This might help....
http://www.seat61.com/Egypt.htm
Be aware that the person selling the tickets will try and pretend there are no seats left...... ask for the destination after yours and hey presto, tickets appear!! It's to do with pocketing the extra EGP for themselves..... doesn't always happen..... always ask for first class though... you'll see why!

Thanks for your reply ,I shall try 1st class train ,IVe travelled on trains In Morroco so I know what you mean .once again,thanks

Hi Crumble,
One point that I always make to people contemplating the train journey for Luxor to Cairo, especially at the time of year that you mention, is that the air-conditioning in first class is surprisingly efficient and if you are travelling overnight and trying to grab some sleep, you should definitely take something a little warm to wear during the journey, otherwise you feel mighty chilly! I thoroughly recommend the trip though, which is a real "adventure" within a holiday and so much better than travelling on an organised excursion.

Thanks very much for the info

hi
we traveled by train about 3 years ago and thought it was great

the price if i remember is about £60 for the both of us

with that we got picked up from station then taken to hotel after we did the sites

hope this is of some help

Thanks ,any more information about the Day train versus the Night train would be appreciated thanks to you all.

Personally, I would always do the overnight trip. The train leaves at a quite late hour, you get some sleep and somehow it doesn't seem to erode so much into your precious holiday! You then have the whole day to do the "must sees" in Cairo, before returning the following night. I have done the day trip once and found the scenery, although interesting, did get a little monotonous on such a long journey. For me the best bits are the last hour as you run into Cairo (quite an experience in itself) and it should be light enough to see that anyway. You will see plenty of the "agricultural strip" that borders The Nile on the approach to Luxor on the way back.

Hope this gives you some ideas.

Thankyou, shall be going for the overnight train,makes more sense in the long run.

Hi,

We will be taking the overnight sleeper train from Luxor to Cairo in 2 weeks time.

We looked up the timetable on Seat61 website but there was an extra charge to get tickets sent to you in advance. As we are on a limited time schedule with only a couple of nights in Luxor we needed to ensure we had reservations in advance.

I was lucky and have found an agent who has not charged us any extra to reserve the tickets for us (he's also pre-booked our 3 night cruise from Aswan to Luxor) and the ticket price quoted is the same as on Seat61 website.

His name is Mr Sherif from MemphisTours.com - we paid 25% deposit and will pay the rest the next day after we arrive at our hotel in Aswan. (We are flying in from Cyprus so it's quite a late arrival and we didn't want to drag some poor Egyptian representative out to the hotel at that time of night)

We've also travelled on the overnight train in the 1st class seated carriage on 2 other occasions and 1 tip I would recommend is asking the person who sells you the tickets - to write on the back of them the Seat and Carriage number in English. There are two lots of carriages with the same numbers on them and you need to make sure you are in the correct seats - otherwise, if you sit in the wrong ones - you will be thrown out of them when the holder of the valid ticket gets on the train (it could be halfway down the line and in the middle of the night). By this time, someone else will be sitting in your seat and you'll have a hell of a time sorting it out!

We saw this happen on our 2nd journey and it was a nightmare for one Indian family from Birmingham.

Cyprus100

Try EgyptAir. Flights tend to be more expensive than trains but you sometimes get very good deals. http://www.egyptair.com