8 mistakes in 8 days. Kettles in Egypt

24 January 2010 Travel time: with 02 January 2010 on 09 January 2010
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This was our first trip to Egypt, so before making it, I shoveled through a huge number of travel sites, read a lot of articles about this country, reviews of tourists and stories of travelers. When the decision was made to “go”, I knew everything about Egypt. Well, almost everything. I knew what the weather was like there in January; what is the temperature of the sea; difference between day and night air temperature; the language spoken; coins that are in use; how much to tip and for what to give; what souvenirs to bring and how to distinguish cheap fakes from originals; how to bargain; how to look on the street; how to communicate with the local population; what excursions and from whom to order ...- and much, much more. You can imagine how carefully I approached the choice of the hotel!!!

But somehow it turns out that the more you flutter and try to spread straws wherever you can hypothetically slip, the more new trials and difficulties appear. All my thoroughness and meticulousness did not save me from making mistakes. I am going to tell about them in order to warn others, and to draw the appropriate conclusions myself.


Mistake No. 1. Buying a voucher at the peak of the price.

This is not so much a mistake as a conscious step, although obviously incurring losses in the form of a significant overpayment for plane tickets and a hotel room. Being a first-time teapot in the travel industry, I mistakenly expected that by the new year the prices for tours would drop, hot offers would appear ...This did not happen. Against.

On the hottest dates, which were of interest to me in particular, prices began to rise so rapidly, and places on good flights and good hotels disappeared so quickly that I had to choose the best of the worst for the money that a week ago was asked for the best of the best. I had to quickly analyze the remaining hotels, urgently make a choice and pay. And even in these crazy conditions, I chose a fairly decent hotel in all respects - Alf Leila wa Leila - however, 4+, but this hotel differed from the top five of a good level only by its location on the second coastline. From articles and reader reviews, I knew how relative the star rating of Egyptian hotels is, so I focused not on the number of stars, but on the exact description of services, reviews of tourists, and from Western sites too, since this hotel is considered one of those that the Germans prefer .

So the voucher for the price of a super five, bought in the last two days before the new year, lay on the table. It remains to pack your bags, celebrate the new year and fly to Hurghada on the second day of the night.

Mistake number 2. Night flights.


There were four of us: me, my husband, a 15-year-old son and a 6-year-old daughter. Departure from Boryspil at 5.20. At the airport, as you know, you have to be two hours before departure. To go to Boryspil - 40 minutes. You also need to get up 40 minutes before the exit. The alarm clock was set for 1.30. We went to bed on January 1 at 20.00, in order to have a little rest before the languishing night. The flight back from Hurghada was supposed to take place at 20.00 - it seems to be quite convenient, but the plane was delayed by 10 hours! And if it were not for the guys from Kyiv, who learned about the flight delay in time, then we would have been cuckooing for 10 hours on the metal benches of the Hurghada airport. And so - we spent 6 hours out of 10 at the hotel.

The conclusion that I made for myself: hotels must be booked in advance, carefully learn about the time of departure there and back, book seats for the most comfortable flights by time of day. So, it is better to arrive at the hotel by 14.00: in most hotels, new guests are settled by this time, and you also need to leave the hotel at 13.30-14.00. At 12.00 check-out from the room, put your suitcases at the reception and before the bus arrives you will have time to have lunch at the hotel. Find out in advance if it is customary in your hotel to cut off the bracelets at 12.00. Our bracelets flew with us to Ukraine, so we could use All Inclusive services during the flight delay.

Mistake #3. Relocation.

I was on my way to the Alf Leila wa Leila hotel, which I knew everything about, down to the room numbers I was going to get with 20 bucks in my passport. And what?

At the reception in Alf Leila wa Leila, a certain hostess Linda kindly informs us that they have rooms that we will not like: they say, there are small windows, the rooms are bad with a bad view, so we offer you better conditions and a better hotel - 5 stars - on the first coastline. I immediately became suspicious: well, I don’t believe in free cheese! Moreover, she was going to use the right of the guests of Alf Leila wa Leila to a free visit to the show "A Thousand and One Nights", which Linde informed about. Linda assured us that we can come to this hotel at any time and even dine in it, come to the show when it suits us, and if we don’t like it in another hotel, we can come back in 2 days. In general ...we were chatted ...So we ended up in a large hotel on the first line of the Beach Albatros Resort.

Error number 4. Room with a sea view.

I knew that I should put a bill in my passport and kindly ask for a room with a sea view.


But I also knew that Egypt is a patriarchal country and a man should “solve issues” here. Therefore, I instructed my husband to put twenty in the passport and “nice to ask”, especially since he speaks excellent English. But my husband, not accustomed to giving bribes, could not do this ...But, by the way, I myself could not. It's one thing to know what to do, and quite another to do it. In general, he asked for a sea view, but he didn’t put a twenty. We come to the room… There are three beds in a row, close to each other… It is not clear how to approach them, just jump from the spot. We go out onto the balcony - as many eyes are enough - the desert is behind the fence, but if you contrive and bend your neck to the right - you can see a piece of the sea. Gee. But the bathroom is large, spacious, though without a bath - only a shower with a tray. In short, it all ended with the fact that we officially paid 20 c. u. e.

per day for an “upgrade” of the room and we were settled in a “family room” with a gorgeous view of the central pool and the endless blue sea that opens behind it. We did not regret this surcharge, the view from the window was really fabulous, and the room was an order of magnitude higher. We lived in room 1303 on the third floor, as my husband joked on the topic - a damn dozen and an ambulance.

Mistake number 5. Excursions in bulk

When I went to Hurghada, I knew that people come here, in particular, to take an excursion to Luxor, so visiting this particular part of the excursion program was practically not discussed. Next time we will go to Sharm or Taba, from where they take to Luxor only by plane and for big money ...In general, it remains to choose a day and make a payment ...And then the guide Mohammed (and who is not Mohammed at all? ) offers us three excursions wholesale for the price of one! I know that the tour "Cairo by plane" costs from 220 to 250 USD. e. per person. And here ...imagine, we are offered for 940 USD.

Instead of the stated 3 hours, a one-way trip takes 5 hours, not counting the time that the bus travels to hotels, collecting tourists. I don’t know how anyone, but I perceive this slight distortion of the fact as pure lies! If we initially knew that a trip to Luxor takes more than 5 hours one way, we would definitely refuse this excursion!! ! In Luxor, the temples of Karnak and Hatchepsut, as well as the Valley of the Kings, made an indelible impression on us. Everything else could be safely overslept, especially the terrible canteen where we were brought for lunch, having previously announced with pathos that we were going to have a meal in a restaurant. My husband and I picked up some kind of infection there - an intestinal infection, as the hotel doctor, called by insurance, told us. Thank God our children didn't get sick!! ! On the way back, I was already hooked in black: my head hurt terribly, apparently, a high temperature had risen.


The 5-hour drive back seemed like hell. We arrived at the hotel at 23.30 and immediately fell asleep. I was sure that I was just tired, everything would pass in the morning. And I didn't want to wake up in the morning. Such a cool infection - the temperature drives, you sleep and do not wake up. Well, the toilet bowl is our dear friend  My husband only got sick in the morning. I started calling the insurance company in Ukraine: 30 UAH per minute. Brave insurance. I called for such an amount that you could just go to the pharmacy and buy medicine: 6 USD. e. per plate. Who does not know: in order to call a doctor for insurance, you need to call the insurance company in Ukraine and report the occurrence of an insured event within 24 hours. After that, the insurance company contacts the hotel and “arranges” a doctor. It took half a day, can you imagine? And one man from Kazakhstan, by the way, never got through to his insurance: he had to resort to the services of a hotel doctor for a fee. And that's with insurance!

Miser pays twice

I sincerely hoped that we would recover before morning, but in the morning it was still bad, although better than the day before. Our big mistake was an attempt to overpower ourselves and fly to Cairo, despite being unwell. In the morning, at the appointed time, we, slightly staggering, were already standing on the reception with a bag and breakfasts from the hotel, ready for an agonizing trip. The bus arrived almost on time, the accompanying guide took the receipt of payment (THAT RECEIPT FOR WHICH WE SUBSEQUENTLY COULD REFUND AT LEAST PART OF THE TRIP COST!!! ), and we headed to the airport. I will not paint for a long time. We did not fly to Cairo. My husband got worse at the airport, and we actually returned from the plane. Interestingly, we returned to the hotel by taxi at our own expense, even without an escort! So Travel Ways is worried about its tourists. Draw your own conclusions gentlemen.

It was necessary immediately, as soon as you fell ill, to send a written application by fax to the Travel Ways office about the refusal of the excursion for health reasons, with a certificate from the doctor attached; it was necessary to keep the receipt of payment, and not give it to the guide. If someone can tell me what else I should have done in this situation, I would be very grateful. But I think that these two actions would be quite enough to receive at least partial compensation. And so - the Travel Ways company refused us any compensation whatsoever. We lost money, vacation time and health (fortunately, temporarily).

My husband was practically healthy by the evening of the day when we almost flew to Cairo. On that day, I decided to pull myself together and go to the beach so that mine would not sit with me in the room. After all, what difference does it make where you sleep: in your room or under an umbrella on the beach?


Moreover, there was no temperature anymore, which means that nothing prevented spending time in the fresh air, there would only be a toilet nearby.

I must say that the rest of the time we spent just fine. And three excursions every other day would be an excessive burden even for healthy people. We got excited a lot - we were tempted by a freebie. Excursion to the "Paradise Island" we took advantage. True, they imagined a truly paradise island, green, fragrant, blooming ...A deserted piece of land with a single palm tree can hardly be called a "paradise", as the sign insistently testified to. But we plunged into the underwater fauna of the Red Sea, and this is truly an unforgettable experience!

Mistake number 8. What kind of tour operator do you have

And again about Travel Ways… Guide Mohammed is an irresponsible person. If it were not for the guys from Kyiv, who were supposed to fly back on our own flight, we would not have known that our flight was being postponed. At 17.

00 Travel Ways arrives to pick us up at the airport - not a dream about rescheduling the flight. WE inform them that our flight is rescheduled! The guide ran in, began to call somewhere, find out something ...Yes, the flight is delayed until 20.00. So we stayed at the hotel, walked, had dinner, rested some more ....If waiting can be called rest. At 20.00 we already knew that the flight was being postponed again, but the guide who arrived again did not know anything. The flight was postponed until 4.00 in the morning, so at 2.00 the guide will come for us again. We had to book a room before this time in order to get some sleep before another exhausting night. It cost $80. e. No, I do not blame the tour operator for the fact that the plane was delayed in Zaporozhye due to bad weather.


I just think that a travel business professional will closely follow the information from the airport and promptly inform their tourists about all changes in the schedule, and not pull themselves, the vacationers, or the bus driver, who also had to come to the hotel several times in order to we informed the guide that the flight was delayed. Nonsense! By the way, Teztour works quite well in Egypt: the buses arrive on time, the guides do not know the word “I don’t know”, they speak Russian well. In the hotel where we lived, there was always a guide ONLY from Teztour. So what if you take it for advertising: I didn’t use their services, I just watched the work from the outside. I like it. Next time we fly with Tez.

Translated automatically from Russian. View original
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