Alyssa
2024-02-26
5
1) As a solo female traveler traveling to Egypt 2) during a time when there’s war in the region and 3) hearing from others about aggressive sales tactics and harassments at touristy areas, I wanted to make sure I pick a good tour agency to travel with. I reached out to numerous agencies and decided to go with Egypt United Tours (EUT) because of their quick response, patiently working with me to customize my itinerary, and the professionalism from the team, specifically from Athar and Hamad, the CEO.
When I called EUT I made sure to let them know that I enjoy learning and I want a knowledgeable guide. Sherif, who was my tour guide for the 10 days, is an Egyptologist and is very well-versed in Ancient Egypt. It’s no wonder because he’s been a tour guide for 16 years!
I typically join group tours to cut cost and to meet new people, so this trip was my first private tour experience as a solo traveler. Some benefits are that you get to customize your itinerary - for example, I asked if I could check out Valley of the Queens and Sherif was able to check with the company very quickly and arrange to take me (I just had to cover the additional cost). If I’m too tired I can take things out of the itinerary and just take it easy or switch to a less strenuous activity, which Sherif would be happy to suggest alternatives. The itinerary works well for solo travelers - I enjoyed sitting on the sun deck for hours reading my book with beautiful views along the Nile River. Ancient Egypt is fascinating and there’s so much to see and so much to do. Sherif will also check in on me and make himself available in case any issues arise, and he is keen to show Egyptian hospitality and will invite you to sit at local cafes trying local tea, mango juice and shisha. I appreciate nice videos and photos for my Instagram account and Sherif has a good eye to point out good photo spots and helped me take nice photos and videos too! I also appreciated how Sherif would help manage the sales people so I didn’t have to experience a lot of the aggressive selling. Having a local guide definitely helps with this! Lastly, there’s no standard itinerary that they try to push to you for commission or anything like that. If there was something I was less interested in, Sherif tried to understand my preferences and made recommendations based on it and it was up to me to decide what works best.
I went on a 10 day trip with EUT (including a 5D4N Nile Cruise) and at an initial glance, the quote was much higher than what another agency provided. Sherif took time to go through the 2 itineraries with me to understand the differences and I saw how EUT’s itinerary covered more sites and had better quality hotels and cruise. It’s good to raise this with the agency before you decide on which one to use if you’re receiving multiple quotes - they can help point out the differences or make it more competitive.
Despite that, because it was something I had raised, Hamad went out of his way to offer to cover the entrance fees and additional activities to make his quote extremely competitive. All the tour guides and guests has access to Hamad the CEO, so if I had any concerns it would be addressed quickly. I also decided to add a trip to Abu Simbel on Feb 22nd for the Sun Festival. Athar and Hamad were very thoughtful to help adding a complimentary day use at the hotel in Aswan so that I can rest coming back from an 8 hour round trip ride in the wee hours of the morning.
Attending the Sun Festival is not for the faint hearted and it takes good preparation from the agency to succeed in getting into the temple while the sun is still on the face of the statues inside the temple. Thanks to the small details - finding a good driver (thank you Hossam!) who’s able to drive safely but will hustle to get ahead of other cars/buses, purchasing the ticket online ahead of time so we don’t have to wait in line, and help with navigating through the massive crowds and being firm on others trying to cut in front of me - all of this contributed to me having the chance to get into the temple just in time!
The airport assist at immigration and pick ups (thank you Tamer for your hospitality and kindness) and transition between cruise to hotel and from site to site were seamless because they have local teams and contacts at each city which are arranged ahead of time to ensure that their guests don’t experience the hiccups and long wait. All in all it’s been an amazing experience with EUT.
I didn’t feel unsafe in Egypt and unfortunately because of the war, many tourists have canceled their trips, but it also means less crowd for me at the monuments during my time here and it was great!
Some tips: I would recommend discussing with EUT on including entrance fees in the initial quote so it’s one less thing you have to worry about during your vacation and they can also purchase tickets online for you.
