Many, many years ago I watched the programme ‘Around the World in 80 days’ with Michael Palin. In it he took the night train from Cairo to Luxor, and I’d been fascinated with the idea ever since. It looked like a real adventure.
By the time I actually got round to making the journey myself I’d been on a whole lot of night trains, so I pretty much knew what to expect. What I wasn’t anticipating was that this 10.5 hour journey would be the bumpiest, noisiest ride of them all!
Despite this, it does still feel like a bit of an adventure and it’s definitely the most memorable way to travel between Cairo and Luxor.
Here’s exactly what to expect when boarding the sleeper train from Cairo to Luxor.
The overnight train from Cairo to Luxor: what to expect
The cabin
The sleeper trains between Cairo and Luxor (and Aswan) are all run by the private company Watania, on behalf of the Egyptian Railway Service. Every single seat onboard can be converted into a bed and is within a cabin. Although you’ll see an option for straightforward seats on the website, it will always tell you there aren’t any.
The cabin consists of two large seats, which are turned into a bed at night, and then one bed above, which forms the second bunk. There’s also a ladder to get up to the top bunk.
The seats are large and comfortable enough, but very old and worn. The beds have a thin, but decent mattress, with a sheet, blanket and proper pillow.
It was pretty standard for a night train and relatively comfortable. Even with the AC turned off, I got really cold in the night (during winter) so you might want to have a fleece or something with you.
Other than the seats/beds there is a mirror and a small sink inside. The cabin is really small, so if your luggage is big, it is going to be very tight.
There’s some storage above you, but only really for day bags, and there isn’t room under the beds for suitcases.
There were various buttons in the cabin, but none seemed to work apart from the light switches! There’s a curtain to pull across the window which blocks out some, but not all of the light for sleeping.
The toilet
The toilets are shared and there are two located in every carriage. I never had to wait to use one. The toilets are western, but pretty basic. They are supposed to flush with a foot pump, but that never worked. There was always plenty of toilet paper though which I hadn’t been expecting!
There wasn’t any soap, so you might want to bring your own or some sanitiser. The toilets did smell fairly bad, but overall for train loos they were good.
The food
You get an evening meal and breakfast included in the price of your ticket, but it’s pretty basic, think aeroplane food but worse! Even though I selected vegetarian they brought me meat, so that left plain rice and boiled veg to eat.
Joe had chicken and said it wasn’t too bad. You also get a little dessert and juice. If you’re not a fan of plane food, I’d probably recommend eating beforehand to be honest.
The breakfast is a series of packaged bread, cake and croissant, which are tasteless. You also get yoghurt, juice and tea or coffee. I preferred just to wait to have brekkie in Luxor!
There is a lounge car which serves hot and cold drinks, as well as a very small selection of snacks. However, this seemed to be the place to go if you wanted to smoke, so it’s not somewhere you want to linger if you’re a non smoker.
The experience
I’d say the first couple of hours out of Cairo were pretty smooth and standard. After that it became a seriously bumpy and jolty affair, not to mention reeeeeally noisy! All trains bump a bit, but this was definitely on another level. I’ve taken over 20 night trains in various countries and this one was definitely the most jerky and loud. It also vibrates you intensely, which was a new one for me.
Unless you’re the sort of person that can sleep through a lot of movement and noise, you may manage to sneak a couple of hours sleep, but probably not anymore than that!
Most of the journey is of course at night, but you will get a bit of pretty rural scenery in the morning, and it was lovely to watch the sunrise.
We were also really surprised that the train ran exactly on time and everything about boarding etc was seamless.
The verdict: was it worth it?
Considering this has hardly been a glowing review, you’re probably thinking the answer will be no. In reality I don’t regret taking it, but I did change our itinerary to fly from Aswan to Cairo instead of taking the train both ways as originally planned.
Overall, I’d say that experience wise it’s one of those ones you look back on and laugh at because it was just so bumpy. You’d constantly be saying ‘are you asleep?’, ‘nope’, pretty much all night. If you’ve never taken a night train and want to see what it’s like, then I’d say go for it - although I will caveat that by saying it does depend on what you’re planning to do the day you arrive in Luxor.
You’re unlikely to get much sleep at all on the train, so if you only have very limited time in Luxor you might want to consider how it could affect your day. We were lucky to have five days in Luxor, plus I had spent a week there previously.
We were pretty wiped out on the day we arrived from the train and only managed to do a sunset felucca ride. If you’re planning an action packed day in the Valley of the Kings etc I would reconsider the train unless you can sleep through anything!
In terms of cost/value, the train is by no means cheap and if you book in advance you can fly for much less - but you do save a night’s accommodation - so overall unless you are staying in very low cost hotels or hostels, it will save you money.
At time of writing the cost of the train is USD $160 for a cabin for two people and USD $120 for a single cabin.
This is of course if you’re a foreigner as the Egyptian rate is much lower. For the price, it’s definitely the worst value night train I’ve ever taken by a long way, but it is the only way you can do it as a foreigner in Egypt. You can take local trains during the day, but not overnight.
For comparison, you can get a flight from Cairo to Luxor for around USD $35 per person if you book in advance, but flying will mean you need to book a hotel for the night.
Tips for a better train experience
If you’re staying in Giza, then you don’t need to go to Cairo as you can board at the station in Giza. You won’t be able to book a ticket starting from Giza - you must select Cairo - but you can board there. It’s the next stop along and arrives around 20 minutes after it leaves Cairo. Not only will this stop you having to negotiate the horrendous Cairo traffic, but navigating Giza station is much easier than Cairo’s Ramses station. As a foreigner we weren’t even asked to go through security at Giza, which was really surprising.
There is a bar at the station in Giza you can wait at and you’ll likely be directed there. Watch out for the fact that they will hand you extra things (for us it was cakes) that you didn’t order and will then add them to your bill at the end. Hand them back straight away if you don’t want them. By Egyptian standards the bar is expensive and quite bright and loud. You might prefer waiting on the platform.
Bring soap or wet wipes as the train had no soap. Although there was plenty of toilet paper you might want to bring your own just in case. You also might want to bring water as this was an extra charge on the train (although not very expensive).
Bring a warm layer. I found the train really cold and the blanket was quite thin.
Watch out for the bag carriers when you exit the station at Luxor. Given half the chance they will grab your bag out of your hands and carry it out the station before demanding a big tip. If you want the help that’s fine, but we found that it was hard to fend them off and we didn’t actually need help.
The taxi drivers at Luxor Station are Giza style hasslers. They will aggressively demand you go with them for their crazy inflated prices. There is sadly no Uber in Luxor, and though there is apparently Careem, we could never get a lift. This is one occasion where I’d say you might want to get your hotel to pick you up, or prepare to haggle very hard because the drivers were trying to charge double what the Hilton hotel charges for a ride!
Booking your tickets
Booking your sleeper train tickets can be a frustrating experience as it’s a pretty glitchy system, but persevere and you’ll get there.
Here’s how we did it to save you some time and hopefully stop your blood pressure going through the roof!
1. Head to Ernst’s website
Instinct is to go to the Egyptian Railway’s website, but ultimately this doesn’t work. Booking a ticket here seemed to be an almost impossible task, it’s much easier on Ernst’s website. They run the sleeper trains and you can get your tickets by heading to https://www.wataniasleepingtrains.com/.
2. Create a profile and fill in the inquiry section
You’ll need to create a profile which requires your passport number and lots of identification. You’ll also have to do this for any other passengers you’re travelling with. Sometimes you’ll have to go to the “book now” page as the inquiry one won’t work.
Here you’ll see a drop down list of the stations you can pick from, of which Giza isn’t one of them. If you are intending to get on at Giza, just select Cairo as your start point.
Make sure you select “bed” (there are no other seat types on these trains and you’ll get no results) and select “foreigner” for seat type and nationality. You’ll get a list of results like the screen below.
Depending on the time of year, you’ll have a choice of two train times in the winter months and just the one in summer. We confirmed with Watania that there’s no difference between the trains (at time of writing), it’s just they run more services during peak season, so pick the time that works better for you. We chose the 9pm departure, which arrived in Luxor at 7am, as we weren’t keen on arriving in Luxor at 5.55am.
You’ll also be able to see how many seats are available on each train and the price per person for a ticket: USD $120 per person for a single cabin, USD $80 per person for a double cabin (making a double cabin USD $160).
3. Passenger info & how to pay
From here, if you get anything wrong you have to start all over again! It will temporarily take the tickets you tried to book off the total amount available on the website, so if there were only two tickets left and you got it wrong, you’ll have to wait a while to book.
If you are a group, select “yes for family” to ensure you go in cabins in the same carriage.
4. Receiving your tickets
After you’ve finally cracked it, you’ll get a blank email with pdfs which are your tickets. It can easily go into your spam folder, so check there if it hasn’t come through. You’ll need to print them out for the train.
Unfortunately, the pdfs didn’t work on our phones, it kept coming up with just a single page which wasn’t the one that has the vital info on it. You can see the mobile version below.
If, like us, it doesn’t work on your phone, then try to download the tickets from your email on a desktop or laptop. The correct format should have details such as your car and bed number, meal choice and your ID number.
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