From Tourist to Traveller – Experience Egypt by Bike and Ship

In February 2025, Michael joined a journey that had never been done before: the first boat and bike tour through Egypt. From the Nile to the Pyramids, from ancient temples to lively city streets, he traveled through a country where every stone seems to hold a story. This is his personal report of a warm, intense and unforgettable journey — one that begins as a vacation, but slowly becomes something much deeper.

“Tourists compare. Travelers experience.”

“There is a difference between tourists and travelers,” our Egyptian tour leader and experienced Egyptologist, “Magic” Maged, tells us during our final bus ride through Cairo, his voice crackling over the bus speakers.

It is February 17; the roads are busy, and it’s 95 degrees Fahrenheit in the hot desert sun. Cairo stretches out around us: a modern, sand-colored metropolis of broad roads, apartment blocks, palm trees, mosques, desert, traffic, and life.

And then, suddenly, there they are, as they’ve stood for 4,500 years… the Pyramids of Giza.

The first sight of Giza

Not so long ago, the mighty Nile still flowed right up to the foot of the Sphinx. But since the construction of the Aswan High Dam, the river has been tamed. Giza is now a dry, guarded plateau, one of the true wonders of the world… the culmination of almost two weeks of traveling along the Nile by ship and by bike.

As a “tourist,” you take the selfies and group photos. But as a “traveler,” this experience gives you something more: a deeper understanding of the country, its people, its culture, its beliefs and its history.

“A tourist compares,” says Maged. “Travelers don’t compare. They experience.”

And during these two weeks, we’ve become not only travelers, but pioneers. We’ve completed the very first bike-and-boat holiday in Egypt.

From winter to the Red Sea

My journey began in an icy February. From snow and cold, I stepped off the plane into 85 degrees F of sunshine and sand at Hurghada Airport. A kind man with glasses met me at customs and arranged my travel visa without any trouble. I withdrew some Egyptian pounds for tips, and the man escorted me straight to my hotel for the next two nights in El Gouna: a gated resort community where motor yachts bob in a bright blue marina on the Red Sea, along a lovely promenade filled with restaurants.

Our beautiful hotel featured a courtyard full of palm trees, a seaside swimming pool and a restaurant offering many delicious things.

These first few days are mainly for rest and getting acquainted, and serve as a warm-up for the journey ahead. We cycled through El Gouna on a Friday, a day of prayer. It felt like a ghost town – a world of difference from Esna and Luxor and everything that would follow. Still, there is a feeling in my gut pulling me westward… toward the Nile Valley.

On the third day, our luggage is collected by the bus after breakfast, and together we drive through the bleak Eastern Desert – where the internet can no longer reach us – toward Qina. We first glimpse the famous River Nile, the source of life in Egypt, from a beautiful bridge. Following a tasty lunch, we visit our first temple: Dendera.

The temple of Dendera

The Temple of Hathor at Dendera lies on the western bank of the Nile, not far from Qina. In ancient Egypt, the west was considered the land of the dead, the realm of Osiris. The domain of the endless desert, the west was where the sun set, and where the people – rich or poor – buried their dead in great cemeteries.

Our trip is not only a physical journey through Egypt’s geography and history, but through its ancient religion as well – and it starts at Dendera. This impressive temple’s beautiful columns and ceilings are covered with remarkable inscriptions and restored drawings. It is the sanctuary of Hathor, the goddess of fertility.

Stories whispered by the walls

Every temple is an education. Through their whisper devices, the Egyptologists literally whisper into our ears the ancient stories told by the walls, and where in history these temples belong: from the Old Kingdom to Cleopatra.

On the back wall of the temple complex of Dendera, an expansive carving shows Cleopatra and her son Caesarion, the son of Julius Caesar, making offerings to the gods.

Without the fascinating stories told by our Egyptologists, you would miss the context that makes these ruins so unique. Yes, you are exploring temple after temple, pyramid after pyramid… but without the stories behind them, each monument is just a pile of stones.

Cycling through Luxor

The city of Luxor itself is chaotic, redolent with the smell of gasoline. Stray dogs cross the road, children on donkeys pass us at roundabouts, and motorcycles and old cars rattle across the pavement. But everyone is cheerful when they meet us. “Welcome to Luxor!” they shout. With our entourage of security, tour leaders and the van following us with water and snacks, we imagine ourselves in the Tour de France. And in the way children along the roadside greet us – waving and giving us high-fives when we stop.

While Egypt is a tolerant, secular nation, we hear the calls to Islamic prayer echoing over tinny loudspeakers throughout the country. Riding on the highways, security assists us, and our tour leaders make sure the cars pass us safely and give us enough space. It is hot, every day, but the wind on the bike is cool. And Luxor’s surrounding lands are beautifully green.

Stopping at a small monastery by the roadside, we are given a little bottle of blessed olive oil as a gift. And then: Karnak, the most impressive temple complex we will visit… my favorite.

Karnak, the largest ancient temple complex in the world

The site is large and sprawling. We park our bicycles among the big tourist buses and walk into the largest ancient temple complex in the world. Acres of ruins and a “sacred” lake. An open-air museum with temples, obelisks, pillars, and incredible columned halls. Much history is “whispered” to us by our guides, but I am often too busy with my camera to hear them. There is just so much beauty to capture here.

Among the obelisks of Hatshepsut and statues of Ramses II, there is also a scarab on a pedestal. They say that if you walk around it seven times counterclockwise, it brings good luck. I am not superstitious, but I still clocked my laps.

It is so warm that I sometimes forget it is only February… an extra piece of summer. In the afternoon, we arrive on our bikes at the somewhat smaller, but no less impressive, Luxor Temple. On either side of the entrance stand the largest statues of Ramses II, and, in front of them, a great obelisk. About four years ago, walking around the Place de la Concorde in Paris, I saw its brother. Now I was standing in the place from which that one had been taken.

The modern city of Luxor occupies the site of Thebes – a former capital of ancient Egypt – and within it sit the temple complexes of both Karnak and Luxor. What catch my eye are the statues of the young Tutankhamun and his bride; the cartouche of Alexander the Great on the inner sanctuary walls. All bear witness to thousands of years of history.

Cycling through the real Egypt

The most beautiful cycling days were not always the ones with the most famous sights. Often, they were the stretches in between.

We rode through the Luxor countryside, along the Nile, over roads never before opened to tourists. Past villages, date palms and green fields, we made our way south. We saw men working, children playing, animals along the roadside, small shops, dust, traffic, and again and again, the river nearby.

On a bike, you have time to notice these things. You are slow enough to look around, and fast enough to be surprised again and again.

Of course, cycling in Egypt is different from cycling in the Netherlands. The traffic is busier, the heat more intense, and the surroundings sometimes ask for more attention. But we were well guided. The tour leaders, security, and the support van with water and snacks made sure we could ride safely and feel well cared for.

In Egypt, I did not feel unsafe for a single moment. Not on busy roads, and not in narrow streets with vendors, though they can sometimes be persistent. It is part of traveling there: staying friendly, walking calmly, and sometimes simply ignoring things respectfully.

That, too, is part of the experience. Egypt is not polished smooth. It is lively, busy, warm, friendly, sometimes intense, and often surprising.

Sailing the Nile

The cradle of Egyptian civilization, the lifeline of the country, the River Nile. For centuries, the annual flooding of its valley provided agriculture and fertile “black earth” for a great civilization. Along this river, the granite blocks that became the Pyramids were transported northward.

But as we sit on deck, sipping drinks by the pool, we are given a break from all the history. We just sit, and breathe, and enjoy the scenery.

What a feeling! The bridge in the distance disappears behind a mist, creating a beautiful picture.

South to Aswan

In Aswan – on another very hot afternoon – we cycle over a gigantic bridge to the western side of the Nile, and stop at a hotel with beautiful views for a drink. Arriving in the Nubian villages, we visit a school for a close-up look at local life. The smiling children wonder at our bikes, while the adults hand out drinks and tell us about their teaching.

When evening falls, we cycle to the bank of the Nile to sail back across the river aboard a traditional felucca, and back to our ship. The early sunset is often the only way we notice that it is winter; after 4 pm, dusk falls quickly, and the horizon is bathed in rich colors.

The next morning, we board other boats for a cruise amidst Aswan’s gorgeous surroundings, including a nature reserve filled with birdlife. We’re dropped off in a Nubian village with a lovely market area, colorful houses, and lively, sandy streets offering beautiful views over the water. The vendors are respectful here, and guests laugh and look at every figurine and all the spices on offer.

After cycling along the desert toward the old dam of Aswan, we’re picked up by bus and taken to Aswan’s High Dam.

We end the day with a visit to an island featuring a UNESCO World Heritage Site located between Aswan’s old and new dams, known as the Nubian Monuments. Threatened by the Nile’s rising waters resulting from construction of the new Aswan High Dam in the 1960s, this remarkable site in lower Nubia was saved in 1968 by moving the monuments stone by stone and reconstructing them on a higher island, not far from their original location. An amazing international effort to preserve ancient history, explained for us by guides and historians.

The Valley of the Kings

The next morning, it is so hot that we do not travel to the Valley of the Kings by bike. Hidden in a vast sandy valley beneath a pyramid-like mountain lie great tombs that for centuries were the resting places of the kings of kings, the Pharaohs who ruled ancient Egypt, and their families. Many have been excavated, and today, the Valley of the Kings is busier than Disney. And yet, once you step inside a tomb, the noise fades. You walk down into the earth, past walls covered in colors, symbols and stories of the afterlife. The air is still. The history is close.

My favorite is the tomb of Ramses VI, emblazoned with colorful images depicting the afterlife and the reincarnation of Amun. And at the end of the tunnel stands Ramses’ great stone sarcophagus, broken into 370 pieces by looters. To enter the tomb of Tutankhamun I had to pay extra, but of course I couldn’t miss that one. It is the smallest tomb, but the most famous.

Down below stood the glass sarcophagus, and there I came face to face with the young pharaoh. Tutankhamun himself still lies in his tomb, shriveled by time, humble without his golden masks, which we will see later that week in the Grand Egyptian Museum in Cairo, where his riches, masks and family are waiting for his arrival.

This may have been the hottest day of our trip, but I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. We eventually rode our bikes down into the desert. To be among the first to cycle through the Valley of the Kings and its beautiful landscape was an unforgettable experience.

From Luxor to Cairo

After a brief flight from Luxor and a bus ride through the heart of Cairo, we exchange the luxury of the ship for a room in the beautiful Renaissance Hotel. We visit the White Mosque of Muhammad Ali, built atop the old Citadel of Saladin, to discover Egypt’s Islamic and gaze up at its magnificent domed ceiling. Breathtaking.

Cairo immediately feels like a world metropolis, and it is: multi-lane roads full of cars, fewer vendors on the streets, and, strangely, more calm.

Three days in and around Cairo, Egypt’s capital and largest city, follow. We visit old neighborhoods: Egypt’s oldest synagogue, built on the site where it’s said the infant Moses was found in his basket by the Nile, a stone’s throw away, where the Holy Family once hid from their pursuers, the Hanging Church, built on the site of Roman fort.

A journey never to be forgotten

Then, on the final day of our meaningful journey, we at last visit the Pyramids of Giza and the Sphinx. And as the cherry on top, the beautiful and brand-new Grand Museum of Cairo. I will always remember the time I spent at the foot of the Pyramids, even if it was only a walk, even if it was only one stone of these impressive structures that I was able to climb. And as for the Sphinx: you may have seen every photograph, but nothing compares to the real thing; you are truly standing there, and you somehow can’t quite believe it.

At Cairo’s new Grand Museum, we are greeted by a collosal statue of the King of Kings, Ramses II. Gathering beside the Pharaoh’s gigantic foot, we divide into our groups one last time. It is a beautiful modern museum, and one could easily spend hours wandering around. There’s a fully reconstructed Egyptian ship that you can walk around. But most impressive is, of course, the Tutankhamun wing, where all the treasures from “the boy king’s” small tomb are displayed… ceremonial daggers, chariots, enormous sarcophagi, and his splendid golden masks.

And so this first bike-and-boat holiday along the Nile and beyond came to an end. Endless history, great museums, food, accommodations and service afloat and ashore. Everything was perfectly arranged from beginning to end, with a little chaos… and a little improvisation.

Everyone was so friendly and helpful. The final dinner at our Cairo hotel was warmth and conviviality at its best.

Among couples, friends and groups, I traveled alone, often moving around by myself, camera in hand. And I noticed things differently. I took my time. Sometimes I lingered just a bit longer, waiting for that one moment to reveal itself. But not for a moment did it feel lonely. The journey was too rich for that, the group too involved and the experience too intense.

Cycling throughout Egypt is warm, sometimes challenging, but precisely because of that, it is so, so special. You ride along the green banks of the Nile, through rocky valleys and dusty villages, through busy cities where life unfolds around you, to tombs, temples and pyramids.

This is not a trip you simply “do.” It is not a list you “tick off.” It is a journey that slowly gets under your skin… through everything you see, but above all, through everything you begin to understand.

And when I think back to that first glimpse of the Pyramids, somewhere outside Cairo, I understand what “Magic” Maged meant. You can come here as a tourist, but if you allow it, you leave as a true traveler.

Inspired to experience Egypt for yourself?

Michael’s story is only one way to describe this journey. The best way to understand it is to feel the Nile breeze, stand beneath the temple columns, cycle through the green riverbanks, and see the Pyramids appear in the desert with your own eyes.

To start planning your Egypt bike and boat adventure, call us at (203) 814-1249 or send an email to info@boatbiketours.com. We’ll be happy to help you choose the right departure and answer your questions.

We’d love to welcome you on board, and perhaps see you return home not just as a tourist, but as a true traveler.