Best Things to Do in Egypt

The three pyramids and the Sphinx sit on a plateau on the edge of Cairo, about an hour from the city centre by road. Going inside the Great Pyramid needs a separate ticket and involves a low, steep, airless climb, so skip it if you are claustrophobic. Camel and horse rides run along the ridge for the wide view of all three. Half a day is enough, and early morning is far cooler than midday.

The Grand Egyptian Museum opened fully in November 2025, about two kilometres from the pyramids, and it holds the complete Tutankhamun collection of 5,398 pieces shown together for the first time. The grand staircase lined with royal statues and the hall built for Khufu's boat are the other things to look for. Give it three to four hours and pair it with the plateau on the same day.

Cruise boats run three and four night sailings between Luxor and Aswan, stopping at Edfu and Kom Ombo along the way. The boat is your hotel, meals are included and a guide handles the temple visits, which saves a lot of arranging. Most itineraries fly Cairo to Luxor, sail south, then fly home from Aswan. Book the direction that suits your flights.

The valley holds 65 known tombs and chambers cut into the rock on Luxor's west bank, built for pharaohs and senior nobles. A standard ticket covers three tombs of your choice, while Tutankhamun, Seti I and Ramses VI are ticketed separately. The painted ceilings in the quieter tombs are often better preserved. Go at opening time, as there is almost no shade.

Karnak grew over roughly 2,000 years, so you are walking through the work of dozens of pharaohs at once. The Great Hypostyle Hall and its 134 columns is the part people remember. It stands on Luxor's east bank, ten minutes from the town centre, and a sound and light show runs after dark. Two hours in the morning covers it comfortably.

Balloons lift off from the west bank just before sunrise, the only time the air is calm enough. You float over the Valley of the Kings, the Ramesseum and Medinet Habu, with the green strip along the Nile on one side and open desert on the other. Pickup is around 4 am and you are back for breakfast. Flights are cancelled in high wind, so book early in your stay.

Ramesses II had two temples cut into the cliff here, and the whole complex was moved uphill in 1968 before Lake Nasser flooded the original site. It is about 300 km south of Aswan by road, so most people take the early convoy, a short flight, or add it to a cruise. Twice a year the sunrise reaches the inner sanctuary. Allow a full day from Aswan.

Best Time: Nov - Feb

Ras Mohammed, at the tip of Sinai, is the reef most divers come for, with walls dropping straight off the shore. Sharm el-Sheikh and Hurghada have the widest choice of dive schools and both suit beginners doing a first certification. Dahab is quieter and cheaper. Boat trips run daily and snorkellers see plenty from the surface.

Known For : Ras Mohammed National Park Naama Bay Old Market

Sharm sits on the southern tip of Sinai and works as a resort base rather than a sightseeing town. Naama Bay has the restaurants and the nightlife, Shark Bay and Ras Um Sid are the better swimming beaches, and most hotels have their own stretch of reef. It is a short flight from Cairo and a common way to finish a trip after the temples.

Best Time: Apr, May, Sep, Oct

25 Sharm El Sheikh Attractions

Luxor Temple stands in the middle of the modern town, so it is the easiest of the big sites to reach on foot. Time it for the evening, when the columns are lit and the avenue of sphinxes running towards Karnak is at its best. An hour covers it. Many people do Karnak in the morning and this one the same night.

Khan el-Khalili has been Cairo's main bazaar since the fourteenth century, a warren of lanes selling lamps, inlaid boxes, spices and silver. Bargaining is expected and the first price is rarely the last. El Fishawy, the old coffee house in the middle of it, is the traditional stop. Evenings are livelier and cooler than afternoons.

Al-Muizz Street runs through medieval Cairo past mosques, madrasas and merchant houses, and much of it is closed to traffic in the evening. Climbing the minarets at Bab Zuweila gives the best rooftop view of the old city. It joins on to Khan el-Khalili, so the two work as one long afternoon and evening on foot.

Twenty-two royal mummies moved here from Tahrir Square in 2021, and the Royal Mummies Hall is kept dim and cool with each one displayed on its own. The museum sits in Fustat in Old Cairo, a few minutes from the Coptic quarter, so the two make an easy morning together. Photography is restricted in the mummies hall. Two hours is enough.

The 1901 museum on Tahrir Square still holds a very large collection of antiquities, though the Tutankhamun pieces have moved to the Grand Egyptian Museum and the royal mummies to Fustat. What remains is dense, old-fashioned and lightly labelled, which some visitors prefer. Worth a half day if you are staying in central Cairo.

The Saladin Citadel sits on a spur of the Muqattam hills, and the Mosque of Muhammad Ali inside it is the silhouette you see from across Cairo. The terrace outside gives the widest view of the city, with the pyramids visible on a clear day. Cover your head and shoulders for the mosque. Two hours, and it pairs with Islamic Cairo.

Coptic Cairo is a small walled quarter of churches, a synagogue and a museum, all within a few minutes of each other on foot. The Hanging Church, built over a Roman gate, and Ben Ezra Synagogue are the ones people come for. It is quiet, shaded and free of traffic. An hour or two, and the metro drops you at the gate.

Feluccas are the small lateen-sailed boats that have worked this stretch of the Nile for centuries, and Aswan is the best place to take one because the river widens around granite islands here. An hour at sunset past Elephantine and Kitchener's Island is the standard trip. Boats are hired whole rather than per seat, so it suits a group.

Philae was taken apart and rebuilt stone by stone on Agilkia Island in the 1970s after the High Dam raised the water. You reach it by motorboat from a jetty south of Aswan, which is half the appeal. The temple is dedicated to Isis and stayed in use into the Roman period. Half a morning including the boat, and there is a show after dark.

The Nubian villages on the west bank and on Elephantine Island are painted in deep blues and ochres, and families open their houses for tea and a meal. Elephantine is part of the Nubian Monuments World Heritage listing and has its own ruins and a small museum. A public ferry crosses from the corniche. Half a day from Aswan.

The temple of Horus at Edfu is the most complete temple left in Egypt, roof intact and reliefs sharp, because sand buried it for centuries. It sits between Luxor and Aswan, which makes it a standard morning halt on a Nile cruise. By road it is about two hours from Luxor. An hour inside is plenty.

Kom Ombo is built symmetrically for two gods at once, Sobek the crocodile and Horus the Elder, with a mirrored pair of entrances and sanctuaries. A small museum next door holds mummified crocodiles found nearby. It stands right on the riverbank north of Aswan, so cruise boats tie up at the steps. Under an hour.

Chalk pillars weathered into mushroom and animal shapes cover the White Desert, and the usual trip is an overnight in a simple camp with dinner cooked over a fire. Bahariya Oasis is the base, about five hours by road from Cairo, and operators run 4x4 tours from there. Nights are cold even in summer, so take a jacket.

Safaris out of Hurghada bundle quad bikes, sandboarding down a dune and dinner at a Bedouin camp into one late afternoon and evening. Nothing about it is remote or hard going, which is the point if you have children along. Longer overnight versions run further into the Eastern Desert. Book through your hotel a day ahead.

The climb starts around 2 am from St Catherine's so you reach the summit before first light. The camel path is the gentler way up and the 3,750 steps the harder one, and most people go up by one and down the other. St Catherine's Monastery at the base opens in the morning and is worth the wait. A guide is required and it is properly cold at the top.

Known For : Siwa Salt Lakes Shali Fortress Cleopatra Spring

Siwa lies far out towards the Libyan border, roughly ten hours by road from Cairo, and it feels separate from the rest of the country, with its own Berber language and the mud-brick ruins of Shali at its centre. You can float in the salt lakes much as you would in the Dead Sea, swim at Cleopatra Spring and take a 4x4 into the Great Sand Sea. Give it three days.

Best Time: Oct - Apr

5 Attractions

Known For : Blue Hole of Dahab Kitesurfing in Dahab Blue Lagoon

Dahab is a low-rise town on the Sinai coast where the diving starts a short walk from the cafes on the seafront. The Blue Hole, a deep sinkhole in the reef ten minutes north, is the famous site, and there is safe shallow snorkelling around its rim. Prices are lower than Sharm and the pace is slower. Easy to stay a week.

Best Time: Apr-May, Sep-Oct

17 Dahab Attractions

Koshari, a bowl of rice, lentils, macaroni and fried onions under a sharp tomato sauce, is the national dish and it costs very little. Ful medames and taameya, the local falafel made from fava beans, are what people eat for breakfast. There is plenty here for vegetarians, and the shawarma and mixed grills are good if you eat meat.

The modern library on Alexandria's corniche is a tilted disc facing the sea, opened in 2002 near where the ancient one is thought to have stood. The main reading room steps down eleven levels under a single roof, and there are small museums of antiquities and manuscripts inside. An hour or two, on a day trip from Cairo.

A three-level Roman tomb cut about thirty metres into the rock at Alexandria, reached by a spiral staircase that once lowered bodies on ropes. The carving mixes Egyptian gods with Roman dress, which is what makes it worth the detour. It is cool underground, a relief in summer. Under an hour, and it pairs with Pompey's Pillar nearby.

Faiyum is a farming depression about two hours southwest of Cairo, built around Lake Qarun. The waterfalls at Wadi El Rayan and the whale fossils at Wadi Al Hitan, a World Heritage site, are the reasons to make the trip. Roads are rough in places, so go with a driver rather than driving yourself. A long day out of Cairo.

Night tours run out of Hurghada into the desert once it is properly dark, far enough from the resort strip that the Milky Way is visible. Most include a telescope, a guide who knows the sky and tea at a camp. It is a short evening of three or four hours and works well on a day you have already been diving.

Tanoura is the Egyptian version of the whirling dervish dance, performed to flutes and drums by dancers in weighted, brightly coloured skirts. Wekalet El Ghouri, a restored medieval merchants' inn near Al-Azhar, is the usual venue and shows run a few evenings a week. It lasts about an hour. Arrive early, seating is limited.

Every neighbourhood in Cairo has its own ahwa, a plain cafe where people sit out on the pavement over mint tea, Turkish coffee and a shisha pipe. It is the ordinary evening in Egypt rather than a sight, and nobody minds if you only order tea. El Fishawy in Khan el-Khalili is the tourist version and still worth one visit.