Guest Post by Tad Heath
Meet Tad Heath
Tad lives in Marin County with his wife and two teenagers. He loves getting outside to wing foil, surf, snowboard, backpack and hike. He will occasionally remain inside to work, sleep and watch his beloved Lakers scrape by and just barely make the playoffs.
Q: Where is your favorite place(s) in the world to travel to?
A: That’s a tough one. Like asking a parent who his favorite child is. For the outdoors, I loved Patagonia. For wildlife, it was Tanzania. For food, it was Thailand. For feeling like I was going back in time, it was Cuba. For beach and diving, it was Fiji.
Q: What are your favorite travel tips or hacks?
A: Seek out the shoulder season. I’m not a fan of crowds, but bad weather can ruin a trip real quick. But the shoulder seasons often provide a nice blend of emptier/cheaper sites with weather that’s good enough to enjoy your destination.
Q&A GUEST POST with Tad Heath: Egypt 🇪🇬
Q: Please provide a brief overview of Egypt and why it is such a great travel destination.
A: There can’t be too many other places like this in the world. You walk down the ancient steps of the Seti’s tomb, or along the Avenue of the Sphinx or within the Great Pyramid, and these are the exact same steps that were walked upon by their Egyptian builders 5000 years ago. There is just so much to see, and it is overwhelming to try to take it all in (in a good way). The temples are often wide open, allowing you to tap into your inner explorer and absorb the details of these ancient sites which have changed remarkably little over centuries. I often felt like Indiana Jones, excited to see what I’d find around the next corner.
I did not have much knowledge of ancient Egyptian History, but it was fun to learn the basics before the trip and see it all displayed out before me during our time there.
It is inexpensive, the weather is great during our winter, the people are friendly, and the tourist infrastructure makes it very easy to get around.
Q: How many days should you plan to visit Egypt to truly experience it?
A: This is best as a two week trip (or more if you have the time). Our trip was 12 days, and that’s including more than a full day of travel each way. We had then had a day in Cairo, 3 days for Alexandria (including the days driving there and back), a day in Memphis and Saqqara, and a few days on the Nile. I would have really liked at least one more day in Cairo, more time in Saqqara, and travel to the less touristy parts of Egypt. I could have sacrificed the trip to Alexandria.
Q: What’s the best time of year to visit? What’s the weather like then?
A: Our fall and winter are the most comfortable. I believe it gets very crowded around Christmas time. We were there the week before Thanksgiving and it was relatively empty of tourists.
Q: Do you need a Visa to visit? If so, what’s best way to secure one in advance?
A: Yes. We used a travel agency that took care of it for us.
Q: How’s the safety in Cairo?
A: Zero issues. Granted, we were usually with a large tour group. However, we were there about a month after Hamas attacked Israel. I was fully expecting to experience some backlash as Americans given we were traveling in an Arabic country. But nothing could be further from the truth. The Egyptians were truly welcoming and if I walked down the streets in Cairo or Alexandria (without the tour group), many Egyptians, old and young, would greet us with a smile and a salutation. It was a very friendly place and I never felt unsafe.
Q: Is Egypt kid-friendly?
A: It’s very heavy on visiting ancient Egyptian sites and some museums. If your kid likes that kind of stuff at home, they’ll love it in Egypt. My 15 year old daughter loves to read every placard in the museum and ate it up. My 12 year old son would be interested for the first few minutes of a site, then get bored. The tour groups involve a lot of lectures, which neither one of my kids was able to focus on. But the historical sites are pretty wide open and allow for exploration. You can touch the ancient carvings and run through the catacombs and gasp and the mummies and climb the pyramids and wander through exotic markets. My kids loved those elements of the trip a lot more than the lectures.
Q: When visiting Egypt to see the pyramids and more, is it best to book with a tour company? If so, do you have any tour company recommendations or local guides you can recommend?
A: We booked the entire trip through a tour company beforehand, so everything was taken care of from the transport to the lodging to most of the meals to the tour guide who was with us the entire trip. We used Globus, and we were surprised how nice the hotels and the restaurants were, given what we paid. So traveling this way made the logistics super easy, and all we had to do was show up on time for the bus.
That being said, there were significant downsides to this kind of prescribed travel. I was dying when we left the Cairo Museum after a few hours. I was angry whenever we stopped at some kind of store (perfume, cotton, papyrus, etc.) for a prearranged shopping tour. I was sad when we left the pyramids after a couple hours. I couldn’t believe how little time we were given in the Valley of the Kings. And so on. So basically, the ease of travel is off set by the lack of freedom.
I would consider myself a relatively adventurous traveler before having kids, and we have never purchased a package tour like this before. We did so this time assuming that Egypt was so foreign and there was so much to see, that it would just be much easier to go the packaged tour route. But having been there, I really don’t think it would have been hard to figure it out. If I could go back in time, I’d skip the packaged tour route and plan it on our own.
Q: What is the best airport to fly/in out of? Any specific airport tips?
A: We flew into Cairo, which is the main hub. Plus it’s near the Cairo museum and the Pyramids or Giza, which are obviously big attractions. It’s the de facto entry/exit airport. We also flew through Aswan and Luxor for trips within Egypt.
Q: Upon arrival, do you need to rent a car? Get around by cab? Is there Uber? Hire a driver? Describe any unique insights about the transportation situation.
A: All of the travel within Egypt was pre-arranged by our packaged tour. We did a lot of walking in Alexandria, Luxor and Cairo when we had free time. It was very cheap to get a taxi cab. We were warned to avoid the horse drawn carriages which will just take you to their friends shop and leave you there until you buy something.
Q: What sites in Cairo are absolutely not to be missed?
A: The Pyramids and the Sphinx are the main attractions, and they live up to the billing! The museum is top notch and I could have probably spent a week there. The new museum is set to open at any time, and that would probably keep me busy for a month. 🙂
Q: Any key tips for visiting the pyramids?
A: Go inside! You can pay a bit extra to walk through a tunnel dug in the 1800s that will connect you to the main shaft created by the ancient Egyptians to house the sarcophagus of Khufu. You can also take a ride on a camel and get a classic picture with the Pyramids in the background (feel free to ignore the fact that camels were not in Egypt at the time the Pyramids were built).
Q: Tell me about going on a Nile River cruise! How was the experience? Any specific tour or boat companies you recommend? How many days do you recommend being on the Nile to truly experience it? Did the boat make stops along the way so you could explore areas on land?
A: We started in Southern Egypt in Aswan and floated north to Luxor. We had 3 nights and I think that was enough. We stopped at many temples. My daughter and I also made an extra trip to Abu Simbel, which was about 3 hours south of Aswan (it was awesome!). Our boat (arranged by Globus) was very nice. The food was great.
Q: Any hidden gems or off-the-beaten path spots you visited while in Egypt?
Q: We remained on the beat path. But we did have a small amount of free time to walk the streets of Alexandria, Luxor and Cairo, and that was great to get a small feel for what the locals lives were like. I wish I had more time to explore the non-touristy parts of Egypt!
Q: Let’s talk Food! Tell me about typical Egyptian cuisine. What were some favorite dishes? Any favorite restaurants? Sorry to be a broken record, but all the restaurants were picked out by the tour group and I didn’t write down the names. We ate some street food in Alexandria and Luxor, which was pretty good (but we did get a little sick!). As you’d expect, the food is classic Mediterranean – lots of hummus and pita and kebab and chicken shawarma and grilled seafood. The seafood in Alexandria was top notch!
Q; What do Egyptians drink? Is alcohol widely consumed? Any kind of unique beverage or tea?
A: No, Egyptians don’t drink alcohol. You can get beer or wine at the restaurants, but it’s for us, not them. There was lots of yummy tea.
Q: What’s one unique Egyptian custom/cultural tradition that you learned about while there?
A: I tried to learn a few things about Ancient Egyptian history before the trip. So learning about all the customs surrounding death was fascinating, from mummification to the Book of the Dead to meanings of paintings on their tomb walls. We learned about ceremonies at the temples, the influence of the Romans. Their modern traditions around marriage and women’s rights are quite different from our own, and fascinating to learn about.
Q: Any last words of advice or insights to share about traveling to Egypt?
A: Go! It was always a bucket list item for me. One night, my wife got a Travelzoo email with a great deal and we said, “why not?!” Again, the packaged tour will allow you to see a lot and scratch the surface of all the major sites. But if you want to get a feel for Egyptian culture and choose how you spend your time there, a packaged tour might not be the best fit for you.
