Cairo in One Day: Giza Pyramids, Egyptian Museum & Khan el-Khalili

Overview

Forty-five centuries ago a man had a mountain built for himself, and it stayed the tallest structure on earth until the Middle Ages. This morning you stand at the foot of it. By mid-afternoon you are looking at the only surviving portrait of the man who ordered it - seven and a half centimetres of ivory, in a glass case downtown.

Your Egyptologist collects you from your hotel early, while the plateau is still cool and half empty. You walk the west field where Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure step down the ridge in order of descending ambition, then drive up to the desert edge where all three finally fall into a single frame. Below, the Sphinx keeps its watch over the causeway, and Khafre's Valley Temple behind it is bare pink granite - no paint, no inscription, nothing but blocks weighing tons, fitted so closely the joints still hold.

Lunch is Egyptian, sit-down and unhurried, and then the day changes register entirely. The Egyptian Museum on Tahrir Square opened in 1902, the first building in the Middle East designed from the ground up to be a museum, and it still feels like it - crowded cases, old labels, sarcophagi lined up like furniture. Your guide walks you past the Old Kingdom halls to the small things that matter more than the big ones.

Then Islamic Cairo, and Khan el-Khalili - a market trading on the same ground since 1382. The lanes narrow, the light drops, and the trades sort themselves by street: copper here, gold there, spice and perfume where the smell finds you first. Nothing about the day is shared. Your car is yours, your guide is yours, and if you want twenty more minutes with the Sphinx or ten fewer in the bazaar, you simply say so.

Highlights

• ✦Stand on the Giza plateau at opening hour, before the coach groups arrive
• ✦See all three pyramids fall into a single frame from the desert panorama point
• ✦Meet the Great Sphinx and the bare pink granite of Khafre's Valley Temple
• ✦Find Khufu's ivory portrait in the Egyptian Museum - 7.5cm, and the only likeness of him that survives
• ✦Wander Khan el-Khalili, a bazaar trading on the same ground since 1382
• ✦Private car, private Egyptologist and a sit-down Egyptian lunch, hotel pickup included

Included

• ✓Private air-conditioned vehicle for your party alone
• ✓Hotel pickup and drop-off in central Cairo or Giza
• ✓Licensed Egyptologist guide for the full day
• ✓Sit-down Egyptian lunch at a local restaurant
• ✓Bottled water throughout the day
• ✓All entrance fees to the Giza plateau and the Egyptian Museum (All-Inclusive tier only)
• ✓All taxes and service charges

Not included

• −Entrance fees to the Giza plateau and the Egyptian Museum on the Guide and Transfers tier - about EUR 21 per adult, payable by card at the gates
• −The separate ticket to go inside the Great Pyramid - available as an add-on
• −Guides in French, Spanish, Italian, Polish, Chinese or Turkish, which carry a language supplement

Good to know

• iChild price: ages 2-11 · Infants under 2
• iThe gates at Giza and the museum now take card, but carry some cash for the bazaar and for restroom attendants.
• iModest dress is expected in the museum and around Khan el-Khalili - shoulders and knees covered.
• iWear shoes you can walk sand in. The plateau is uneven and there is no shade on it.
• iYour guide speaks English, Arabic, German or Russian at no extra cost. French, Spanish, Italian, Polish, Chinese and Turkish guides are available for a supplement - ask us when you book.
• iThis is the historic Egyptian Museum on Tahrir Square, opened in 1902, not the Grand Egyptian Museum out at Giza.
• iGoing inside the Great Pyramid is a separate ticket sold as an add-on. The passage in is low, steep and warm.
• iFree pickup covers hotels in central Cairo and Giza. Heliopolis, New Cairo, 6th of October, Sheikh Zayed, Madinaty, the New Administrative Capital and the airports are covered by the out-of-zone pickup add-on.
• iReserve now and pay later - we confirm your place first and take payment on the day.