This is my budget breakdown of my trip to Egypt (with a layover in Frankfurt, Germany). I knew going into this trip that it was going to be on the expensive side. I had budgeted $6262.41Â in expenses for this trip. Here is how I actually spent that budget:
Airfare:Â $972.26
I had watched airfare obsessively for about 2 months before I saw the airfare drop significantly through Lufthansa.
I was able to get a 1 stop through Frankfurt on the way to Egypt, including a 12 hour layover in Frankfurt. And then on the way home I’d have 2 quick stops in Munich and then Frankfurt on the way home.
Note that the actual tickets were $230 plus $642.26 in taxes and fees. Then I opted to choose my own seats at an additional cost of $100 but I figured it was worth it to make sure I wasn’t trapped in a middle seat for those long flights. (I only opted not to select my seat on the short 1 hour flight from Munich to Frankfurt.)
Main Tour: $1954.15
I went through G Adventures for a 12 day tour of Egypt called Egypt Explorer. It originally costs $2299 but I had a 15% off coupon from their catalog to drop it to $1954.15. I chose G Adventures because I had gone through them before on their Costa Rica on a Shoestring and Mayan Encounter tours and loved it!
Extra Accommodations: $442.74
I had grand plans for my 12 hour layover in Frankfurt, I’d sleep on the plane and arrive fresh in the morning, head to a museum before finding a place for lunch, then head to the Apple Wine district and bar hop before heading back to the airport to catch my flight. Only problem? I have never, ever, slept on a plane. I took my sleeping pills…and it backfired. I felt sick, and instead decided to get a hotel to rest for a bit before exploring a small town near Frankfurt. My hotel ended up being in Langen, and cost $84.67 after conversion.
I decided to arrive 2 days early and stay 1 day later for a cost of $285 ($95 a night). This was so I could have enough time in the beginning to get over jet lag, as well as give me the freedom to see Cairo and the surrounding areas at my own pace. The last few tours I’ve done I left on the last day of the tour and it just seemed too soon to be leaving my newfound friends.
Note that I had these nights booked directly with my G Adventures tour and so are about 50% more expensive than if I had booked on my own. I acknowledged this extra expense and agreed to it for 2 reasons. Firstly, I didn’t want to waste time transferring between hotels and so this was the easiest option. And secondly, my G Adventures tour included airport transportation only if I booked my extra nights with them directly. Again I choose for simplicity’s sake to go through their airport transfer so I wouldn’t have to worry about it since I would be arriving/leaving late at night.
A week before my trip, I realized that my last day in Egypt was on such a tight schedule I might miss my flight home. I’d have to go from the Cairo Airport to the 1-2 hour drive to Giza, shower, pack and then drive the 1-2 hours back to Cairo to catch my international flight. If the drive took the full 2 hours, I wouldn’t have time to shower, so what was the point to spend up to 4 hours traveling to/from the airport and back? I couldn’t cancel my far Giza hotel so I had to book a hotel near the airport for an additional $100.07. A bit frustrating that I hadn’t thought that through (either not booking my last night hotel until sooner so I had a better plan, or having booked 2 extra days at the end to spend a nice time in Sharm without being rushed) but I wanted to be safe than sorry and so spent the extra money. And then the day before my day trip to Sharm….it was revealed that the MetroJet crash in Sharm was due to terrorism. And so I cancelled my day trip, and never even bothered going to the hotel near the airport.
Ground Transportation: $107.54
I took a Super Shuttle to/from Denver International Airport for 61.40. I have taken Super Shuttle in the past and have found that they are the most economical way to get from one’s home to the airport and back. Taxis are about 70% more expensive and while the RTD SkyRide bus is by far the cheapest option you then have to figure out how to get home from a park and ride. But in the end, my parents picked me up and so I didn’t use my 2nd half of my Shuttle.
I didn’t have any ground transportation in Frankfurt during my 12 hour layover because I ended up using the free hotel’s shuttle to and from Langen.
I had an additional 96 EGP in ground transportation. This included taxis and horse drawn carriages called Caleches.
Since my transfer to the Cairo airport is covered by my tour I have left that out of the calculation. I thought that my transfer back to the airport was covered, but it wasn’t. Instead it cost 150 EGP and $15.
Meals & Drinks: $315.96
11 breakfasts, 3 lunches, and 6 dinners were included with my tour. The tour company recommended I budget $350 for meals not covered by the tour but I bumped up my budget to $500 since I was staying a few extra days. I actually spent $165.86. Why so little? Well outside of tourist areas, you could eat for 2-3 dollars per meal. This was a lot of shawarma, koshari, as well as some meals scraped from hotel breakfast leftovers.
$27.78 was spent in Denver since I got to the airport way too early and needed to kill some time. I ate a salad the Chophouse and got some water for my flights.
I spent 49.25 on meals during my layover in Frankfurt. This consisted of Kinder Eggs, OJ, A burger and Apple Wine that made me horrifically sick. And Water.
On my travel day from Cairo>Munich>Frankfurt I spent $73.07. Â Mostly on water, OJ, a sandwich, and a ton of Kinder Eggs.
Tour Optional Activities: $200
These are the Optional Activities offered by G Adventures that I did:
Camel Ride at the Great Pyramids: 120 EGP
Alexandria Library Archeological Museum: 20 EGP
Alexandria Library Manuscript Museum: 20 EGP
Egyptian Museum Royal Mummy Rooms: 100 EGP
Unfinished Obelisk: 40 EGP
Nubian Museum: 60 EGP
Philae Temple & Transportation: 250 EGP
King Tut’s Tomb: 100 EGP
Ramses VI Tomb: 50 EGP
Abydos & Dendera Day Trip: 450 EGP
The Citadel, Islamic & Coptic Cairo: 370 EGP
I decided to not go on the Luxor Hot Air Balloon ride which was offered at $130. I choose not to go because A: I’m afraid of heights (and the last time I tested that fear it didn’t work out well) and B: There have been fatal hot air balloon crashes in Luxor, (one of the most recent being in 2013) and my thought process is that if there have been so few tourists than operators likely haven’t had the cashflow to properly maintain their equipment and so I wouldn’t want to risk it. C: If I had wanted to do this, I would have had to get up super early, and with already such little time in Luxor I didn’t want to be to tired (or if I was going to get up early, I’d see sights I was interested in up close.)
Note that many of these Optional Activities are likely more expensive than if I had attempted to do them on my own, as you likely can bargain or find cheaper alternatives. (Also note that if you are a student you can get discounts at might sights with an ISIC card.) But on a tour you are paying for connivence and companionship, and so pay a higher cost for them to organize your activities.
Additional Sight Seeing: $603.42
These were sights I saw on my own.
Prior to the start of my G Adventures tour, I also booked a full day Saqqara/Memphis/Dahshur tour with Egyptian Sidekick for a cost of $110 plus admission costs. I had looked at the Saqqara tours that G Adventures provided, but they started expensive and decreased in costs if more people booked. But I really wanted to do Saqqara at my own pace and without a gaggle of people. Since it is hard to find reputable tour guides online (Trip Advisor is riddled with many self promotion posts that it was overwhelming) and the fact I had already done so much research, I decided not to get an Egyptologist guide and instead use a local. I actually stumbled upon Egyptian Sidekick on accident. I was looking for “Egypt Bloggers” and their blog had a lot of information. The prices for the additional sites were:
Dahshur: 47 EGP
Memphis: 43 EGP
Saqqara: 95 EGP
On my last day I decided I wanted to do a Memphis Tour to Sharm El Sheikh. The tour was similar to this one, but I customized it to do a full day of snorkeling and then the city tour. I made this change since I don’t feel the desert is that safe near Sharm, and because I truly was only going to Sharm to snorkel, so wanted more time to do that! Memphis was happy to customize the tour, and even let me pick my flight times as I wanted to make sure I had enough time to get back to my hotel to shower and pack. (Why I didn’t think to say 1 more extra day so I wouldn’t feel rush I’ll never know.) The total for the Memphis Tour was $470. If you went with more people the price drops by a lot. If you try to do this on your own, the flights are around $125 each way, the boat tour would likely be around $30-40. Then you’d also need to pay for rental of equipment, lunch, all of the taxi transportation to/from the airports, and the city tour. So even though I paid a little bit of a premium, I was happy that Memphis would be handling the stressful parts of this day trip. And then…I ended up having to cancel my day tour because the day I was going to go, was the day UK and other countries cancelled all inbound and outbound flights to Sharm due to the reveal of information that the 10/31 MetroJet crash was caused by terrorism, likely due to an insider at the airport.
Tips/Baksheesh: $136.18
Going to Egypt one of the key things people tell you is about baksheesh. You are expected to tip for even the smallest service rendered. I’ll cover this practice in more detail in another post. But I spent $2 and 81 EGP (10 of which was tips to use the bathroom.)
In addition to baksheesh, our tour guide collected $60 amount on the first day of travel to handle tipping expenses throughout the trip. I then tipped $50 plus 70 EGP to our wonderful G Adventure guide at the end of the trip. I also tipped the guide of our Abydos/Dendera day trip 40 EGP.
Souvenirs & Gifts: $1415.19
I spent 870 EGP and $1305.06 on souvenirs. This included perfume, silvery jewelry, an alabaster vase, papyrus, ornaments, books, and things like that. Since you had to barter for everything so in some cases I paid more for things, and in other times I paid pretty low for items. I also bought a lot of Christmas presents for my family and friends, which greatly inflated this number. This number is a lot higher than I hoped, but I really enjoyed everything I brought back.
Travel Insurance: $246
I went through Travel Insured International for my travel insurance because as a USAA member I received a discount. I opted for their higher price plan that also includes canceling the tour for any reason in case the situation in Egypt drastically changed by the time I was going on my trip.
Visa: $25
As a US Citizen you can get your visa early from an Egyptian Embassy for $15 but you have to fill out the form, include 2 passport sized photos, and mail your passport to them. This hassle makes the “lower” cost not worth it. So I opted to get my visa upon arrival for $25.
Total: $6418.44
This amounts to $400 dollars per day. Egypt has been a dream of mine and I knew this one in a lifetime trip would be expensive but decided it was worth doing Egypt right. I had about $612 in costs that didn’t work out. So overall my budget and planning was spot on.
A few things not included in these calculations:
- Exchange Fees, I exchanged money a few times, but didn’t keep track how much the fee was.
- All pre-trip costs on luggage, clothing, or other packed items.
- All pre-trip preparation materials like guidebooks or history books.
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