Private overnight Tour from Luxor to Abu Simbel

Really enjoyed visiting Philea and Abu Simbel, but an awful lot of travelling in a minibus for what essentially was 2 hours at both sites.

We were collected from our hotel at 7am, we reached Aswan around 1pm with no rest stops along the way, we were herded onto the boat for Philea island and after a 10 minute talk from the guide, were left to look around for around 45 mins, we were then herded back onto the boat to be taken back to Aswan.

After a drive back to the town during which we endured constant pressure to book other trips around Aswan that afternoon for extra money, we were taken to an perfume/essential oils shop, where were were given a small drink and a talk on the process, then the inevitable hard sell to buy some oils obviously a kick back for the guide We were then dropped off at our hotel which we had to book and pay for separately around 3:30pm.

The next morning we had a 4:30am start and another 4 1/2 hour drive down to Abu Simbel, which was amazing, but after a 5 minute talk from the guide they are not allowed in the temples, we were only given an hour to look round on our own, nowhere near long enough. We then got back on the minibus for the 4 hour drive back to the Aswan high dam, 15 minutes there with not very good views of the dam, then back in the minibus for the 6 hour drive back to our hotel in Luxor.

The only proper food we had was the breakfast box our hotel had provided, as we were leaving before breakfast started and were only offered water at the beginning of each day luckily we had taken our own drinks The only food the guide offered was a bag of bananas and oranges from a roadside stall.

This was not a 'private' trip as we were joined by another guest who had clearly been sold this trip whilst on another trip with Luxor Travels, and to add insult to injury, we discovered they had only paid 70 for it, not the 182 we had been charged.

In short, if it had not been for the amazing sights at Philea and Abu Simbel, I would not recommend this trip at all and I'm sure a coach trip would have been cheaper, more comfortable and we would have been better looked after. A real shame as this could have been a really memorable trip with better transportation and food/comfort breaks.

This was another incredible experience, getting to see the temples around Aswan, the High and Old dam, and the temples at Abu Simbel. Our guide, Omar, was excellent, a joy to hang around with and was very helpful and accommodating to the things we wanted, for example, they drove us to the airport in Aswan as requested instead of taking us back to Luxor, and arranging lunch for us even though it wasn't part of the tour. Omar offered us to add more onto the tour which included temples at Edfu and a Nubian Village in Aswan, which were also well worth the small amount of money they cost. Now is the time to go as there are very few tourists around, we even had some sites all to ourselves which was a pleasure not having to deal with hordes of people. Everything is very safe as there is security everywhere, the food is excellent, and the accommodations were very comfortable. I highly recommend taking this very interesting tour!

This was my first trip to Egypt and I wanted to check out all the major sights. I booked a few tours with Luxor Travels and thought all of them were really great. My guide Omar and driver picked me up on time and I learnt a lot of Egyptian history from them. If you are thinking about going to Egypt then you should visit Luxor and Abu Simbel and I thoroughly recommend Luxor Travels.