Cairo to Luxor cruises return after two decades
Chris Moss finds cause for celebration as he joins the first British tourists for two decades to sail the Nile from Cairo to Luxor
After 20 years, it is once again possible to book a Nile 'long cruise' between Cairo and Luxor
We were a mile south of Beni Suef, about a
third of the way between Cairo and Luxor, when I grasped the meaning of a
Nile cruise. The early morning haze that had swathed Cairo in a smoggy
sadness and obscured my first sighting of the pyramids had the opposite
effect here. It softened the harsh sunlight and turned the riverbank –
busy with families gathering onions and potatoes and loading donkeys
with hefty sheaths of watercress – into an Impressionist painting.
Wider than on previous days, the river rippled like an inland sea while
long meanders promised ever-changing vistas. So soon after dawn it was
mesmerising. There was symbolic meaning in the quiet, too. Our ship, the
MS Hamees, was entering a section of the river that has been almost
entirely closed to tourist traffic for much of the past two decades.
In the Nineties members of the Gama’a al-Islamiyya Islamist group fired
at tourist vessels and in 1997 the group killed 62 people, mainly
tourists, at the site of Deir el-Bahari in Luxor. The Arab Spring in
2012 and ensuing chaos following the election of Mohamed Morsi made
policing the river a low priority. Even when visitors continued to pour
into Aswan and the southern section of the Nile, the 420 nautical miles
between Cairo in the north and Luxor farther south were considered off
limits.
The Denderah Temple Complex
“It was operating well until 1991,” said David Pattison, head of
product and marketing for Voyages Jules Verne, which has been
instrumental in its reopening. The middle section of the Nile remained
closed “because no one did anything about it, even though the rest of
Egypt was doing really well”.
It reopened briefly in 2013 until a change was made to Foreign Office advice. “Passengers sailed the long cruise in April and May and we had strong forward bookings for the autumn, which we had to cancel.”
Now, the so-called “long cruise” from Cairo to Luxor is possible again. “We wrote letters to the British embassy in Cairo and the Ministry of Tourism in Egypt,” said Pattison. That lobbying, in tandem with some from its local agent Traveline, saw the Cairo to Luxor route reopen on November 26 last year. The long cruise is outselling others on the Nile, including the popular Luxor to Aswan route.
• Highlights of a Nile river cruise: in pictures
That said, visitor numbers to Cairo remain at rock bottom. “Good for you but not for us,” said Bassem, our guide, as we left the city’s empty Egyptian Museum just before closing time. I had had the luxury of sharing Tutankhamun’s famous death mask with no more than a dozen other visitors. Even at Giza I had some quiet time walking around the base of the Great Pyramid and was able to see the Sphinx free from queues.
Tahrir Square has been sanitised and emptied of protesters. But elsewhere, Cairo was comfortingly hectic: cars bouncing off each other, gimcrack apartments ubiquitous, the pavements crammed with bakers, grocers and spice, shisha, egg and pet sellers, and every other kind of shop. If the museum and the excursion to Giza served as crammer classes on Egyptology, the city was like a sensory storm before the calm of the Nile.
Built in 2001 and fully refurbished in 2008, the Hamees is one of the largest and most luxurious vessels on the river. Its shallow bottom allows it to cruise (in season) on the river’s shallower sections. Its décor is a mix of old-school polished wood and metalwork fixtures and fittings, and there is satellite TV and Wi-Fi. Cabins feature proper baths, powerful showers and soft Egyptian cotton sheets on the king-size beds.
Ship life followed an orderly pattern of disembarkation, dining and afternoon tea, oiled by the professional Egyptian crew. I gravitated to the panoramic sun deck with its small pool and shaded tables and loungers. Passengers came and went, ordering coffee and, later, cocktails as we drifted past small towns punctuated by farms.
Egypt is a desert nation and most of its 82 million citizens live close to the river. The Nile valley is no wilderness; rather a single, well-ordered, expertly irrigated farm that goes on forever.
During his time on MS Hamees, Chris Moss found that long meanders on the Nile provided ever-changing vistas
Each day brought with it a major site, or two. We saw the mud-brick pyramid of Amenemhet III at Hawara and the stepped pyramid at Meidum. Exploring the remains of the ancient town of Ashmunein we saw Thoth, the god of equilibrium and law – represented by a giant baboon – close to the ruins of a Ptolemaic church where there was graffiti in Greek. We visited tombs and catacombs where we scanned the hieroglyphic “CVs” of Egyptian nobles and priests.
The sites of the reopened section are smaller, quieter and more personalised and would be otherwise almost impossible to reach. They include Tuna el-Gebel (the necropolis of the city of Hermopolis, sacred to Hermes), the former capital Tel el Amarna (built by pharaoh Akhenaten), Beni Hassan, Abydos and Denderah.
As well as being chock-full of factual detail (how those dynasties add up) tours thankfully allowed for time to absorb the sites and scenes. I began to make sense of the divine falcons, ibises, cows and cobras and decided that Anubis – the jackal-headed protector of the dead – was my favourite deity.
• Nile cruises: the river where time stands still
I particularly liked the sites associated with the pharaoh Akhnaten. I saw Philip Glass’s eponymous opera in the Eighties and had found the story of Akhnaten’s attempt to introduce monotheism into Egypt beguiling. After all, the god he chose – the sun – could be a cruel force as well as a life-giver, and why would people want just one god when they already had dozens?
We visited Amarna, the site of Akhnaten’s glorious new capital. In his spacious tombs there were well-crafted reliefs showing how the sun’s rays came with a helping hand and an ankh – a cross with a handle symbolising life. But down in the valley below was just sand, sand and more sand – and the fearsome heat of the sun god. Two stumpy pillars were all that remained of the new city. If everyone has at least one Ozymandias moment when touring Egypt’s ancient ruins, this was mine.
A wall in Abydos, one of the oldest cities of Ancient Egypt
Life on board was suitably pharaonic, particularly at meal times when we dined on lavish feasts. Those featuring Ottoman fare: cumin-scented lamb kebabs, grilled Nile perch, tahini salad, falafel and freshly prepared pitta served with eggplant dip and peppery hummus proved particularly popular. Alcohol isn’t included in the fare but the excellent Omar Khayyam dry red wine from Alexandria was inexpensive. One evening there was a wild dance night at which we dressed in jellabiyas – the long gowns worn by many Egyptians – and were entertained by belly dancers and musicians. The authentic and piercing arghul flute music was in its way, rather stirring.
During the 10 nights we were cruising the Nile we saw only one other cruise ship, and passed none that were Cairo-bound. Even in the larger cities the docks were either empty, or full of ageing vessels. Ibrahim Abdel Fatah, the ship’s general manager, expressed his sadness at the absence of a regular service on the Cairo-Luxor section.
“We tried to relaunch in 2013 but the [Muslim] Brotherhood took the police away from tourist operations. Now things are calmer we need to let the world know that it’s safe here again – fortunately, bookings are looking good for the next season.”
After this September’s sailings cruises resume in March 2016 and run through May, and there is, of course, always the risk of another controversial court case, another riot, another incident.
“It’s like poison in honey,” said Fatah. “One bad thing happens somewhere and people think the whole country is dangerous. Americans and Japanese stay away because their foreign offices issue warnings. During these difficult times it is the British, the Germans and French, that have carried us.”
The Sphinx with the Pyramid of Khafre in the background
During my cruise the cabins of the Hamees were partly occupied by a group of about 40 British travellers and a French group of a similar size on a rather different kind of voyage. Their tour leader claimed to have been an Egyptian “in a recent previous life”. According to one of the group’s members they toured the ancient sites absorbing energy and meditating, bonding and charging a crystal, which they threw into the Nile one morning to balance its masculine forces with some feminine ones.
The British group had no such focus. Many of the repeat visitors came for the history and archaeology. Others loved the romance of the Nile. A few just sought sunshine and a Campari and soda. The most memorable pleasures, for me, were the incidental ones. On the penultimate night, as the ship motored slowly towards Luxor, I was out on deck when the evening call to prayer, marking the end of sunset, swirled over the river. The muezzins (those who call the faithful to prayer) in the humdrum town we were passing seemed to be competing, but for musicality rather than volume, and I was sure I heard something like the cante jondo of flamenco coming from one corner of the town.
As prayers ended, darkness descended, and the moon appeared at the stern – an upturned crescent, just like the moons that top minarets. I could see Venus too, close to the horizon. The Nile was a black mirror, the peace was total. Let’s hope things stay like that, and Egypt and its great river can be filled with life again.
Voyages Jules Verne (0845 166 7003; vjv.com) operate a 10-night version of this cruise which costs from £1,745 (no single supplement). The fare also includes a private cocktail reception at the Winter Palace Hotel in Luxor, and an evening sound and light show at Luxor Temple. Departures on September 18, 2015 and resuming on March 14, 2016.
It reopened briefly in 2013 until a change was made to Foreign Office advice. “Passengers sailed the long cruise in April and May and we had strong forward bookings for the autumn, which we had to cancel.”
Now, the so-called “long cruise” from Cairo to Luxor is possible again. “We wrote letters to the British embassy in Cairo and the Ministry of Tourism in Egypt,” said Pattison. That lobbying, in tandem with some from its local agent Traveline, saw the Cairo to Luxor route reopen on November 26 last year. The long cruise is outselling others on the Nile, including the popular Luxor to Aswan route.
• Highlights of a Nile river cruise: in pictures
That said, visitor numbers to Cairo remain at rock bottom. “Good for you but not for us,” said Bassem, our guide, as we left the city’s empty Egyptian Museum just before closing time. I had had the luxury of sharing Tutankhamun’s famous death mask with no more than a dozen other visitors. Even at Giza I had some quiet time walking around the base of the Great Pyramid and was able to see the Sphinx free from queues.
Tahrir Square has been sanitised and emptied of protesters. But elsewhere, Cairo was comfortingly hectic: cars bouncing off each other, gimcrack apartments ubiquitous, the pavements crammed with bakers, grocers and spice, shisha, egg and pet sellers, and every other kind of shop. If the museum and the excursion to Giza served as crammer classes on Egyptology, the city was like a sensory storm before the calm of the Nile.
Built in 2001 and fully refurbished in 2008, the Hamees is one of the largest and most luxurious vessels on the river. Its shallow bottom allows it to cruise (in season) on the river’s shallower sections. Its décor is a mix of old-school polished wood and metalwork fixtures and fittings, and there is satellite TV and Wi-Fi. Cabins feature proper baths, powerful showers and soft Egyptian cotton sheets on the king-size beds.
Ship life followed an orderly pattern of disembarkation, dining and afternoon tea, oiled by the professional Egyptian crew. I gravitated to the panoramic sun deck with its small pool and shaded tables and loungers. Passengers came and went, ordering coffee and, later, cocktails as we drifted past small towns punctuated by farms.
Egypt is a desert nation and most of its 82 million citizens live close to the river. The Nile valley is no wilderness; rather a single, well-ordered, expertly irrigated farm that goes on forever.
During his time on MS Hamees, Chris Moss found that long meanders on the Nile provided ever-changing vistas
Each day brought with it a major site, or two. We saw the mud-brick pyramid of Amenemhet III at Hawara and the stepped pyramid at Meidum. Exploring the remains of the ancient town of Ashmunein we saw Thoth, the god of equilibrium and law – represented by a giant baboon – close to the ruins of a Ptolemaic church where there was graffiti in Greek. We visited tombs and catacombs where we scanned the hieroglyphic “CVs” of Egyptian nobles and priests.
The sites of the reopened section are smaller, quieter and more personalised and would be otherwise almost impossible to reach. They include Tuna el-Gebel (the necropolis of the city of Hermopolis, sacred to Hermes), the former capital Tel el Amarna (built by pharaoh Akhenaten), Beni Hassan, Abydos and Denderah.
As well as being chock-full of factual detail (how those dynasties add up) tours thankfully allowed for time to absorb the sites and scenes. I began to make sense of the divine falcons, ibises, cows and cobras and decided that Anubis – the jackal-headed protector of the dead – was my favourite deity.
• Nile cruises: the river where time stands still
I particularly liked the sites associated with the pharaoh Akhnaten. I saw Philip Glass’s eponymous opera in the Eighties and had found the story of Akhnaten’s attempt to introduce monotheism into Egypt beguiling. After all, the god he chose – the sun – could be a cruel force as well as a life-giver, and why would people want just one god when they already had dozens?
We visited Amarna, the site of Akhnaten’s glorious new capital. In his spacious tombs there were well-crafted reliefs showing how the sun’s rays came with a helping hand and an ankh – a cross with a handle symbolising life. But down in the valley below was just sand, sand and more sand – and the fearsome heat of the sun god. Two stumpy pillars were all that remained of the new city. If everyone has at least one Ozymandias moment when touring Egypt’s ancient ruins, this was mine.
A wall in Abydos, one of the oldest cities of Ancient Egypt
Life on board was suitably pharaonic, particularly at meal times when we dined on lavish feasts. Those featuring Ottoman fare: cumin-scented lamb kebabs, grilled Nile perch, tahini salad, falafel and freshly prepared pitta served with eggplant dip and peppery hummus proved particularly popular. Alcohol isn’t included in the fare but the excellent Omar Khayyam dry red wine from Alexandria was inexpensive. One evening there was a wild dance night at which we dressed in jellabiyas – the long gowns worn by many Egyptians – and were entertained by belly dancers and musicians. The authentic and piercing arghul flute music was in its way, rather stirring.
During the 10 nights we were cruising the Nile we saw only one other cruise ship, and passed none that were Cairo-bound. Even in the larger cities the docks were either empty, or full of ageing vessels. Ibrahim Abdel Fatah, the ship’s general manager, expressed his sadness at the absence of a regular service on the Cairo-Luxor section.
“We tried to relaunch in 2013 but the [Muslim] Brotherhood took the police away from tourist operations. Now things are calmer we need to let the world know that it’s safe here again – fortunately, bookings are looking good for the next season.”
After this September’s sailings cruises resume in March 2016 and run through May, and there is, of course, always the risk of another controversial court case, another riot, another incident.
“It’s like poison in honey,” said Fatah. “One bad thing happens somewhere and people think the whole country is dangerous. Americans and Japanese stay away because their foreign offices issue warnings. During these difficult times it is the British, the Germans and French, that have carried us.”
The Sphinx with the Pyramid of Khafre in the background
During my cruise the cabins of the Hamees were partly occupied by a group of about 40 British travellers and a French group of a similar size on a rather different kind of voyage. Their tour leader claimed to have been an Egyptian “in a recent previous life”. According to one of the group’s members they toured the ancient sites absorbing energy and meditating, bonding and charging a crystal, which they threw into the Nile one morning to balance its masculine forces with some feminine ones.
The British group had no such focus. Many of the repeat visitors came for the history and archaeology. Others loved the romance of the Nile. A few just sought sunshine and a Campari and soda. The most memorable pleasures, for me, were the incidental ones. On the penultimate night, as the ship motored slowly towards Luxor, I was out on deck when the evening call to prayer, marking the end of sunset, swirled over the river. The muezzins (those who call the faithful to prayer) in the humdrum town we were passing seemed to be competing, but for musicality rather than volume, and I was sure I heard something like the cante jondo of flamenco coming from one corner of the town.
As prayers ended, darkness descended, and the moon appeared at the stern – an upturned crescent, just like the moons that top minarets. I could see Venus too, close to the horizon. The Nile was a black mirror, the peace was total. Let’s hope things stay like that, and Egypt and its great river can be filled with life again.
Voyages Jules Verne (0845 166 7003; vjv.com) operate a 10-night version of this cruise which costs from £1,745 (no single supplement). The fare also includes a private cocktail reception at the Winter Palace Hotel in Luxor, and an evening sound and light show at Luxor Temple. Departures on September 18, 2015 and resuming on March 14, 2016.
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