To do an overnight felucca tour it is necessary to get permissions from the tourist police in the evening before the
trip.
For this the captain needs copies of your passports in advance.
(You can send them to Aswan Individual as pdf or jpg for us to print out – or bring them to your captain one or two days before your trip as copies on paper)
Both captains will prepare the felucca well the day before to be ready on the day of sailing (for example: check if all is in "the kitchen", dry blankets after washing - see 3rd picture).
In the morning of departure the captain will get ice for the ice box, fresh vegetable, fruits, meat or fish. Then he
will sail to your hotel to wait for you there: usual time of meeting: 10 am.
Check out after breakfast the 2nd, 3rd or 4th day.
(If you will stay at Anakato which is located far south from Aswan
you will have to come to Elephantine by motorboat provided from Anakato).
Of course all sailing depends on the wind. Especially if you will get off the felucca to visit a village (5th & 6th
picture), the camel market on a saturday or sunday or go shopping fresh food with the captian on the way, you might not arrive in time
at
Daraw (1 day / 1 night. Checkout 2nd day),
Komombo (2 days / 2 nights. Checkout 3rd day),
Edfu (3 days / 3 nights. Checkout 4th).
But this is no problem, as we will send you a car / microbus to take you to Luxor
with stops in Komombo and Edfu – and there is no difference for you, if you get picked up from Daraw, Komombo or Edfu or
some place between them.
If you want to visit a village during a 1-day/1-night-felucca-tour you can choose between a Nubian OR Egpytian village (1 hour). Both villages cannot be visited on the same day, because they are too far apart from each other.
For overnight
tours the back of the felucca is filled with futons to sit or lie soft during the day and night. For the night wind shields are
wrapped around this futon covered place, a mosquito net can be provided. The captains sleep in the front to make sure they don’t
disturb you when you go to sleep.
Your
“Bathroom” is the Nile to wash, for brushing teeth water is provided (from the tap in a big canister). Also the
dishes are washed with the water from the canister.
If you need to relief yourself, the captain will stop at a beach. Please follow his advices which bush to choose to hide behind. There
are farms along the Nile behind the dunes and of course the locals don’t like foreigners to use their fields.
Also - please be clean as cats: it is easy to shove some earth / sand aside with your feet, and then cover well (!) what you will have
left. I think, you would also shout out loud, if foreigners would pass your ground, the wind plays with flying dirty toilet paper
after their visit, or there are smelly mines to step on. Also other travelers who will visit the same beach after you will be happy if
they return to their felucca with clean feet (especially if they will be out after dark).
More “Rules”:
- Please take off your shoes as soon you get on the boat.
- Please don’t throw cigarettes in the water as this is polluting many liters of Nile water.
Advices what to bring:
Mosquito repellent
Sleeping back (otherwise blankets are provided)
Suncream
Cap, hat or scarf in summer
Warm pullover during winter for sunset and night
Thank you for pictures and copyright for this website to use them:
• Claude Le Roux
6th and 7th picture: Lemons; camelmarket
10th: boy on felucca
• Richard Pentelow
5th: Melons on the Suq
10th: Camel and box of Coke
Middle: swimming in the Nile
• Emmanuel
Top on the right: wash in the morning
Middle: under the sunshade
Wojtek and Nadia
First photo in the middle column
3rd and 4th in right colum. Last in left column
• Petra Dressler
all others
1 day, 1 night
Private felucca for you and
your friends (no sharing with strangers):
75 USD one way - for all (not each person)
plus 16 USD each person each day for all meals
2 days, 2 nights
Felucca only for you and your friends (no sharing with strangers):
120 USD one way - for all
plus each person each day 16 USD for all
meals
3 days, 3 nights
Felucca only for you and your friends (no sharing with strangers): 160 USD one way
– for all
plus each person each day 16 USD for all meals
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Tea and Coffee are included.
Softdrinks or alcohol is not included.
----------
Pickup from felucca:
Transfer to Luxor with stop
at KomOmbo and Edfu Tempel
100 USD for car incl. driver
125 USD for microbus incl. driver.
* if you are more than 5 persons a bigger felucca is needed.
Prices for the bigger felucca (not each person) =
110 USD
(1 day / 1 night)
170 USD
(2 days / 2 nights)
230 USD
(3 days / 3 nights)
Please don't worry, the captain will arrange all paperwork without need of your presence.
The copies of your passports will be stamped at the tourist police on the previous day and the captains receives papers for their licenses, the captains themselves, stamped photocopies of your passports plus a red paper to be copied from the captain to give to the Nile Police on the first day of your overnight trip (all papers, see photo on top picture).
The next morning (first day) you start at about 10 am and when sailing out of Aswan the captain has to stop at the station of the Nile Police (2nd small picture). There he has to leave the papers except one to have with him in case he will be asked from some Nile police on the way north.
Sometimes feluccas have to stop at the Nile Police until noon because the officer in charge is not there. Of course the captains feel sorry for their guests and also would prefer to start sailing to make it in time to Daraw, Komombo or Edfu, but they cannot help it.
When Sero sees feluccas waiting at the Nile Police, he prefers to do a round, sail back to Aswan so his guests enjoy sailing instead of sitting on the felucca in front of the police station and wait for the papers to be done. As soon the police officer shows up, the feluccas start to move and Sero gets the papers from the police right away.
And this is how we received this review in tripadvisor, Nov 24 - 2011:
"The crew, boat and catering were great; the problem was with the police permit for the trip which for some reason was not
organised in advance of departure and resulted in a loss of half a day;
I had requested an 08.30 start to give us the best chance of getting there. We checked out of the Moevenpick (Elephantine Island) and
the felucca arrived on time and picked us up from the dock. The captain then said he still had to get the permit and left his mate to
sail us in circles around the hotel for the next 4 hours before returning."
We are very sorry about this review, the captain had tried to do his best by even starting the felucca tour 1.5 hours
more early than usually to fulfill the guest's wish, but on that day the Nile police had opened even later so the felucca could not
leave Aswan until the police officer in charge arrived. So the captain thought his guests would be happy to sail around Aswan instead
of waiting at the police station.
After this review we have decided that the tour always starts at 10 am, no matter if a guest wishes an earlier start.
Regarding the felucca tour, everything was fine. The captain and the crew were very friendly, took us to many nice
places and cooked excellent food!
I forgot I had to call and confirm 2 days before and only called the day before, so we had to spend the first day around Aswan and
left on the second day. Consequently, after 3 days we only reached Kom Ombo and not Edfu, as we'd have liked, but that wasn't a
problem at all. And we even went through a sandstorm, interesting experience! :)
(from Alberto, guestbook May 17, 2012)
On the street some captains offer "for 20 only".
Please be warned, that usually this will be in USD, English Pounds or other currency.
Prices you negotiate could be for the first hour only, every following hour could cost much more.
Prices could be for each person, or one hour is 40 minutes only.
The tour could be used to be intrusive and a second captain sell all kinds of souvenirs, etc. etc.
Phantasie has no ends.
Why do I tell you this? Because guests that sail only with Aswan Individual of course dont make the experience what can
be behind offers from the street: "I am sure I could have got these things cheaper if I had been on the spot to sort it myself -
however he provided an excellent service at probably half what a hotel would charge." (Nov 29 - 2011 in tripadvisor)
Of course it is up to you to decide if you prefer to negotiate on the street or if you want to reserve with services and agreements
written down by email in advance, reserved with people who have been recommended to you and are keen to keep their global reputation.
Also sometimes we are asked about felucca sharing.
This is not offered from Aswan Individual.
About 13 persons from different low-budget-hotels are collected to share one felucca. The food provided is very "easy", of
course there is not much privacy when one puts his toe in the nose of the next traveler while sleeping.
Please see picture if you are interested.
Aswan Individual offers all services exclusively.
