Terroir Adventure Travel currently runs four small-group trips to Egypt, each led by a private Egyptologist guide.
Groups are capped at 8 travelers for the Luxor Immersion, the Essential Egypt Itinerary, and Western Desert trips, and 20 for the Once-in-a-Lifetime Luxor Eclipse.
Trips run 10 to 17 days and start at $3,888 per person.
I cap my groups at 8 travelers because eight people can sit at dinner with a local guide and actually talk.
Meet the group in Cairo for the Great Pyramids, then fly to Luxor and settle into one guesthouse on the West Bank for the rest of the trip, surrounded by gardens and farmland, not a new hotel every few nights. That's on purpose: you can't get to know a place by passing through it. You have to sit still in it long enough for it to start making sense.
From there, a private Egyptologist guide takes you through Karnak, Luxor Temple, the Valley of the Kings, Deir el Medina, and the Noble Tombs, the sites everyone comes to Egypt to see. But this isn't a monument checklist: you'll walk through villages, wander the markets, bake bread and cook a meal with local hosts, and have the kind of conversations you can't have from a tour bus window.
Two of those nights are spent on a felucca, sailing the Nile the way people have for thousands of years. Swim in the river, eat what gets cooked onboard, and sleep under the stars while the riverbanks keep living their ordinary life right alongside you.
Capped at 8 travelers. Full itinerary: https://canva.link/terroirluxor
On August 2, 2027, the sky over the Nile goes dark for six minutes. This is one of the longest total solar eclipses of our lifetimes, and you'll watch it from the deck of a private Dahabiya sailing between Luxor and Aswan.
It's a 10-night immersion built around that moment, not a bolt-on eclipse tour. Three nights in Cairo with the Great Pyramids and the Grand Egyptian Museum, then a week aboard a traditional sailing ship with stops at Karnak, Luxor Temple, the Valley of the Kings, Edfu, Kom Ombo, and Philae. A sunrise hot air balloon ride over the Valley of the Kings. Licensed Egyptologist guides the whole way.
Capped at 20 travelers. Rooms range from a twin/king cabin to a balcony queen suite, priced per room, with all meals, transfers, and entrance fees included.
Prices are per person and based on double occupancy.
The deposit is $5,000 per person; balance is due 90 days before departure. International flights, flights within Egypt, and gratuities are separate. Clients should book their own flights from Cairo to Luxor, and Aswan to Cairo. If no flights have been booked 60 days prior to departure, overnight train tickets will be reserved for each customer from Cairo to Luxor, and a return flight from Aswan to Cairo; the cost will be passed on with the final invoice.
Six minutes of totality happens once.
Read the full itinerary here: https://canva.link/luxoreclipse
The Essential Egypt itinerary is a 15-day immersion into how geography, agriculture, belief systems, and daily life shaped one of the world's greatest civilizations—and how they continue to influence modern Egypt today.
Beginning in Cairo, you'll explore Old Cairo's layered religious history through Coptic churches, mosques, and synagogues that coexist in close proximity. From there, you'll travel south through Egypt's heartland: Luxor's temples and sacred landscapes, the Valley of the Kings' painted tombs, and a multi-night dahabiya cruise that lets you experience the Nile the way it has been traveled for millennia.
Unlike typical tours, there are no large buses, no rushing between sites. You'll spend time in places most travelers pass through. You'll cook with local sisters in their homes. You'll visit Nubian villages where architecture, food, and language reflect a distinct cultural landscape. You'll see Abu Simbel's massive temples at Egypt's southern frontier. And you'll connect every monument to the landscape that shaped it.
Your guide is Amer Ahmed, an Egyptologist whose expertise and passion bring Egypt's history alive. This is travel like a researcher, experienced like a local.
Cost: $7,359 per person (double occupancy). Solo supplement: $650.
Includes: All accommodation, domestic flights, private guide, meals, and dahabiya cruise.
Full itinerary: https://canva.link/essentialegypt
How I Build a Terroir Trip
Every Terroir trip starts with research. I study the place, and I read what matters to me. I work with a local guide who shares my vision and knows the place deeply. Then we design an itinerary that moves you through the landscape like a researcher: with purpose, with time to notice, and with a guide who knows the texture of where you are.
I cap my groups at 8 travelers: not because small is trendy, but because eight people can sit at dinner with a local guide and actually talk.
I partner with guides who live where they guide and who have a relationship to the place. They show you what matters to them, not what's on a checklist. They help you move through a place like a local because they are local.
I build unscheduled time into every itinerary, because the best moments in travel aren't scheduled. They happen because you're present enough to notice them.
