We booked our whole package through Imperial Travel....we are 9 days at Sunrise Holiday resort and they used Hotels4u for that...then 7 days on the Serenade (it was Emely at time of booking but they changed that) and that is through youhotels.com...we have a transfer booked from hotel to boat via A2B transfers and our transfer voucher just states to Luxor City and Dock.
I did e-mail youhotels and they said they couldn't comment on the booking and we had to go through the broker...I rang Imperial travel and as far as they are concerned we are on the Serenade
if you go here it tells you the itinerary....I'm assuming they are sticking to that
http://www.youhotels.com/10/Egypt/99/Nile-Cruise/368/Nile-Cruise/M_S-SERENADE/

Tangobunny wrote:

I rang Imperial travel and as far as they are concerned we are on the Serenade
if you go here it tells you the itinerary....I'm assuming they are sticking to that
http://www.youhotels.com/10/Egypt/99/Nile-Cruise/368/Nile-Cruise/M_S-SERENADE/

Hmmmm, not according to the reply that Sunshine.co.uk received from the cruise supplier..... This below is the reply we got back from them yesterday.

"Please see below the reply from the supplier regarding you facebook request,

Dear sunshine.co.uk

The boat is supposed to dock at the luxor port for 3 days, whilst they
do the east bank /Karnack but they never confirm this to us before
because they switch around if they sail for 3 days towards aswarn or
dock for the first 3 days
Sorry I cant be more direct with this but they will never confirm these
kind of details because they change so much"

I've written back as it's not normal they change the itinerary as regularly as they've indicated but - they may switch guests to a different (same standard) boat if they can't make the numbers up or justify running boats less than half empty.

We reallly need to know what time we can embark and of course, where to embark! Neither of which has been supplied with the documentation sent from Sunshine.co.uk. Most unusual as I've always found Sunshine most accommodating with information....

If you ring or email youhotels they may be able to tell you what's going on...I would leave it until closer to your holiday...say 2 weeks before...you'll still have plenty of time to book your transfers

No worries about the transfers, we've already sorted them with our man on the ground in Luxor but knowing where the boat is docked and times to embark was the problem.

I pushed them some more last night and finally, we got some info on that today. The boat is definitely at the New Bridge and embarkation from 2pm onwards.

However, they will not confirm the itinerary which is a pain as we're doing our own "thing" and there are 6 of us so we wanted to see if we could work something out in advance. Not much chance of that until last minute by the sounds of it.

"The itinerary is never set
Boat changes can happen our suppliers mention this in our terms and conditions."

That bit isn't on the Sunshine.co.uk website though.... It's on YouHotels.com who we did not book our cruise with.

As long as it doesn't interfere with our planned balloon trip on the Wednesday morning before we embark, I can live with it....

One of the reasons I've not booked any trips....I'm waiting until we get onboard then I'll arrange things from there

i think ittinerys change according to the times you can get through essna loch. i know when we went we was waiting about 9 hours as so meny boats arrived at same time so youhad to queue...

We're not doing any trips with the cruise boat/company as they're very overpriced - we always do our own when we go to Egypt.

We arrive on Monday evening before we embark the boat on Weds so plan to do the balloon trip with an agent we know in Luxor on the Weds morning before we join the boat in the afternoon.

Last time it worked out at about 35 to 40 EUR each for the balloon trip including the transfers to and from our hotel as our agent puts us on the "wait list". We've already told him when we want to go.

We were hoping to visit the Luxor and Karnak temples on the Thursday and Friday before we sailed but that may have to go by the by if the itinerary changes.

We really wanted to make it more relaxing at the end rather than possibly having to get back into Luxor traipsing around on the last 2 days before we fly back to Cyprus. Some of the friends who are coming with us haven't been to Egypt before and it's a better order to do it in which is why we chose the Serenade over the Emely.

So, we shall see what happens.

All we have to do now is make arrangements to have our minibus and driver collect us from the boat at the new bridge for the first few days if the itinerary and boat stays the same, whereas if we're nearer to the Winter Palace we can walk to the Luxor and Karnak temples. Hot though!

Shell
Would you be willing to pass on the contact details of the agent you use for trips....I'd like to arrange the balloon trip for the morning after we arrive on Serenade......thinking of doing Luxor by night on that evening as well and then Karnak or Valley of kings the following day....will decide on the rest of the trips as we go along

Hi Tangobunny

Yes, no problem at all....

I will send his email details to you by PM. He worked for many years for Jolleys travel agents and set up his own business in 2009.

Cheers
Shell

Thanks Michelle...I have just emailed him to tell him we will be booking with him....I really want to do the Balloon ride but as we only have 2 full days at Luxor we are either going to have to sacrifice the East bank or the West bank trips in order to do it....I'm going to book him for the trips on the other stop offs as well

Can he arrange trips for Aswan, Esna etc?
We plan to do Philae Temple, Old and New Dam and the Unfinished Obelisk which will make a good round trip.

We were looking to see if Ahmed could maybe sort us out with transport in those locations as there will be 6 in our party so we don't want to spend time hassling for 2 taxis each time as well as having to agree a price with a boat to take us to the island at Philae.

According to the website the company does several trips along the Nile although he only quoted me prices for Luxor/Karnak temples,Valley of Nobles ,Valley of Kings ,Sound and light show,Camel rides etc etc

Cheers

I will email him I think and ask if he can arrange transport, I'm sure he will have contacts which will make that part of our organising a little easier. Bad enough having to barter for 1 taxi but getting 2 to agree to the same price is a bugger! We've done it before and it's a real pain in the backside...

I will let you know...

Cheers
Shell

Just got this back off Ahmed today:

"dont worry about your tours i can arrange anything you want in egypt not just Luxor, transportations or guide . when i meet you in my office. we will arrange everything you want"

Looks like we will be sorted then! We can cut down a lot of the time if we can get tickets and transport arranged in advance.

We can be round and back onboard in the pool in no time at all!

In your opinion as we are pushed for time in Luxor what would you leave out....We will arrive on the boat on the 5th....the day you leave....so that day will be out of it for trips unless we do the light show in the evening ....but we will have had a 4 hour trip from Hurghada that day so thought it best to rest up ready for the Balloon ride on 6th....that only leaves 1 more day.....granted we will have seen Valley of the kings etc from the air but should we do that as a day trip the following day or should we do the East bank trips instead??? I'm thinking the latter

They don't do any excursions until Day 2 (Thursday) - according to their schedule.

Last time we did the balloon trip, we were back for a second breakfast a little before 9am and after that we went off shopping around the souk with our friends rather than going back to bed or relaxing by the pool... So you would still have time for some sightseeing.

TBH - if you're going all that way, wouldn't you want to see King Tut's tomb? It's definitely a "must do" for anyone who has seen all the treasures on display at the Cairo museum because once you've seen inside Tomb number 62 you will most definitely wonder how on earth they got them all in there! Cost for Tomb 62 is 100LE

So I would say a trip to the Valley of the Kings is a must do - you could simply ask the balloon transfer people to drop you near the Ticket Office after the balloon flight and make your own way to VOK. There are always taxis waiting nearby.

One ticket will give you entrance to 3 tombs - cost is 80LE plus you will pay 4LE for the return transfer on the mini-train from the visitors centre up to the valley.

Hatshepsuts is quite awesome although there is no depth to the temple but the structure is amazing. But it's one that could be missed in favour of visiting Howard Carter House at 20LE which if you do the VOK and pay the extra to see Tut's tomb, it will finish off the trip quite nicely.

The Luxor Temple is open into the early part of the evening and it's a nice sized temple to go around. Karnak is a monster of a temple and I would not recommend the Sound and Light Show unless you are really into Egyptian history. Twenty minutes describing all the columns just inside the entrance had me passing out from the heat when we went in 1994 and that was only one small part of the show!

But if you want to go and explore the temple, it's best to do that first thing in the morning and just do as much as you can before the heat kills you...

So if there are 2 that I would recommend not doing - it would be Karnak and Hatshepsuts temple because they are both very exposed to the heat.

Looking at the itinerary, we should be back in Luxor by mid afternoon on Day 7 (Tuesday) so that may give you time to visit the Luxor Temple if you wanted to leave it till last....

Entry fee prices can be found here: http://bit.ly/R2ka88

And then, I found this today - so we've now got another to add to our list: http://www.ancient-egypt-history.com/2010/05/tomb-of-sennefer-nobles-tombs-luxor.html

Check out the tomb of Sennefer at the Tombs of the Nobles. Awesome!

I added up the prices today for all the entrance tickets as shown on the itinerary. 310LE per person.... Of course you will need transport but I know that Ahmed is very reasonable and if you tell him what you want to do, he will tell you approx how long it will take you. We just did half day tours last time and it worked fine for us.... 4 hours or so at a time is enough!