Perfect Cairo Layover Tour - I made the most of a 24 hour stop in Cairo thanks to the team at Ramasside. They were able to put together a perfect layover tour for me that covered the Giza pyramids and the Egyptian museum. My guide Alberr was very knowledgeable. I would highly recommend them to anyone considering a transit or a long visit to Egypt. I hope to return myself too!

Great tour and fabulous guides! - We chose Ramasside from the many operators after having excellent communication and help arranging a privately guided tour for two weeks including a Nile cruise and Alexandria. Here are the highlights of this amazing tour: 1. Organizing the tour: perfect. I contacted by email several operators about six months in advance and Ramasside was the most prompt and detailed in replying. Nada from Ramasside helped us arrange the perfect trip for our specific wants (superior accomodation and guidance, off-the-beaten track site visits, local experiences, and a packed iterinary but two days to enjoy things on our own and at our own pace). 2. Guides: Top drawer! Can't say enough about how great our guides were. Always prompt, ensuring everything was going smoothly, deep and broad expert knowledge, and flexibility to change to make sure we saw attractions when they were not crowded....not a minute was wasted because they were all so organized. Shout outs to Mohammed Sayed (Aswan/Luxor/Nile cruise), Mohammed Salama (Alexandria) and Paul Asamir (Cairo). I would recommend them all to anyone visiting Egypt. They really made us feel taken care of. 3. Sites: Perfect. What was particularly good was being given expert knowledge while touring, but time on our own at each site for photos, and arriving when there were minimal (in some cases no) groups of tourists around. And we saw two sites that you must visit, they are so worth the 3 hours it takes to see them: Dendara and Abydos..they are even better preserved than any other we saw and i would go there more than Abu Simbel if you only have one to choose from. 4. Pick-up/transfers: smooth. All were on time, we were always greeted at the airport, or helped into our hotel, never did we feel confused or uncertain what to do as it was all taken care of. 5. Drivers: Almost perfect. Mina (Cairo) was amazing. He was prompt, courteous, and safe. Romani (Aswan) was also great. However, I did not like the driver who took us to Rishad (rosetta) and back to Cairo from Alexandria...he was a particuarly aggressive driver (driving in Egypt is crazy, but he was annoying a lot of other drivers by how reckless he sometimes was in lane changing). And our car (not his he said) had no seatbelts in the middle seats so we had to sit in the uncomfortable back seats That wasn't so bad except he clearly did not care and was a bit annoyed it seemed that we insisted on having seat belts. I dont know his name, unfortunately. 6. Food: Hit and miss. All the hotels breakfasts were so good and there were many egyptian delicacies to try...but dinners, including all but one on the cruise boat, were so bland, with very dry, overcooked meats (fish was consistently good) and rarely was there anything egyptian! when we ate locally (on our own) we found some amazing restaurants. 7. Cruise: Nice boat! We took the Steigenberger Royale, royal suite, and it was a great boat to take. Lots of covered outdoor space, an extra deck (many have only one outdoor deck), surprisingly large dipping pool, and the attendants and service at the restaurant (Mohammed) was perfect. The food (note above) hit and miss except for the good egyptian food night. And the had a fun Nubian performance that we participated in. 8. Communication. Here's the problem. The only downside to all of this was some very poor communication about pick-up times and tour times I think due to there being a 'traffic department" communicating to tour leaders, tour guides and the tour office (Nada). Somewhere in all of that things were getting mixed up. For example we arrange a full day on our own with a 7 PM tour that I confirmed a day before and the morning of...but at 3:30 in the afternoon we got a message ("I'm here at the lobby") from our guide who had been told to pick us up for our tour...not 7 pm but 3:30 in the afternoon. There were at least two , maybe three, other occasions with similar confusion. And at times were greeted and transported by someone who didn't explain that they were only there as a transport and not a guide (e.g. we arrived at one hotel and a new guide was there when we arrived but we had no tour that moment so we didn't know why he was there..turns out it was just to check us in. that's great, and nice, but we should have been told we were going to be greeted by someone and not to be wondering who he was and why he was there. Overall, a really great experience.

Enlightening, Informative and Enjoyable - I spent 2 days with Donna and thoroughly enjoyed them. The first day we did the Sakkara, Memphis, Dahshur tour. Donna is very knowledgeable, easy to talk with, and has a great sense of humor. He is very good at giving the right amount of information and helping to make historic connections between the different sights. On the second day we took in Coptic Cairo and finished with The Citadel. Donna is especially informed about the Coptic sights and their history and traditions. Mark was our driver for both days and was always in the right place at the right time. Thanks guys for 2 fabulous days!

Cairo tours - Sam was an awesome guide! He gave great information and worked with me when my kids needed snacks and breaks. I would highly recommend Sam and his drivers to give you the best experience!!

Great tour - The day was very well organized. Pick up time was confirmed the day before, and our guide Amir was ready with everything that we had requested. Despite it being a Friday and facing immense crowds at the large Pyramid in Giza, he managed to steer us towards quieter areas for viewing, pictures, etc. We then went to Memphis and Saqqara, with lunch at a tourist restaurant in-between them. Amir was knowledgeable and informative, and answered our many questions. It was a pleasant day and I would recommend Ramses Tours without hesitation.

Frrde's Fieldtrip - What an amazing tour! Mina and Ibrahim were awesome guides. Insightful and knowledgeable. I was shown the main attractions and a few hidden spots that were amazing! The Papyrus and Perfume tours are a must for any visitor doing this tour. Also getting to experience the local street foods was amazing.

Caution recommended before booking. - booked and secondly what was delivered was poor. But mostly it was the way issues were handled that should be a cautionary tale for other travellers. We booked to go to the pyramids along with lunch overlooking the Nile and a Fellucca trip on the River afterwards. If time was to available then the tour would visit ‘the bazzar’. After sitting on the bus for over an hour we finally took off (a number of people had been given the wrong time by the Ramasside office and it was not their fault we were delayed). The guide began to talk and eventually explained the tour. It wasn’t the one we booked (there were others in the same situation). We gestured for him to come talk to us and he continued answering questions that were being shouted out. When he came over we explained that we must be on the wrong bus to which he explained the tour again. We finally got him to understand that we were not happy to be on the wrong bus and asked him to get us swapped (by this time we were well through the streets of Port Said). He went to make a long call and came back to tell us ‘that tour was full’. He spent a long time telling us to enjoy this tour and trust him etc but we said we didn’t want to do this tour. So he went to make another call. He came back and said he would see what could be done when we got to the Museum (we had done before so didn’t want to do again). By this time we were well through Port Said. Needless to say when we got to the museum nothing was said, nothing was done and we knew we were stuck on this tour. We walked round the museum again and then he announced that we would all go for lunch. He asked if people wanted to buy lunch for $15USD. We got to the ‘restaurant’ (called Rhianna) where those who hadn’t opted for lunch found there was no other option nearby so had to fork out $15. The quality of lunch can only be symbolised by the server asking if you wanted chicken and putting one small piece (less than a chicken nugget) on your plate of salad and rice. The restrooms were dirty as was the restaurant and there was no option of going back for more. The next stop was the pyramids and the sphinx which at least was what we wanted. We eventually got there and the first thing was to be heeded into a group photo for rammaside publicity. You were walked as a group to the front of the great pyramid and then to the edge before being told that you had to get on the bus. No time to explore or walk just herded back on so that we could go to a ‘viewing platform’ which turned out to be a place for camel rides and tourist sales (great if you were looking for fridge magnets). From there we went to the Sphinx which amounted to being given five minutes to take photos from behind a wall now where near it then herded back on the bus. All in all the two reasons for visiting Giza had been reduced to a 40 minute staged photo op. From there we were taken to a ‘papyrus museum’ I.e one of the many shops selling modern day papyrus look alike. The guide then said ‘we will go to the Bazaar’. We had been to Cairo before and enjoyed going round the famous market near the Great Mosque and knew it was nowhere near where we were. We went to a shop called ‘el Bazzar’. We sat on the bus for over an hour as three people negotiated for some shopping. The whole bus sat there and waited longer than we had been at the pyramids outside a shop not the famous Bazzar. The guide then announced that as some of us had booked a fellucca ride the whole bus would do it. By now it was very late, and many on the bus were tired and wanted to get back but we were taken to the side of the Nile in the middle of the hotel district and put on a boat. Not a fellucca, just a boat. Our guide hadn’t communicated with us since Port Said. So wrong trip, poor tour and guess what happened on the way back? He came asking for the rest of our payment (we had paid half as a deposit). The tour we bought was more expensive than the others on the bus had paid for. So we told him we would talk to the office the next day to discuss payment. He made a call and came back with some arguement that we must pay. We sent him away and he came back with his phone saying someone from the office wanted to talk to us. To put this in to context, more calls were about our payment than were made about us being deliberately put on the wrong tour. The woman on the call was aggressive and rude. We were told that we had done a tour so why did it matter that it wasn’t what we wanted. We were told we should have just got off the bus if we didn’t want to do the tour (we were out of Port Said and told it would be sorted at the Museum remember). We were told that we had lunch and went on a boat so what was the problem etc (not the lunch we booked and not a daytime trip in a felucca). The mindset was ‘you must pay’ and no consideration even to the fact that not only was it not what we wanted but the tour we were put on was cheaper. Eventually the aggressive tone changed and she seemed to understand why were not happy and agreed that they would leave it to the next day. So my advice to others is to check everything this tour company offers (don’t assume you are going to the famous Bazaar!) when you book and before you get on your bus but don’t expect to be much more than a sales opportunity for a couple of camel rides and poor shops. If you want to enjoy the spectacular pyramids and sphinx then find a better way.