National Geographic Traveler: Egypt

Great pictures and great background info on egypt and it's ancient culture. Good guide in the ciaro museum as well. great compliment to my tour.

The National Geographic "Traveler Egypt" is a very complete guide for touring Egypt. The book is full of beautiful color photography, details all places of interest, and has a full guide for hotels, restaurants, tipping, etc.

The National Geographic Traveler guide to Egypt is light on the practicalities. It does provide some info in the back of the book about customs, hotels, restaurants, and what to expect (such as the helpful suggestion to bring toilet paper everywhere!), but you will get more information from other guidebooks, probably. Here is why you will need this book, though: when you go to the myriad tourist sights in Egypt, you will not find many signs or much information at all about what you are seeing. There is very little about the history, where things came from, or even what the object/ruin is about. This is true whether you are at the immense Egyptian Museum (which is notorious for bad signage) or at the Valley of the Kings. It is a shame that the Ministry of Tourism in Egypt can't get their act together on this point, but until then, at least you have the National Geographic guide, which does a great job of filling in the holes. This guide also suggests some great activities that are a little off the beaten path, but still very friendly to tourists, such as the free whirling dervish show on Wednesdays and Saturdays in Islamic Cairo, and also Al-Azhar park. This book is so great that we left ours with our hosts (because they can't buy it in Egypt), and we are rebuying it, so we can remember all the places we have been. The descriptions are so detailed and the pictures are beautiful. This is one guide worth buying and keeping if you are making a trip to Egypt.

The only book one needs to take on a tour of Egypt. I found this book informative, up to date and easier to use than those I had previously purchased. I learned of this book when I saw fellow travel companions reading theirs. Since returning from my trip to Egypt I purchased the book to further my research and edit my photographs.

I have gathered several books on travel to Egypt, Lonely planets, Passport, Travelers Key, DK eyewitness(second fave) and this one I would rate the best. Its got tons of great pictures, some of which I haven't seen in other books, plus its very full on information. Usually with such books its either tons of info and few pictures or vice versa. This one balances both well. It also has some nice maps and diagrams (tomb layouts, pyramid chambers)a section rating hotels and restaurants, a small section on usefull arabic terms, and a book and movie guide with egyptian themes. The book starts out with an introduction to the history and culture of Egypt, something many travel guides lack and require a second book for. Then it moves on to points of interest in Cairo, around Cairo, The delta and Suez, Alexandria, Western Desert, Middle Egypt, Luxor, South of Luxor, Red sea and Sinai, then the final part of the book is basically travel tips. Lots of great information. I was happy to see they included a section on the rescue of the temple of Abu Simbel. I've heard of how they moved the temple to save it but was having trouble pondering how such a task could be done. This book explains the actual 'why' the temple was in danger, the various ideas of saving it, and the technique used. Just an example of how in debth this book is. The pages are nice and glossy as well. And though thick for a traveling book(to take along) its still a reasonable size to fit into a travel bag to take with you. I would say if you were looking to buy one book only, by far, I'd recommend this one. I like the DK eyewitness book too, but this one I rank higher due to more volume of information and pictures. If you want something slimmer and less in debth I'd go with the DK one, which is still a great book on its own.