By type of trip
Nile Cruises Luxor to Aswan: Routes, Boats and Prices
Classic Egypt Tours: Cairo, Luxor and Aswan Itineraries
Nile Cruise and Red Sea Holidays: Two-Week Egypt Trips
White Desert Tours from Cairo: Oases and Desert Camping
Short Breaks in Egypt: Three and Four Day Cairo Trips
Tailor-made Egypt Tours: Private Trips Built Around You
West of the Nile
Chalk formations, black volcanic hills and a night camped out in the Western Desert.
About these trips
Desert tours from Cairo run four hours southwest to the White Desert, which looks like nowhere else in Egypt — wind-carved chalk standing in open sand. Camping there is the point of the trip.
These routes are more demanding than the Nile itineraries: 4×4 transport, basic facilities and real desert heat. Worth it if you want a few days away from the temple circuit.
You leave Cairo early and drive four hours to Bahariya. From there a 4x4 takes over and the tarmac ends.
The Black Desert comes first — volcanic hills that look burnt. Crystal Mountain is a roadside outcrop of calcite. Then the White Desert, where wind has cut the chalk into shapes that photograph better at dawn than at noon.
You camp. A driver sets up mattresses and cooks over a fire. There is no plumbing and no phone signal. That is the point, and it is worth knowing before you book.
October to April. Daytime sits in the twenties, and nights drop close to freezing in January. Bring a fleece even when Cairo is warm.
Summer is genuinely dangerous out there. We will not run these trips between June and August.
Two nights beats one. The second morning gives you the White Desert without the drive still in your legs.
Entry rules, opening hours, security advice and exchange rates all move. Check them at the source, not here.
Written and checked by the Nile Trip Guide editorial team · Last reviewed . Entry rules, prices and opening hours change — check anything critical against the official sources linked on this page.
1 itinerary
14 days · Desert & oases
Fourteen days that add the Western Desert to the usual route: Cairo, two days of Luxor on land, four nights sailing to Aswan, then a drive west to Bahariya and a night out among the white chalk formations.
from US$3,815 / per person
