your hotel.
Overnight: Cairo
Meals Plan: Breakfast & Lunch
After breakfast, transfer to Cairo Airport for your domestic flight to Luxor, where your Egyptologist guide meets you on arrival.
You begin on the West Bank in the Valley of the Kings, the burial ground of the New Kingdom pharaohs. The rock-cut tombs keep their painted ceilings and funerary texts almost intact; your ticket covers three tombs from those open on the day.
Next is the Temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahari, rising in three colonnaded terraces against the cliff face. Hatshepsut began as regent for Thutmose III and went on to rule as a crowned king in full pharaonic regalia — with his regnal years still running alongside hers. Her temple carries the reliefs of the trading expedition to Punt and of her own divine birth.
You finish at the Colossi of Memnon, the two seated quartzite statues of Amenhotep III that once fronted the largest mortuary temple ever built on the West Bank.
Transfer to your hotel.
Overnight: Luxor
Meals Plan: Breakfast Only
After breakfast you cross to the East Bank for Karnak, the largest religious complex ever built — around 100 hectares, added to by pharaoh after pharaoh across roughly two thousand years. The Great Hypostyle Hall alone holds 134 columns, the tallest of them around 21 metres.
You continue to Luxor Temple, joined to Karnak by the avenue of sphinxes, with the granite colossi of Ramesses II and the standing obelisk at the first pylon.
After lunch you transfer by private air-conditioned vehicle to Hurghada — about four hours across the Eastern Desert to the coast — and check in to your all-inclusive resort on the Red Sea.
Overnight: Hurghada
Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner
A free day. Your resort is all-inclusive, so meals and drinks are covered and nothing needs planning.
If you would rather be out on the water, optional excursions can be arranged: diving and snorkelling trips to the Giftun Islands, glass-bottom boat and submarine rides, quad safaris into the Eastern Desert and Bedouin dinners. See our Hurghada day tours for prices.
Overnight: Hurghada
Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner (all-inclusive)
Another free day at your all-inclusive resort. Optional diving, snorkelling, glass-boat, submarine and desert safari excursions are available on request.
Overnight: Hurghada
Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner (all-inclusive)
After breakfast, free time at the resort until your transfer to Hurghada Airport for the domestic flight to Cairo. Our representative meets you on arrival and transfers you to your Cairo hotel for the final night.
Overnight: Cairo
Meals Plan: Breakfast Only
After breakfast and check-out, your Egyptologist guide takes you into the older layers of the city.
Coptic Cairo sits inside the walls of the Roman fortress of Babylon. You visit the Hanging Church, built over the fortress gatehouse with its nave suspended above the gate; the Church of St Sergius and Bacchus, raised over the crypt where tradition places the Holy Family during their flight into Egypt; and the Ben Ezra Synagogue, where the Cairo Geniza manuscripts were found.
You then climb to the Citadel of Saladin, begun in 1176 to defend Cairo against the Crusaders and the seat of Egypt’s rulers for some seven hundred years afterwards. Inside it stands the Alabaster Mosque of Muhammad Ali, its Ottoman domes and twin minarets visible from most of the city, with a terrace looking back across the rooftops toward Giza.
You finish at Khan el-Khalili, the bazaar founded in 1382 — coppersmiths, spice merchants and perfumers, and the old cafés of the Al-Muizz quarter around it.
Transfer to Cairo International Airport for your departure flight, and the end of your 8 days in Cairo, Luxor and Hurghada. It is a hard country to leave; when you are ready to come back, we will be here.
Meals Plan: Breakfast Only
