I recently visited Egypt in October 2021. It was the best time to visit because tourism was down and the sites weren’t nearly as crowded as they usually are. We spent 9 days traveling between Cairo and Aswan and saw SO MANY PLACES that you need to be sure to visit when you go to Egypt.
How to get around:
We booked our trip with Travel Talk Tours (the Jewels of the Nile). The transportation, accommodations and guide were all included in the tour, which made the trip so brainless. I didn’t have to really worry about anything!
Click to jump to the following locations:
- Sakkara
- Giza Pyramids
- Sphinx
- Philae Temple
- Abu Simbel
- Temple of Kom Ombo
- Temple of Horus at Edfu Temple
- Luxor Temple
- Valley of the Kings
- Temple of Hatshepsut
- Karnak Temple
- The Hanging Church
- Mosque of Muhammad Ali
Sakkara
- Address: V6G6+C4C, Badrshein, Giza Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 180 EGP per person ($11.50 USD per person)
- History: The Step Pyramid is the earliest monumental pyramid in Egypt! The Step Pyramid of Djoser is in fact proto-pyramid. Please note, the Step pyramid is older than the Giza pyramids. It was built by great ancient Egyptian architect Imhotep in the 27th century BC as the burial site of pharaoh Djoser.
Giza Pyramids
- Address: Al Haram, Giza Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 200 EGP per person – includes visit to Sphinx ($12.50 USD per person)
- Know Before You Go: You can’t climb on the outside of the pyramid, however, you can go inside the Great Pyramid and climb all the way to the top. Let me tell you, it is the sweatiest experience ever!
- History: The Great Pyramid of Giza is the only remaining wonder of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. And everyone wants to see the only still lasting mystery of the Ancient World. The Great Pyramid of Giza is the largest pyramid in Giza. The Great Pyramid of Giza was built as a tomb of Pharaoh Khufu.
Sphinx
- Address: Ibn Sofian, Al Haram, Giza Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 200 EGP per person – includes visit to Giza Pyramids ($12.50 USD per person)
- History: Just in front of the Pyramids in Giza stands another famous Egypt landmark – the Great Sphinx of Giza. The Great Sphinx of Giza is a statue of a mythical creature with a lion’s body and a human’s head. The Sphinx was a spiritual guardian of the Pharaon’s tomb – the pyramid. The face of the Great Sphinx in Giza is assumed to represent the face of Pharaoh Khaphre. The Great Sphinx is one of the oldest statues in the World dating back to the Old Kingdom of Egypt and the Pharaoh Khaphre times (about 2.500 BC). The Sphinx in Giza is also one of the largest statues in the World as it is 238 ft (73 m) long and 68 ft (20 m) tall.
Philae Temple
- Address: Aswan 1, Aswan Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 180 EGP per person ($11.50 USD per person)
- How to Get There: Since Philae Temple sits on an island in the Nile, you have to take a boat to get to it. There are plenty of water taxis to take you there, or if you are with a tour, they will arrange the transportation for you.
- History: Philae is unique in that it was used mostly during the Ptolomaic Dynasty – the last dynasty of ancient Egypt before it was conquered by the Romans and the ancient Egyptian religion began to give way to Christianity. The temple was dedicated to the goddess Isis (and also connected to her husband, Osiris, and son, Horus), but later was used by early Christians as a church.
Abu Simbel
- Address: Abu Simbel, Aswan Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee:
- Know Before You Go: There are two ways to get to Abu Simbel: by bus or by plane. The tour I did included a roundtrip bus to Abu Simbel from Aswan. The trip took 3.5 hours each way so it definitely made for a long day. If you are doing this trip on your own, I would suggest the flight as it is a much faster way to go.
- History: Pharaoh Ramesses II, who reigned for 66 years during Egypt’s Nineteenth Dynasty, is known as one of the greatest leaders of ancient Egypt. And I think part of this is because of all the building he did during his reign to remind people how awesome he was. You can see the marks of Ramesses II at several of Egypt’s ancient sites; and you can’t miss them since Ramesses II loved to put his own face on things. The most famous site related to Ramesses II is Abu Simbel, a pair of temples south of Aswan, not far from Egypt’s border with Sudan. The temples – The Great Temple with huge statues of Ramesses II outside and the Small Temple, dedicated to his favorite wife Nefertari – date back to the 1200s BC and are both incredible, with intricate carvings still intact inside. This is all even more impressive when you learn that both these temples were completely relocated in 1968 in order to save them from flooding by the High Dam on the Nile River. They were moved with such precision that everything looks exactly as it did before the move. They even repositioned everything so that twice a year the sun still shines through the doorway of the largest temple to illuminate statues in a room at the very back.
Temple of Kom Ombo
- Address: Nagoa Ash Shatb, Markaz Kom Ombo, Aswan Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 140 EGP per person ($9 USD per person)
- Know Before You Go: I highly recommend visiting Kom Ombu via Nile Cruise. Your boat pulls up along side the temple and you get to walk right up to the temple from the boat! Seeing it at night was also really cool.
- History: The temple of Kom Ombo is an unusual Egyptian temple since it was dedicated to two gods. In fact, it was dedicated to two rival ancient Egyptian gods: Sobek, the crocodile-headed god, and Horus, the falcon-headed god. Sobek was the god of Nile and a god of Fertility and Rebirth, while Horus was the god of Sky. The temple of Kom Ombo is a perfectly symmetrical temple with twin entrances, two hypostyle halls, twin chambers, and twin sanctuaries. The east part of the temple was dedicated to Sobek and the west part was dedicated to Horus.
The Temple of Horus at Edfu
- Address: Adfo, Edfo, Aswan Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 180 EGP per person ($11.50 USD per person)
- Know Before You Go: This is another cool site to see from a Nile Cruise. We got up at 6:45 AM so we could be the first ones at the temple and were picked up via horse drawn carriage from our boat. We were back on the boat by 9AM in time for breakfast.
- History: The Temple of Horus in Edfu is the largest temple dedicated to Horus, the falcon-headed god of Sky. Edfu is located 110 km south of Luxor and 112 km north of Aswan. The Edfu Temple was built between the 3rd and the 1st century BC and although it is not so ancient compared to other Egyptian temples, the Horus temple is one of the most impressive ancient temples in Egypt. The massive temple consisted of the colossal entrance, forecourt with 32 towering columns, the vestibule (the entrance to the inner temple) with 12 columns, the hall of consecration, hypostyle hall (the place for preparation of rituals), library, alters of the priests and the sanctuary (the room of the gods). The Library of the Edfu Temple was one of the most important and largest libraries of the Ancient World. Believe me, the Horus Temple at Edfu is one of the most remarkable ancient Egyptian monuments. It’s no secret, Horus Temple in Edfu was my favorite ancient Egyptian temple. I loved the mystical atmosphere and elegance of the temple. Please, don’t miss adding the Horus Temple in Edfu onto your Egypt bucket list! Horus was the son to Isis and Osiris, and the husband to Hathor, the Egyptian goddess of Love, Music, Beauty, and Happiness usually pictured with the cow horns and a sun disk on her head. The right eye of Horus represented the Sun and the left eye represented the Moon. The ‘Eye of Horus’ or so-called Wadjet was a powerful symbol of protection in ancient Egypt.
Luxor Temple
- Address: Luxor City, Luxor, Luxor Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 160 EGP per person ($10 USD per person)
- History: The Luxor Temple is a large Ancient Egyptian temple complex located on the east bank of the Nile River in the city today known as Luxor and was constructed approximately 1400 BCE. In the Egyptian language it was known as ipet resyt, “the southern sanctuary”. It was one of the two primary temples on the east bank, the other being Karnak. Luxor temple is dedicated to the rejuvenation of kingship; it may have been where many of the pharaohs of Egypt were crowned in reality or conceptually.
Valley of the Kings
- Address: Luxor, Luxor Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 244 EGP ($15.50 USD per person)
- Know Before You Go: Your main Valley of the Kings ticket will get you entry into any 3 of the “included” tombs that you want. (When I went, there were 9 open “included” tombs to choose from.) Some tombs – like the small tomb of Tutankhamun, the tomb of Seti I, and the tombs of Ramses V and VI – require separate entrance tickets that can range in price from 50 Egyptian pounds to 1000 Egyptian pounds (King Tut’s tomb was 200 EGP to enter when I was there).
- History: Just as I don’t think you can visit Egypt without seeing the pyramids, you also shouldn’t go without visiting the Valley of the Kings in Luxor. This is where all the famous pharaohs of ancient Egypt were interred. And, even though almost all of the tombs were looted long ago (“in antiquity,” as most of the signs will say), the carvings and paintings inside are still in-tact in most of the tombs. This is a popular place for both international and Egyptian tourists to visit, so you can expect it to be pretty busy. But, it’s such an iconic site that you should definitely still go – just go as early as you can.
Temple of Hatshepsut
- Address: Luxor, Luxor Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: 142 EGP ($9 USD per person)
- Know Before You Go: This temple is on the West Bank of the Nile in Luxor, which is in southern Egypt. It can get VERY hot here – temperatures frequently surpass 80 F in the winter, and soar above 100 F in the summer. Hatshepsut’s temple offers very little shade, so it’s recommended to visit early in the day and definitely bring a hat and water. The walk from the parking lot to the temple is also pretty long. There is a tram that will take you out to the temple for free.
- History: The Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut was one of my favorites in Egypt for two reasons. For one, it looks very different from many of the other temples there. And for two, it belonged to one of ancient Egypt’s badass boss babes! You’ve probably heard of Hatshepsut; she’s regarded as having been a very successful ruler of Egypt during the Eighteenth Dynasty, and is one of the most famous female pharaohs. But she was never meant to to rule ancient Egypt. Hatshepsut was the only child of Tutmosis I and his royal wife. Usually only children born to a pharaoh and a royal wife could rule Egypt, but back then women did not ascend the throne. In order to try to get what she felt was rightfully hers, Hatshepsut married her half-brother, Tutmosis II (son of the pharaoh and a secondary wife), who eventually took over ruling Egypt. And when Tutmosis II’s son from a secondary wife (Tutmosis III) was set to inherit as a child, Hatshepsut sent him off to military school and ruled Egypt herself.
Karnak Temple
- Address: PM92+CP3, Luxor City, Luxor, Luxor Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee:
- History: Luxor was the capital of ancient Egypt during the New Kingdom (back then it was known as Thebes), and today is regarded as basically one big open-air museum because of all the ancient temples and ruins that can be found there. The real star of the show, though, has to be the Karnak Temple Complex. You have to call Karnak a temple complex rather than just a temple because it is truly HUGE. It’s comprises temples, obelisks, columns, and other buildings dedicated to the Theban triad of Amun, Mut, and Khonsu that were constructed over the course of 2000 years throughout the Middle and New Kingdoms.
The Hanging Church
- Address: Kom Ghorab, Old Cairo, Cairo Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: Free
- History: Coptic Cairo is the heart of ancient Egyptian Christianity. The Hanging Church in Coptic Cairo is the most famous church in Egypt and the official residence of the Coptic Pope. The official name of the church is Saint Virgin Mary’s Church, but it is widely known as the Hanging Church of Cairo since it was built atop of ancient Babylon fortress gates in 690, therefore it appeared to be hanging. The church was made from ebony and additionally ornamented with ivory. One of the most prominent features of the church is the ceiling that mimics Noah’s ark. The Hanging Church holds many exquisite Coptic Orthodox icons. The oldest icon is the famous Coptic Mona Lisa Virgin Mary with Baby Jesus sitting on her lap and John the Baptist standing next to them. The church is connected to several apparitions of the Virgin Mary.
Mosque of Muhammad Ali
- Address: Al Abageyah, El Khalifa, Cairo Governorate, Egypt
- Entrance Fee: Free
- History: The Great Mosque of Muhammad Ali Pasha or Alabaster Mosque is a mosque situated in the Citadel of Cairo in Egypt and was commissioned by Muhammad Ali Pasha between 1830 and 1848.
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