Lonely Planet Discover Egypt [ペーパーバック]

This is the sort of book you just want to curl up with and dream of your perfect trip. It has gorgeous pictures and lots of information about virtually all regions of Egypt. That is both a plus and a minus in the long run.

First, let me identify myself a bit. I studied Egyptology at the Oriental Institute (U. of Chicago). I've been to Egypt many times, going once every year or two. I travel completely by myself (single female) or with specialized tours, or a combination of both (partly with a tour, but then going off on my own afterwards).

The best overall guide book to the ancient sites of Egypt was unquestionably the Blue Guide, Blue Guide Egypt, which is out of print and partially outdated (hotels and restaurants change; ancient sites essentially don't). The Penguin Guide, Guide to Ancient Egypt, The Penguin: Revised Edition (Penguin Handbooks), is also good for ancient sites. This book is much more general and is aimed more at casual tourists.

First timers should absolutely go with a tour to avoid culture shock. Of course, you can always stay on after the tour and do what you want. This book can help, but frankly, many of the places covered in this book are places most tourists can never get to unless they are staying for a very extended time in Egypt. The average tourist will go to Cairo, Luxor and maybe either Aswan or Alexandria. Giza, Saqqara, Dahshur, Meidum and such are accessible from Cairo. Many out-of-the-way sites require permits that must be arranged weeks in advance.

I found the book quite accurate, although since it is so ambitious, there is a limited amount of information for each area. Anyone traveling by themselves will need to find more comprehensive guides for specific areas. Site maps and floor plans are absolutely essential, and the ones in this book are too small and general. I can't imagine trying to find one's way around Karnak with just the plan in this book.

Also, I found some of the bargaining prices mentioned just a bit high, especially for drivers for day trips. In fact, one should avoid bargaining for transportation. Any major hotel will have price lists for short taxi trips, and they will either have car services available or relationships with local companies that will arrange private cars. It will almost always be cheaper. Also, you will be guaranteed a clean and safe car.

Common scams: A private driver you hire off the street for a short trip around town may offer to take you somewhere the next day for a reasonable price. But the next day, he will be "ill" and his "brother" will meet you and put you in a rattletrap, unsafe contraption. At the end of the day, he will insist that you agreed to a price three times higher than you negotiated.

Also keep in mind that many places are changing rapidly, Luxor in particular. Hotels change names constantly. The roads are changing as the entire main part of town is being "modernized." (It's horrible, not like it used to be, complete loss of atmosphere, so sad.)

Dress conservatively for both cultural sensitivity and common sense. Arms, necks, legs and everything else should be covered with sunblock fabric. Wear a wide-brim hat (and carry a sun umbrella if you are there any time other than the dead of winter.) You will stay cooler and avoid biting insects.

If you're really planning to go, this is a very good book, probably more so if you haven't already been (as you can see from the other reviews, The More You Know the less you'll rely on the book or accept everything in at face value and it doesn't point out some not so obvious cautions as the other reviewers have helpfully done). Although I would say that it's obviously meant to use to go again and again, and not "oh hey, hit up all these while you're there for five or ten days", since some/most/all of the areas featured do warrant and require more than a drive by or pop in to absorb and appreciate and the book never seeks to insult the reader by implying otherwise.

It does cover a lot more areas than the typical tourist trap guide, physical destinations as well as logistics. There is a cultural section, albeit such information can and does take up entire books such as Egypt - Culture Smart!: The Essential Guide to Customs & Culture, that cover the same info, obviously much more in depth and with a bit more panache than the aw shucks ma'am just the facts given here. At least the Wall-E type tourists are forewarned, if paying attention. It is geared toward that mindset more than factually necessary. It even implores "don't even think of drinking the tap water." Somebody might want to send pearl clutching Lonely Planet a case of GSE. Nobody's trying to serve you Bear Grylls style elephant dung water.

If you just like to armchair vacation, or like a variety of resources to dream and plan, it's a really beautiful book. Features hundreds of color photographs of all the hotspots and varieties of people, places, and things you'd see as you tromp through modern Egypt on your way to your destinations, Pharaonic and otherwise. Contains two or three times that many interesting factoid articles to guide you on your way.

DISCOVER EGYPT by Sattin, Benanav, Firestone, and Hall, is a 384 page guidebook printed on semi-glossy paper, with color photographs or a colored map on almost every page. The book has 8 chapters. Each chapter is color-coded. These are Suez Canal & Red Sea coast (pink color), Cairo (red color), areas surrounding Cairo (light green), Alexandria (dark green), western desert (dark blue), Esna (light blue), Luxor (green), and Beni Suef (orange). In the first 27 pages, we find a splashing photographic introduction to Egypt, and the reader is treated to pictures of camels sitting in front of the pyramids of Giza, sailboats on the Nile River, statues at Luxor, Saqqarara's Step Pyramid, Abu Simbel, and Mt.Sinai. This introductory collection of photos also includes some local color, e.g., bearded men smoking molasses-flavored tobacco using water pipes, and Souqs (outdoor markets).

HIGHLIGHTS. Highlights occurring at later points in this book include:

1. Annual camel races at South Sinai Camel Festival (p. 47);
2. Re-enactment of Abraham's sacrifice of a sheep instead of his son, at Eid Al-Kebir Great Feast (p. 49);
3. Dozens of mosques to visit (pp. 73-77);
4. Features of temples at Karnak, Medinat Habu temple, obelisks, Tombs of the Nobels, and plenty of relief carvings, paintings, columns, pylons, and obelisks (pp. 98-125). These photos are supplemented with schematic maps of the relevant temple, for example, on one temple ground the map shows the location of the Chapel of Mut, Chapel of Amun, Colonnade, a pylon, obelisk of Hatshepsut, Temple of Ptah, and (for those interested in contemporary features of a temple), the location of a sound and light show (page 110).
5. Temple of Horus at Edfu, where the walls contain huge 50-foot tall relief drawings (p. 188);
6. Nature preserves where you can view flamingos or dive among coral reefs (pages 248, 257-263, 275);
7. Strange geological formations in the White Desert and nearby Black Desert (pages 282-311).

WARNINGS. The book provides warnings that tourists need to dress with arms and legs covered (pp. 61, 73), that shopping scams are common (p. 64), and that terrorist bombings may occur (p. 258, 346).

HISTORY. As with other tourist guidebooks in this series, DISCOVER EGYPT provides a full-page of history at various points in the book. For example, on pages 106-107, we learn of the periods of history at Thebes, which include the 12th dynastay pharaohs, the Second Intermediate Period, and the period of rule of Amenhotep III, when the Colossi of Memnon was built. Amenhotep III is noted for that that his son was Akhenaten, famed for believing in only one god. On page 323, we learn that Egypt had no Arabs, until Amr ibn al-As lad an army from Istanbul to Egypt, in the year 640.

CONCLUSION. This tour guide provides an excellent array of photographs of archeological sites, pyramids, and street markets. Obviously, one does not visit Egypt with the goal of viewing amazing skyscrapers. Dubai is the place for that. Obviously, one does not visit Egypt with the goal of bar-hopping and tasting various kinds of beer. England and Ireland are the places for that. Obviously, Egypt is not the place to go to treat oneself to an elegant $200.00 dinner. Paris is the place for that. The French Laundry in Napa Valley in California is also the place for that. For what it offers -- well preserved remnants of a very ancient civilization -- Egypt offers the best of what is available on the planet Earth. A note of criticism, is that the book seemed not to mention what to do about language difficulties, either in Cairo or in smaller cities, for people who only speak English. Another shortcoming, is that the book seemed not to devote significant space to shoppers -- for example, shoppers interested in buying artwork, clothing, spices, or replicas of ancient carvings.