Transport from Giza to Safaga - Go Bus Egypt or private transfer?

[Railwaylass]

We're booked on an MSC cruise out of Safaga and terminating in Venice, in March of 2025. A long way off yet but I love the planning part!

 

My plan is for my DH and me to fly into Cairo and stay in Giza for a week before the cruise, so that we can really take our time at the monuments, go inside a few, take a boat trip on the Nile and visit the new museum. I've been on a couple of shore excursions in Egypt before and obviously didn't have time to enjoy things at an unhurried pace. DH has never been and he's going to love it!

 

But, this means arranging transport to Safaga, about 500 kilometers distant I believe, for the start of the cruise.

 

There aren't a lot of options that I've found so far. 

 

Go Bus Egypt looks to be the equivalent of our National Express coaches here in the UK, or Greyhound in the US. It's about a 7 hour overnight trip and only costs about £9.00. I think that it would be a really cool experience. But, as adventurous as we both are, I'm really not sure if this is a viable option for us. We speak only English and a lot of the journey looks to be through remote areas. When I was in Egypt before I didn't feel unsafe at all - on the one hand, I feel that away from Cairo might even be safer areas, on the other hand, we'd be on a bus in the middle of the night in a country where we might have trouble communicating. We'd also arrive about 7 in the morning so it's doubtful that we could check in to our hotel so early (we'd get there the day before the cruise, I wouldn't tempt fate and arrive the day of!).

 

Another option to consider is a private car/driver. I've not done a lot of research of companies yet, but the cost looks to average out at around £50.00, which is very inexpensive, and the journey time is a couple of hours less. We could make the journey by day, which would be better. My hesitation here might seem a bit silly, but the thought of just me and my husband in a car with a stranger, trying to be sociable for 5 hours, is not something that either of us would really enjoy. DH is not great at conversation and I'm an introvert who pretends I'm not, which is really hard to maintain for that length of time when there's no one else to take the pressure off. There's a certain anonymity on a bus, you're just one of the crowd, lol. A plus for this option would be that possibly we could initially go from Giza to Luxor and stay a couple of days, and then get another car/driver to take us on to Safaga.

 

Car hire isn't an option as I don't drive and my husband wouldn't have the confidence. It was hard enough for me to convince him to hire a car for a day trip in Greece a few years ago! 

 

Has anyone out there made this journey, and if so, how? Any options I've missed? I'd love to hear suggestions/thoughts from people who have had more experience travelling in this part of the world.

[John Bull]

Cairo (effectively Giza) to Luxor (which is where you want to be on that part of the Nile - Valley of the Kings, Temple of Karnak, etc etc)  is something over 400 miles by road, 7 1/2 hours by car..

Whilst Safaga is a little closer, that's not where you want to be - it's just a port town 140 miles of desert  / 3 hours from Luxor.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/nUwZdPzX7b4K9bGt7

 

£50 for a taxi from Cairo to Safaga sounds way too cheap, even for Egypt.

To Luxor will be further / cost more, and via Safaga makes no sense.

And I don't rate the idea of taking a bus. I don't know about the safety aspect, but it's almost all across desert and I know it would be tedious.

I'm used to driving long distances and we're pretty adventurous - but there's no way I'd rent a car in Egypt 😲.

 

I see the only sensible option to be.....

 

Taxi from Giza to Cairo International Airport 15 miles, 40 minutes.

Pre-booked flight to Luxor airport, one hour, about £70 to £90 including luggage.

Luxor hotel for 2 or 3 nights

Nile cruises around Cairo are pretty awful, kinda like a cruise in Birmingham but not as pretty.

Luxor is the place to take a Nile cruise - semi-rural and very laid-back. So give yourselves 2 to 3 full days in Luxor at the expense of a day or two in Cairo.

Pre-booked taxi from Luxor to Safaga (your hotel can help), starting good & early in the morning to arrive in good time to register for your cruise. But check with MSC whether they offer a transfer bus from Luxor, which will be popular with those who embark in Safaga.

 

Luxor area is much safer and more laid-back than Cairo.

From time to time you will still be hounded by street-sellers, but the atmosphere is much better than in Cairo.

 

Cruise ships are avoiding the Red Sea at the moment and 2024 cruises will doubtless be re-routed.

But hopefully the current grief will be history by the time you cruise

 

JB 🙂

 

 

 

 

[Railwaylass]

On 12/19/2023 at 9:17 PM, John Bull said:

Cruise ships are avoiding the Red Sea at the moment and 2024 cruises will doubtless be re-routed.

But hopefully the current grief will be history by the time you cruise

 

Many thanks for your thoughtful answer and my apologies for the delay in acknowledging it! I took your expertise onboard and had just about decided to fly in to Hurghada, spend a couple of days there, and then go on to Luxor for a week pre-cruise as there is so much to see and it is nearer to the cruise embarkation port.

 

Then MSC cancelled this cruise due to the unrest. They offered a different cruise at the same price with 4 extra days and keeping all of our perks, which sounded great. Then a few weeks later they cancelled that one. I had thought it odd that this alternate cruise was still being offered as it went to the same Egyptian ports as the original one so I wasn't particularly surprised. I'm a bit cynical so I figure that MSC wanted to hold on to customer's deposit money as long as possible, lol.

 

So now we are booked on a 12 night MSC cruise from Rome to Kiel, as it fits within the dates we need and the itinerary is pretty good, but this time the perks we were offered before were not transferable. Again, it's MSC so I'm not surprised. 

 

Truthfully, I'm expecting this one to be cancelled or amended in some way as it's a leg of a much longer cruise that is coming up through the Suez Canal! We shall see...

 

Thank you again and hopefully we'll be able to make use of your stellar advice for Egypt not too far in the future!