The all-suite MS Salacia carries only 59 guests and sails 3, 4 and 5-night itineraries between Luxor and Aswan, visiting Karnak, Edfu, Kom Ombo and Philae.
Our representative meets you at Luxor Airport or the railway station and transfers you to the ship. You settle into your suite and lunch is served on board. The afternoon covers the East Bank: the Karnak Temple Complex, with its towering columns, sacred lake and the Great Hypostyle Hall, and then Luxor Temple, standing on the riverbank and carrying layers of Pharaonic, Greco-Roman and Islamic building on one site. Dinner on board with Luxor lit around you.
Off the ship after breakfast for the West Bank. In the Valley of the Kings, generations of pharaohs were buried in rock-cut tombs decorated with everything they believed about what came next. The Temple of Queen Hatshepsut follows, set against the limestone cliffs of Deir El-Bahari, with its terraces, colonnades and reliefs, and there is a photo stop at the Colossi of Memnon on the way back. Lunch on board as the Salacia sails south through the Esna Lock, and the afternoon is tea on the sun deck.
The Temple of Horus at Edfu first thing, one of the best-preserved in the country. Then sailing to Kom Ombo, whose dual temple is built for Sobek and Horus in mirrored halves. The ship carries on to Aswan through the afternoon, with dinner on board.
A guided morning around a city that runs at a noticeably slower pace than the rest of Egypt. Philae Temple comes first, on Agilkia Island and built for Isis, its columns and reliefs surrounded on all sides by water. Then the Unfinished Obelisk, still attached to the granite bedrock it was being cut from, which shows exactly how obelisks were shaped and moved. Lunch and afternoon tea on board, and the rest of the day at leisure before the last dinner.
A last breakfast on board looking out over the river, then check-out and a transfer to Aswan Airport or the railway station.