The Floating Diamond on the Nile

10 days

DAY BY DAY ITINERARY

Day 1 – Arrive Cairo

Upon arrival at Cairo International Airport, you are met by your Tour Coordinator who assists you with immigration and obtaining your luggage. You are then transferred by air-conditioned vehicle to your centrally-located hotel and assisted with check-in.

Overnight: Marriott Mena House

Day 2 – Cairo

After breakfast, your day begins with a visit of the Great Pyramids of Giza which are the only present-day survivors of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, built over 4,500 years ago as giant tombs for the mummies of the pharaohs Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure, who were father, son and grandson. The pyramids are truly monumental in scale, with the largest, Khufu’s, constructed from over two million blocks. The pyramids were not built by slaves but by Egyptian peasants, whose labor in building the pyramids paid their taxes to the Pharaoh, who also fed, clothed and housed them.

Nearby sits the enigmatic Sphinx with the body of a lion and the face of a man wearing a royal head cloth, which workers may have based on King Khafre to guard his enormous funerary monument. About a thousand years after the Sphinx was built, it was covered in sand until a young prince had a dream in which the Sphinx told him that if he cleared the sand away, he would become Pharaoh. This story is told on the Dream Stela that was placed between the Sphinx’s paws by King Tuthmose IV.

Lunch is served at a local restaurant.

This afternoon visit the pyramids of Sakkara. Sakkara is the former necropolis (cemetery) for the ancient Egyptian city of Memphis and the place where the very first pyramids were built as tombs for kings. Instead of the smooth sides featured on other pyramids, the pyramids here feature six steps on the outside, representing the pharaoh’s stepladder to heaven. Discover the famous Step Pyramid of King Zoser, the first pyramid ever built and the world’s oldest freestanding stone structure. Admire the beautiful tomb art at Sakkara, which gives great insight into the lives of the ancient Egyptians.

Overnight: Marriott Mena House

Day 3 – Cairo

After breakfast at your hotel, you are introduced to your Egyptologist and begin your tour with a visit to the Egyptian Museum of Antiquities. Exhibiting over 120,000 objects in its 107 halls, the Museum of Antiquities boasts the world’s greatest collection of Ancient Egyptian artifacts. Venture into the fascinating Mummy Room within the museum, housing eleven royal Kings and Queens of ancient Egypt, including the Great Ramses II; Egypt’s longest ruling pharaoh.

Enjoy lunch at one of Cairo’s finest restaurants.

Next, Visit Abdeen Palace, constructed in 1863 on order of Khedive Ismail as part of the plan for a modern Cairo. Inspired by the architecture coming out of Paris at the time, the plan was to have the Palace finished by the opening of the 1869 Suez Canal, but the 500 rooms weren’t completed until 1874. The Palace acted as the royal residence until the monarchy was abolished in 1952. Walk through the front archway to explore the museum which features a large collection of weapons and medals and admire the incredible architecture.

Overnight: Marriott Mena House

Day 4 – Cairo – Luxor

After a buffet breakfast at your hotel, transfer by private air-conditioned car to Cairo Airport to take your domestic flight to Luxor. Upon arrival at Luxor Airport transfer by private air-conditioned car to the Sanctuary Zein Nile Chateau. Here you are welcomed by the reception staff.

Sanctuary Zein Nile Chateau is a stunning dahabiya (traditional Egyptian sailing boat), available only for private charter.

Lunch is served on board and this afternoon you visit the East Bank, with a choice of three of the below:

Karnak Temple: Visit the Temple of Karnak, built more than a thousand years by generations of Pharaohs. The great Hypostyle Hall is an incredible forest of giant pillars, covering an area larger than the whole of Notre Dame Cathedral.
Luxor Temple: Visit the strikingly graceful Temple of Luxor dedicated to the god Amun and which was once connected to Karnak via the Avenue of Sphinxes, almost three kilometers in length. Built by Amenhotep III in 1380 BC, the site was added to by later pharaohs. The temple enjoyed many celebrations, the most important being the Festival of Opet which lasted almost a month.
Luxor Museum: Visit the informative and entertaining Luxor Museum. Displays of pottery, jewelry, furniture, statues and stelae were created by the Brooklyn Museum of New York. They include a carefully selected assortment of items from the Theban temples and necropolis. There are a number of exhibits from Tutankhamun, including a cow-goddess head from his tomb on the first floor and his funerary boats on the second floor. However, some of the real attractions include a statue of Tuthmosis III (circa 1436 BC) on the first floor, and 283 sandstone blocks arranged as a wall from the ninth pylon of the Karnak Temple.
Sound & Light Show in Karnak Temple: Attend the Sound and Light Show at Karnak Temple, a fascinating walking tour through the history of the world’s largest-ever temple complex, narrated by the voices of the pharaohs. Shadows play off the enormous columns in the grand Hypostyle Hall, creating a mysterious effect.

Both afternoon tea and dinner are served on board.

Overnight: Sanctuary Zein Nile Chateau in Luxor

Day 5 – Valley of the Kings & West Bank of Luxor

After breakfast on board explore the Valley of the Kings, a vast City of the Dead where magnificent tombs were carved into the desert rocks, decorated richly and filled with treasures for the afterlife by generations of Pharaohs.

Visit to the West Bank, with a choice of three from the below:

Valley of the Queens: There are between 75 and 80 tombs in the Valley of the Queens, or Biban al-Harim. These belong to Queens of the 18th, 19th and 20th Dynasties. It is called the Place of Beauty by the Egyptians and is where the pharaohs’ wives and children were buried.
Hatshepsut Temple: Rising out of the desert plain in a series of brilliant white terraces, the Mortuary Temple of Queen Hatshepsut merges with the sheer limestone cliffs that surround it. Forming a natural rock amphitheater, the temple was an important religious and funerary site.
Valley of Workers (Deir El Medina): Visit the remains of the self-contained village on the West Bank where the workmen who built the kings’ and queens’ tombs lived in mud brick houses with their families. The site gives archeologists a view of how urban people lived in ancient Egypt. You can also visit the tombs that the workmen created for themselves. Nearby is the Temple of Deir El Medina, from Ptolemaic times.
Tombs of the Nobles: On the West Bank sit 400 tombs of Theban aristocrats, some of which you can enter. The tomb walls were white-washed and painted with murals of the nobles’ daily lives, making them quite different from royal tombs, where relief work focused on judgment and resurrection. Since the tombs were not sealed, some have deteriorated.
Medinet Habu: The magnificent Medinet Habu is a series of temples built by the Pharaoh Ramses III (1182-1151 BC) and second only to Karnak Temple in size and complexity. The most impressive is the Mortuary Temple of Ramses III, decorated with relief work depicting his many military victories. With its massive mud brick enclosure that held storehouses, workshops, administrative offices, and residences of priests and officials, Medinet Habu grew into a city that maintained its population well into Coptic times.
Ramesseum Temple: The Ramesseum, the Mortuary Temple of Ramses II, was built early in the great pharaoh’s reign and was 20 years in the making. Here you’ll see the broken, awesome Colossus of Ramses II, a 1000-ton statue in which the fingers alone are over one meter long; it inspired the famous poem Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley. This great temple reportedly rivaled the wonders of Ramses II’s temple at Abu Simbel.

Lunch and then Afternoon Tea are both served on board whilst you sail to Esna.

Once you reach Esna, visit the Greco-Roman Temple of Khnum. The beautifully preserved Great Hypostyle Hall was built during the reign of the Roman Emperor Claudius; it was excavated from the silt that had accumulated through centuries of annual Nile floods and is about nine meters below present-day street level.

Overnight: Sanctuary Zein Nile Chateau in Esna

Day 6 – Edfu Temple

Enjoy breakfast on board and then explore the largest and best-preserved Pharaonic – albeit Greek-built – temple in Egypt, the extraordinary Temple of Horus at Edfu.

Take lunch and afternoon tea on board with the afternoon at leisure. Dinner can also be enjoyed on board.

Overnight: Sanctuary Zein Nile Chateau in Edfu

Day 7 – Selsela

Breakfast is served as you sail to Selsela. The ancient Egyptian site is about 26 miles south of Edfu,14 miles north of Kom Ombo and is located in an area where the River Nile narrows. It was known in ancient times as Khenu (Place of Rowing) and here, the bedrock changes from limestone to sandstone. This is the border of the Egyptian region of Nubia, and in ancient times, Egyptians believed that the Nile originated here.

Lunch is available on board as you continue sailing to Kom Ombo.

Afternoon tea and dinner are also served on board.

Overnight: Sanctuary Zein Nile Chateau in Kom Ombo

Day 8 – Kom Ombo & Aswan

Following breakfast, visit Kom Ombo. In this Ptolemaic temple shared by two gods – Sobek and Horus the Elder – everything is duplicated symmetrically, with double hallways, doors and chambers.
Sail to Aswan as you tuck into lunch on board.
You have the choice of two of the below visits in Aswan, followed by a trip to the Spice Market.

Philae Temple: According to the Ancient Egyptians, the goddess Isis traveled all over Egypt gathering her husband Osiris’s remains after he was cut to pieces by his evil brother. On Philae Island, where she found his heart, the Egyptians built a sacred temple to Isis, goddess of purity, sexuality, nature and protection. During the building of the High Dam, Philae Island was submerged by water, so UNESCO helped transport the temple complex to nearby Agilika Island, where you see it today.
Unfinished Obelisk: Visit this massive obelisk, which was abandoned in Aswan’s Northern Quarry when a crack was found as it was being carved from the red granite. Tools left behind show how builders accomplished such great work.
Kalabsha Temple: The Temple of Kalabsha (also Temple of Mandulis) is an Ancient Egyptian temple that was originally located at Bab al-Kalabsha (Gate of Kalabsha), approximately 50 kilometers south of Aswan. The temple was situated on the west bank of the Nile River, in Nubia and was originally built around 30 BC during the early Roman era.

This afternoon, visit the Spice Market and this evening, enjoy dinner on board

Overnight: Sanctuary Zein Nile Chateau in Aswan.

Day 9 – Aswan – Cairo

Check out after breakfast and transfer to the airport where you board your return flight to Cairo via Aswan.

Transfer to to your hotel.

Dinner tonight is at one of Egypt’s finest restaurants on the River Nile; Pier 88 Nile River offers Italian fine dining set within the renowned Imperial Boat, on the banks of the river. Chef Giorgio Diana has received two Michelin stars for his Mediterranean menus which mix the traditional with the contemporary. The set menus with wine pairings provide a creative tasting that really spoil the senses.

Overnight: The Four Seasons Hotel

Day 10 – Cairo

After breakfast at your hotel, transfer with your Tour Coordinator to Cairo Airport for your onward flight.

The Floating Diamond on the Nile

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