Due to some financial re-jigging when the endowment scandal erupted we’re happily left with a modest lump sum now that the policy has matured.
We’ve never been abroad as a family (two kids, 12 and 16) and to be honest never really seen the need. The UK’s been fine up to now (plus I get to take my bike!)
However, one of the rare things my wife and I agree on is we’d like to see the pyramids. Now we (hopefully!) have the finances but no experience I’m turning to STW for some advice!

When to go and for how long? – October would be best for us, is there plenty to do/see for say 10 days?

Where to go? – The main focus will be the pyramids and other such sites. We’re not really a lying by the pool sort of family but a water park wouldn’t go amiss close by or at the hotel

Who to go with? – Given our relative naivety, go all inclusive with one of the big operators or are there savings to be made by shopping around? We’re not looking for 5*, a residential caravan somewhere has been a typical holiday so far. Also, book early or wait until nearer the time? it wouldn’t be the end of the world if we didn’t go if there was the possibility of a last-minute bargain that didn’t materialise

I assume the recent troubles haven’t affected the holiday areas?

All advice gratefully received!

I assume the recent troubles haven’t affected the holiday areas?

Most of the main demos are on the same square as the Museum – where King Tut’s stuff is. So yes, it has affected the holiday areas. The Pyramids are a bit further out from the centre so are probably OK.

I’d imagine it’s fine down south, but tbh I’m not sure I’d be hurrying to visit the country right now. It might be fine in October, but it might all kick off with the Muslim Brotherhood bombing and burning.

Edit: I’d check out the Foreign Office’s travel advice for the country.

We loved Egypt and when little miss TTP is old enough to appreciate it we will go back.

Pyramids are on the outskirts of Cairo. The Sphinx is on the same plateaux.
The Cairo Museum is a must see. We were told that to see everything you will need 3 days. King Tuts mask is worth the visit alone.
The bazaar (which we missed unfortunately) is supposed to be very good.
I’d recommend hiring a guide to show you the sites.

We were in Egypt on a guided backpacking tour and spend a couple of days in Cairo before travelling to Aswan, Abu Simbel, Luxor and Hurghada.
The accommodation definitely wasn’t even 3 star, but the roughing it element of the trip added to the whole experience.

Highlight for us was sailing on the Nile for 3 days in feluccas and sleeping under the stars on deck. The Milky Way is so clear. Really relaxing. May not be suitable for the 12yo though.

Amazing country with so much to see.
Our trip was in 2001, so not sure on the safety situation, but there were armed police on virtually every street corner to protect the tourist trade that they depend upon.

Take boxes of pens and notepads to give to kids that you see. You will be amazed at the reaction that you get when you hand these out.

You will get Pharaohs Revenge at some point so take diarease.

We used http://www.imaginative-traveller.com.

https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/egypt

I wouldn’t at the moment though.

I have been to Cairo just before the political unrest and it’s quite a challenging place to visit when there isn’t a chance of being caught up in demonstrations. You need to be very aware of scams and ‘guides’ who are going to fleece/rob/rape you.

I’d leave it mate.

pyramids aint going anywhere, wait a while for the safety of you and the family!

The bazaar (which we missed unfortunately) is supposed to be very good.

That’s my favourite bit of Cairo – though it pays to have visited a few times, the first time can be fairly stressful!

I have been to Ciro and it’s quite a challenging place to visit when there isn’t a chance of being caught up in demonstrations. You need to be very aware of scams and ‘guides’ who are going to fleece/rob/rape you.

“Fleece” is pretty relative though – you’ll be paying more than a local, obviously, but when you work it out you often find you’re arguing over 50p… Pickpockets are definitely a risk, but I really don’t think there’s much risk of rape though!

Amazing country. I wouldn’t let the current political situation worry me too much. The people are really friendly and welcoming. In fact it might help keep some of the tourists sites quiet. Generally you have to get to the pyramids early to avoid the crowds. Don’t just look at the pyramids. The whole plateau is filled with interesting places. Luxor is the other main historic site and is amazing.

As well as the history there is the red sea. Fantastic snorkelling and diving. Its a big country, though, so you will need to plan to fit it all in without too much travelling. The best easy access coast is on Sinai by hurghada is nearer.

For 10 days I’d fly to Cairo for 2-3 days, bus down to luxor and maybe do a cruise total 4-5 days, then bus to hurghada for some sea and fun and fly home from there.

just for a bit of balance, we went to sharm and hated it. if we knew then what we know now we’d have gone somewhere less ‘touristy’. from the moment we got there we were hassled by shopkeepers who just dont take no for an answer. had 2 teenage lads with us who at one point were pushed into a shop and they tried to force them to buy drugs.

heard horror stories from other people in the hotel about being locked in shops until they bought something, and also tricked into sitting on camels for a pic. once they were on the camel, they got the camel to stand up and wouldnt let them down until theyd paid £100!!

when you think of all the other nice places in the world why would you go there? the whole holiday was spent in a sh*t atmosphere.

just my opinion mind 🙂

Not a place to take your family any time in the near future in my opinion. Read the foreign office advice. Even if you avoided all the troubles, i doubt you could have a relaxing holiday.

Just read the foreign office advice. All the tourists bit sound fine. Did you avoid going to the Lake District while there was rioting in London recently?

I love the Middle East – especially Syria and Jordan – but I hated Egypt. It was dirty, hellishly noisy and chaotic and I couldn’t wait to get out.

If you must go to the ME, go to Jordan, which is a safe country with lovely people, superb food and of course Wadi Rum and Petra, which are far less spoiled and more spectacular than the pyramids.

Just got back from a weeks diving on a liveaboard boat which was great in every aspect. However the day we had to kill in Sharm wasn’t very enjoyable as already said above. Loads of security everywhere, hassle from people every 5 minutes on the street and the whole place was a tatty, with loads of half built building sites that resembled a middle eastern war zone. And loads of pissed and aggressive Russians hanging around bizarrely.

I love the Middle East – especially Syria and Jordan – but I hated Egypt. It was dirty, hellishly noisy and chaotic and I couldn’t wait to get out.

I always thought that was part of the fun – and I lived there for two years 🙂

OP: globalti’s advice about Jordan is pretty good, certainly given the current situation in Egypt. Although the one place I really want to visit in the ME is Iran, perhaps you could go and let me know how it is? 🙂

The ‘Historic/Cultural’ artefacts are pretty amazing and as said previously if you fancy snorkelling or diving then the Redsea side is a must.
But be prepared for a culture shock ,Cairo is a dump, dirty, smelly packed with cars and people not a place to enjoy walking round.
Same goes for Luxor once you get away from the touristy bit, be prepared to get mithered every 10feet once you leave your hotel.

Ask for help anywhere for anything and ‘Baksheesh’ will be expected in return.

If you are buying something you MUST haggle its part of the scheme of things over there if you don’t you will end up getting ripped off(and you will be probably still pay over the odds).

Egyptian blokes will openly ogle your wife/girlfriend and try and trade her for X-amount of camels, there wives will spit/throw stones at your other half if she dare walk the streets even slightly uncovered.

The carriage drivers all have agreements with the local papyrus/statue/trinket dealer and you will end up being driven to one whether you want to or not.

Stock up on Imodium YOU WILL GET THE SH!TS, no matter how well you try , how much bottled water/alcohol you drink it will get you.

Place for kids, not unless there really interested in the culture side of things.

We have been twice first time we did a Nile Cruise ,second time stayed in Hurgarda near Sharm el Sheik.
Preferred the Nile cruise to be honest we got to see more of the history and sights plus could chill out by the pool on the boat withour getting bothered every 2minutes.

Worth going?, Definetly! Its a place everyone should visit once.

sadexpunk – Member
just for a bit of balance, we went to sharm and hated it. if we knew then what we know now we’d have gone somewhere less ‘touristy’. from the moment we got there we were hassled by shopkeepers who just dont take no for an answer. had 2 teenage lads with us who at one point were pushed into a shop and they tried to force them to buy drugs.

heard horror stories from other people in the hotel about being locked in shops until they bought something, and also tricked into sitting on camels for a pic. once they were on the camel, they got the camel to stand up and wouldnt let them down until theyd paid £100!!

+1.

I did a charity bike ride for MENCAP in Egypt. We were living on a Nile Cruise boat that followed us to our destination every day.
We went on plenty of planned sight seeing trips, while we were there as well as going out on our own in the evenings for an explore.

Now, some of Egypt I really liked. I loved the hustle and bustle of the larger towns, the markets, the horse and cart rides and most of the people were really friendly.
But, on our first day there, in my tourism naiveity, I got sheperded into a shop by a bloke who was trying to flog me white cotton shirts for £100 (not Egyptian pounds – 6 to 1 GBP when i was there, but £100 GBP for a plain white shirt….).
He then moved onto tea towels which were also a ridiculous price. At this point I thanked him and tried to leave, only to find the door blocked by two blokes who made it clear to me that I wasn’t going until I bought something. In the end I picked up the smallest trinket in the place (a small carved Scarab bettle), which I ended up paying £8 GBP for and legged it. Later in the week, a bloke came back onto the boat one evening and had bought a set of 3 of the bettles I had bought for about 35 pence.

There were girls in the group (particularly blonde) who were constantly harassed when they left the boat, people who offered to take photo’s of people in our group using their camera and then wouldn’t give the camera back without a substantial payment etc.

In the whole, just an intimidating atmosphere in a lot of places that we went to – I never felt comfortable, was always waiting for the next person to come up and try to diddle you out of some money.
Other people there (who were perhaps a bit more worldly wise), loved it and went out every night to try and get the greatest bargains etc.

Firstly I have never been and sadly never will. Under the fairly stable army regime this happened to tourists:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luxor_massacre

The situation is far from great at the moment and can turn on its head within months- especially if you book in advance.

For peace of mind spend your money on a stable location. After all, you’d spend the following months watching the news/overhearing things wouldn’t you?

Plenty of other great places to go.

As a former very keen scuba diver I have been to Egypt at least eight times, trips varying in length from 1 week to 1 month. I loved Egypt and highly recommend it overall although I have not been in a few years now and can’t vouch for the current safety. When we went we would use local transport and local hotels – not sure I would now though.

You WILL experience hassle from the locals, be polite, firm and friendly and they will get the message and leave you alone.

Pyramids are great but IMO Luxor is even better, Abu Simbel worth a trip too.

The advice about tummy trouble applies to anywhere in the Middle East or Africa. No matter how careful you are, it WILL happen at some time, especially to kids or older folk. Before you travel get your GP to give you a supply of Ciproflaxacin, which is almost miraculously good especially if you’re on a busy travel schedule. That kills the bug, but you also need something like Imodium to stop the diarrhoea if you’re caught outside the hotel and oral rehydration salts to replace what’s been flushed out of you. I always carry these and a small sachet of wet wipes when travelling in Africa. Armed with this small pharmacy you will be able to survive the tummy trouble when it happens and get on with your business travel or your holiday.

Remind me to tell you about my explosive diarrhoea attack in the clean, shiny bogs at the brand new marble terminal at Karachi, in Pakistan some time.

Stay in cyprus – fly into Cairo for a day or so.

Go to the museum a bit late – early doors it is packed with day tourists from sharm-el-sheik…. I mean rammed and not nice.

Pyramids are good, worth paying the tenner to go inside and get to the top, it’s quite a long way up btw. Look at the sphinx from the front, don’t turn around. Boat wasn’t that interesting to me.

Don’t get a camel ride as you’ll get ripped off. Be very careful with what you eat, of the 28 people with me only 2 didn’t get to shit the world out of their arse for most of the holiday (1 being me and I had a torrid evening in McD’s) and we were staying at a 5 star 🙄

Be careful with the 1k and 10K note, they are very similar.

I won a holiday to egypt and didn’t enjoy myself, would have been really pissed off if I had paid, but I’m not an in your face haggle type person, YMMV.

I’d never go back, happy to have seen the pyramids but everything else was not my cup of tea.

Mrs D28 and I went in 2012 and had a great time. We flew to Luxor for a 7 night cruise up and down the Nile plus a tour of Luxor / Karnak / Valley of Kings . Then flew to Cairo for 3 nights at the Oberoi & visits to and inside the Pyramids. Then flew for 5 nights in El Gouna on the Red Sea. The place was virtually empty got to see all we wanted with no queues but you do get more hassel as a result as traders chase the tourist pound. We went 5 star all the way and were very careful but my wife was still ill.

Honest advice…If you’ve not travelled before don’t go as you’ll probably find it terrifying but if you’re a seasoned traveller I think we went at the perfect time. Not sure I’d go at the present though as the troubles seem to have got even worse now which is a great shame as we met a lot of very nice people who just wanted a return to peaceful times of old.

Pyramids are a bit of a let down. They’ve added an Everest Double Glazed conservatory to the side of the great pyramid as a tourist centre. Put a coach park right next to the conservatory. Build a road between the Sphinx and the pyramids so tourists can just drive past and don’t need to get out of their cars.

Heritage ruined by brf, on Flickr

The excavation holes which show where they buried all the boats used to carry the blocks down the Nile double as rubbish pits.

They’re not exactly looking after their heritage….

By contrast, here’s Wadi Rum:

We went a few years ago and hated it, if I was to go again it would be Sharm and a daytrip to the pyramids. Luxor was part fake and part rubbish in my opinion, the most famous sites are made of concrete.

Footflaps ….to be fair that conservatory house a boat that was dug up there ……..

Just read the foreign office advice. All the tourists bit sound fine. Did you avoid going to the Lake District while there was rioting in London recently?

Did you really ?

Have another read just to be sure.

There have been several violent clashes since July 2013 resulting in a large number of deaths. Most of the clashes have taken place in Cairo and Alexandria.

On 3 and 6 October there were political protests in Cairo and other cities in Egypt that resulted in more than 50 deaths. At protests in Cairo on 19 November 2 people died and over 50 were injured. There are ongoing protests and clashes within university campuses across the country.

There is a serious risk of violence and sexual assault at demonstrations. NGOs report more than 100 rapes and sexual assaults against women in demonstrations since 30 June.

On 26 December, a bomb exploded close to a public bus in Nasr City, Cairo. At least 5 people were injured.

Yeah, Sounds like a lovely place to take the kids at the moment.

Also, the Sphinx is absolutely tiny!

Tiny Sphinx by brf, on Flickr

footflaps …have you actually been…that’s rubbish !

Have another read just to be sure.

Just had another read. So basically don’t spend your holiday on a university campus or in the city centre when there is a demonstration on (For which then will be prior notice) and avoid travel to places you wouldn’t go to like North Sinai.

Good point about the luxor massacre that happened nearly 20 years ago. Might be sensible to avoid Hiroshima, Isandlwana and Glencoe in case any of those happen again 🙂

As someone who visited the pyramids a few years ago (when Egypt was relatively peaceful), it would be pretty much the last place I’d go for a family holiday. Even then, it was a tacky, stressful, deflating experience and I was lucky enough to get five-star treatment (for professional reasons!). I thought it was an awful place and you couldn’t pay me to go back now.

If you want to see fascinating pyramids, have a safe family holiday with a bit of beach action, great local cuisine, and some sunshine, I’d recommend the Yucatan’s Mayan ruins in Mexico. But that, in true STW tradition, isn’t answering your question…

We’ve never been abroad as a family (two kids, 12 and 16) and to be honest never really seen the need.

Didn’t notice this bit… Don’t go to Egypt. Really, don’t. It’s not the place to go for your first foreign holiday. There’s a very real risk you’ll hate it. It’s chaotic, in-your-face, poor, polluted and very 3rd world. There are lots of other places you’d probably enjoy more.

(And the Pyramids aren’t going anywhere!)

Well going by the above I’m on borrowed time, about half a mile up the road is where the Moors murderers lived ,a mile further on is where Dale Cregan shot 2 coppers, about 500 yds away from that is Mottram Church where Bodys where ‘Snatched’ from Graves and my family doctor for the first 20years of my life was Harold Shipman.

With all the terror happening around my home town the middle-east is a break in paradise.

On a side note I would still say its worth visiting Egypt at least once in your lifetime, would it be my first choice having been there and other places? No.

I found the ruins at Pompei and Herculaneum more pleasant and just as interesting and so much more to see around that area of Italy,Day trip to Capri, drive along the Amalfi coast which has some amazing views ,stop off in Positano and take all the winding roads and steps down to the town and beach then turn around for another amazing view.

I thought the pyramids where great. I got up a 5 and jumped in a taxi. He was pretty keen to take me to his mate as a guide but I just got him to drop me off. Shared the site with a few other early birds and had a good explore of the surrounding tombs. By mid morning the coaches turned up and it was a bit busy for my tastes. I can see how that would be a bit rubbish.

I totally see that it is a country that polarises experiences and lots people have a poor holiday. It will be a big risk for a first family holiday but it can be immensely rewarding.

Ok not been personally but the fella I sit next to went last year with his family to Sharm….this was during Ede and his daughter (14) had an attempted rape when a man forced his way into the room. The dad and a bunch of others (posse i guess) hunted the man down turns out the offending guy and a group of others had literally just checked into the hotel…had not even taken their cases to the rooms. This was the icing on the cake for him and his family at the end of a pretty wretched holiday.

A friend of mine has been a bunch of times without kids and really enjoyed it?

globalti – Member
By contrast, here’s Wadi Rum:

It’s a shame that bloke got in the way of what could have been a lovely picture……

Good point about the luxor massacre that happened nearly 20 years ago.

I was in Luxor at that time and didn’t know anything about it until i came home and my father told me.

If you dress like a tourist you’ll get hassled everywhere. Dress like a bum and you’ll be fine. Cairo is crazy city and a bit of a shithole. A day or two to see the sights would be plenty imo, then travel to Luxor* for the remainder of your holiday.

* It’s been over 10 years since i was last there and no doubt it’s changed dramatically, for the worse.

Dont get me wrong- I’d go to Sharma etc if I was in to diving but I’d need to be reassured about the security. In an open city or open attraction its just too hard to secure/police IMO.

Look at it in black and white- You have kids and you are considering going to a country where recently the Army overthrew the elected Prime Minister and where now there are starting to be attacks, where will it all lead to in 6months?

Off to Sharm on Saturday, was meant to be doing 7 days in Hurgarda then traveling to Luxor for a 9 day cruise on the Nile, we were advised to change due to in going trouble.

Thanks for all the feedback, on balance it sounds like it may not be the best idea. The troubles aside, at the very least trying to deal with two kids with upset stomachs doesn’t seem much like the holiday of a lifetime.

One to save for when they’ve flown the nest, as has been said, the pyramids aren’t going anywhere!

Hi Saleem, enjoy and stay safe 😀

Not been there, but in light of the fact this is your first foreign holiday, I don’t think it is a great idea.

I agree with the suggestion of Pompeii/Sorrento/Capri.
I’ve had two holidays to that part of the world, and will be taking our kids at some point.
You fly into Naples, and everything is accessible from the train that runs around the bay towards Sorrento.