Aswan to Luxor by Felucca: Three Days, Two Nights, One Sail

Felucca captains work the Aswan corniche every morning starting around 7:30 AM, and the first number they quote a foreigner is never the number you should pay. Ahmed, whose boat we ended up on, opened at 500 EGP ($10.31 USD) per person per day. Twenty minutes of back and forth got us to 350 EGP ($7.22 USD) per person per day, for a group of four, three days on the water, cook and basic meals included.

Blanket rental, if the boat doesn't already carry enough for everyone, is 20 EGP ($0.41 USD) a night. Bottled water from the onboard cooler runs 15 EGP ($0.31 USD) a bottle, roughly double what it costs in an Aswan corner shop, and there's no shop once you've cast off. Life jackets are supplied free, which nobody mentions until you ask, and the answer is always yes, there are enough for everyone on board.

The boat itself was about 9 meters, one mast, one sail, a small cooking area at the stern where Ahmed's nephew ran the galley. There are no cabins on a felucca. Everyone sleeps on deck, on thin mattresses the crew rolls out after dinner, under whatever the sky is doing that night. Ours was doing nothing in particular: clear, cold enough by 3 AM to regret packing only one blanket.

Sailing north from Aswan is supposed to start at first light. Ours started at 9:40 AM instead, because the wind hadn't picked up and the boat has no engine to fall back on.

Kom Ombo Temple costs 250 EGP ($5.15 USD) for foreign visitors, paid in cash at the gate, and it's not included in the felucca price. The temple is split down the middle: two entrances, two hypostyle halls, two sanctuaries, one side for Sobek the crocodile god, one side for Horus. Its columns are still carved floor to ceiling with hieroglyphs, worn smooth in places by roughly two thousand years of river traffic.

Meals on board were simple and came with the price: flatbread, ful medames, rice, a vegetable tagine most nights, tea whenever anyone wanted it. Seconds were never a problem. A cold soda from the cooler was 20 EGP ($0.41 USD), and after day one everybody just budgeted for two a day.

Ahmed checked the wind before breakfast and gave us the honest version: 40 kilometers if we're lucky, 25 if we're not. We made 28. Also, there is no wifi on a felucca.

By early afternoon the river turns into a flat sheet of hammered light, and everyone retreats under the tarp until it eases.

Boats on this route typically dock somewhere between Edfu and Luxor, and Ahmed's plan for us was a small mooring near Esna, close enough for a short taxi transfer. We were up at 6 AM to catch what wind there was before it died again by 10.

Disembarking took maybe ten minutes: mattresses rolled up, tarp folded, four backpacks handed down onto the bank. A shared taxi into Luxor was 150 EGP ($3.09 USD) total, split four ways, so about 38 EGP ($0.78 USD) each.

Crew tip is customary and not included anywhere in the quoted price. We gave 100 EGP ($2.06 USD) per person, split between Ahmed and his nephew, which felt fair for three days of sailing, cooking, and putting up with four people who reeked of sunscreen.