Egypt on our own
 

I'm planning our trip to Egypt in February. I've seen some great reports (like the one by welltraveledbrit). But the question that is bugging me is: Is there a level of "agency" that will solely arrange guides/drivers?

By this I mean, I've made my international flight arrangements. I've got a pretty good sense of where we want to go when. The internal flights seem easy enough to book online. Likewise hotels can be booked on line. I only need a single contact that will arrange a driver/guide and take care of the other ground logistics?

The guide/travel planner we used in Cairo would likely do that - although you may also want to explore booking hotels/flights with him. I found his hotel rates cheaper than what I could get online

Ahmed Hamid Yousif

[email protected]

Link to our blog

http://lizandrichardsa.typepad.com/l...8_adv/b_cairo/

Thank you. I'll send him a note...I've been having trouble getting any response from some others

We just returned from Egypt last week and did just what you are planning. I booked all our flights with miles and hotels with points and used a local agency, Djed, who provided us with drivers, guides and a Dahabiya cruise. We were the only guests on board! We were able to customize our itinerary and daily timing was flexible since it was a private tour, not with a group.

I would love to try to see what Djed could offer but I've emailed Djed 5 times in the last week, no response. In fact the only company of the 4 I've email that even responded was Lady Egypt.

There is an American woman who has lived in Egypt for about 15 years. She has her own travel agency and does a great job for folks.

Note: I lived in Egypt for several years and so never used her personally, but I have met her and have talked to people who have used her. All responses were very positive.

Her Fodor's name is Casual Cairo, and her company is called Casual Cairo Detours.
http://casualcairo.com/

Yes, Casual Cairo is another of the recommended services I have emailed multiple times without any response. Thank you.

jannan - that's unusual. I'll see if I can contact and check on things.

Yes, I highly recommend Ahmed Yousiff as well. You will love him. I recommended him to Liz. Work those numbers until you get a price you are comfortable with. He's funny, lively; you will call him your friend at the end of the trip!

Jannan,
So glad the trip report was useful.
I'm so sorry you are having trouble getting a reply from Djed and others, very frustrating, it may be people take their holidays in August! I found they took a while with the original proposal but replied quickly after that. It was the most personalized of the replies we got and I contacted all the agencies mentioned here.
Any if the agencies will give you a guide/ car only option but we found that they could get us better rates at the hotels than I could get online so we had them book it all.

Good luck, Egypt is an amazing destination and it's fab to visit without the crowds

The internet started working again, I've heard from several people!

@welltraveledbrit: yes your report has been very helpful. While we enjoy seeing the history, our fear is getting "temple fatigue" like we had elsewhere. We're trying to space out visit to ruins with other options.

I got such wonderful help from this site before our trip to Egypt. After reading Elizabeths report I too contacted Ahmid Yousif Yousif. He arranged everything. Hotels flights-cruise on Nile. I even had a time share of my own in the middle & he arranged the transportation from Luxor to Huraghada. We went to Jordan & Alexandria. OUr guide made sure we were checked in at each ariport-there was never a problem with bags weighing too much. It was truely a trip of a life time. Please say hi to him from Chris & Don if you use him
Have fun
chris

Jannan,
I've only just seen your reply as BeniciaChris topped the thread. Have you decided on an itinerary?


I understand your concern about temple fatigue but I have to say I had less temple fatigue than we had in places like Angkor or Bagan, I think it was because we'd learnt a lot more about Egypt before we went and because the quality of the guiding in Egypt is generally very high. The dahabiya down the Nile is a perfect way to slow things down and it gives you time to recoup while still seeming something.

Here's a link to all of our Egypt posts if it's of interest to anyone else.

http://www.somuchmoretosee.com/search/label/Egypt