 One of the only practical ways to visit Egypt these days,
outside of arriving by air, is on a cruise ship. Sure, there
are land
routes and other possibilities, but most of these for many
visitors are not really much of an option. Many
Mediterranean Cruises visit Egypt, though we can make a distinction
to those that visit the country very casually, together with a
number of other countries, as opposed to those that provide
more in-depth tours. By casual, we mean cruises that stop in
one or only a couple of Egyptian ports for usually very short
durations of not more than a day or two, as opposed to those
that include a more complete tour. For many of the casual
tours, not much will be seen of Egypt's greatest wonders. At
best, there might be some sort of day tour to Cairo
where the Great
Pyramids of Giza
and the Egyptian
Antiquities Museum is located, and at worst, they will
perhaps include a tour of the port cities such as Alexandria
or Port Said.
Even the most extensive (extended) cruises that include
Egypt, for the most part, will fall short of more extensive
land based tours. Some of the best ocean cruises we have found
that visit Egypt may stop in Alexandria,
Port Said, Sharm
El-Sheikh and Safaga,
and may stay more than one day in each area. Technically,
these would allow for some fairly serious touring, and many do
even have extensions that include tours in Cairo,
Luxor and  various
other places, but none appear to be as extensive as most full
two week land based tours.
The cruises vary from world tours, stopping off in Egypt
but visiting many different ports, to cruises that are very
specific to Egypt.
Of course, for those who might for one reason or another be
opposed to flying these days, that may be unavoidable or
impractical in order to reach the beginning point of most such
cruises, but some do actually appear to originate in the US,
and others can be driven to in Europe.
 As can be seen, some of these cruises offer very casual
tours to Egypt, meaning that they may only stop over in one
single port, such as Alexandria.
Our reference to Casual/Extended means that they may stop over
at one port for several days, or several ports for one day.
Extended generally means that the cruises stop in several
ports for several days, allowing enough time to make somewhat
extensive visits to a number of the most important sites in
Egypt. Casual and Extended means that the cruise stops over
long enough to visit a number of Egyptian antiquities, but the
tours are apparently optional.
All of these tours will use Egyptian tour operators to
conduct their ground operations if they do tours at all. Only
licensed Egyptian guides can conduct a tour. Some, however,
may have no tours at all. Even if the cruise does offer tours,
some passengers may wish to arrange their own.  For example,
rather than spending a day touring Alexandria,
which might be offered by the cruise company, they may instead
wish to visit Cairo.
In either case, a number of our AETBI
members companies in Egypt will offer short ground tours
for those individuals who might wish to make such arrangements.
There are probably a number of smaller cruise lines that
offer cruises that are not listed here, but these appear to be
the major ones. There is a lot of variance in these cruises. A
few are world tours that make stops in Egypt, are very
expensive and take considerable time. Others are relatively
brief cruises that do a fairly good job of covering Egypt. For
example, the relatively small Hebridean Cruise line out of
Scotland has an interesting cruise known as "Along the
Frankincense Trail", that makes a number of calls at
Egyptian ports, including Alexandria,
Port Said, Sharm
El-Sheikh, and Safaga,
as well as other points in the  region. This is one of the most
extensive ocean style cruises to Egypt. They even visit places
such as St.
Catherine's Monastery in the Sinai,
as well as the monuments in Luxor
on what is a relatively short cruise. The cruise actually
originates at Rhodes. However, it is certainly not a very
inexpensive way to visit Egypt, being much more than many good
land tours. The cruise is conducted upon their small, but nice
Hebridean Spirit.
The Radisson Seven Seas seems to provide some interesting
alternatives. For example, on their tour that stops in Egypt
they have various options for some ports, even including stays
in Cairo and a visit
to Abu Simbel.
Furthermore, like a number of the other cruise lines, they
transit through the Suez
Canal. This cruise takes place on the Seven Seas Voyager,
a rather large ship with a considerable list of
amenities.
The Cunard Line is, of course, interesting because this is
the line of the Queen Elizabeth, and it is the Queen Elizabeth
2 that makes port on one of their cruises in Alexandria.
We list it as a Casual/Extended tour because it stays long
enough in Alexandria for a brief dash to Cairo
to see  the pyramids and the museum, but little time is
provided for much else. Nevertheless, we suppose that one
could probably travel all the way from the US, in one form or
another, with Cunard, finally visiting Egypt.
For many of the people we have spoken to who have taken a
cruise that included Egypt, Egypt was not the primary reason
that they took the cruise in the first place, and their
interest in making an extensive tour is somewhat limited.
Frequently they have simply asked for a bit more of a tour
than what the cruise offered. However, some of the cruise that
offer a somewhat extensive visit to Egypt might provide some intriguing
possibilities. For example several of the cruises stop at
either Alexandria
or Port Said,
before going through the Suez Canal and then stopping at
either Sharm El-Sheikh,
Safaga, or
both of these ports. It would seem conceivable that one could
exit the cruise at Alexandria, take a more extensive land tour
of Egypt, and reboard the cruise ship at Safaga, or even take
a flight from southern Egypt and reboard it at Sharm
el-Sheikh.
For example, the Seabourn cruise lands at Alexandria
and apparently travelers are than taken to Cairo,
where one could join a land tour heading further south. The
ship then goes on through the Suez
Canal and
five days later arrives in
Safaga, where
the cruise members are taken to Luxor. There, someone taking a
land tour from Cairo could meet back up with the cruise,
traveling back to Safaga with them.
At the very least though, travelers who visit Egypt by way
of an ocean cruse should understand that other possibilities
exist. Many cruise members do frequently arrange for at least
various day tours through regular ground operators in Egypt.
People like cruises, and it is easy to see why. Many short,
relatively local cruises are all inclusive and very
affordable. However, most tours that visit Egypt range in
price from what would otherwise be relatively expensive ground
tours, to very extravagant. In other words, we found very few
cruises that visit Egypt that would be what we would consider
to be budget priced compared to normal tours. Of course, most
all of these tours also visit other ports outside of Egypt,
and they are a relaxing and enjoyable way to travel.
Archives
|
