We will be seeing the 'Splendours of Egypt' leaving Canada on May 11/05. Because the Insight brochure states "In Egypt and Greece, only tours of 10 people or more will be escorted by an Insight Tour Director" we asked our travel agent to find out how many people are booked on our tour so far. Insight told her that London keeps the numbers and we are only allowed to know that the tour is not full. Question 1 - why the secrecy? Question 2 - if there are less than 10 on the tour and we don't have an Insight Tour Director, what exactly does that mean for us and the quality of our trip?
Our Canadian bank can get us Egyptian currency but they have no control over the denominations of the bills we will receive. We always like to have some local currency when we arrive in a country plus changing CAD to USD at home then to Egyptian in Egypt loses us money at every exchange. Question 3 - Are there Egyptian bills that are 'too big' and won't be accepted readily? Question 4 - Since it seems that we will need lots of 1 pound notes are they easily available at the airport or Cairo Marriott exchange desks?
Thanks for the help. We can't wait for the trip to start!

Hi!

A local exchange office can usually get you the currency that you need. If they don't have what you need right on hand, they can usually order it. It can take a few days, so don't wait until the last minute.

May I suggest that you NOT convert from CDN to US to to get foreign currency ... you end up losing money! Let's say you pay 20% exchange to purchase the US dollar, the US dollar that you've purchased will NEVER get you 20% more of the foreign currency.

No matter how low our CDN $$ may be against a foreign currency, changing it to US first will always cost you more.

Have a great trip!

We went on the Splendours of Egypt tour in March, 1999. (Some detailed notes on our tour are linked from the Where are all the tales? topic.)

The original number of participants was 12 but 3 couples cancelled the day before the tour started. In spite of there only being 6 of us in the group, Insight allowed us to be fully escorted.

The nature of the tour is such that the lack of a full time TD may not be a problem. My guess is that if you were not fully escorted, then you would simply have a different tour company representative at each place. This would save the TD's airfares (Cairo-Luxor-Cairo and Aswan-Abu Simbel-Aswan for the "not-to-be-missed" optional).

I should also point out that we never had an "Insight" Tour Director: whilst there was an Insight manager resident in Cairo at that time, all tour services were provided by Spring Tours, a local company. I believe that may still be the way Insight's tours in Egypt are provided.

Phil

I have always found the availability of foreign currency at local branches are "hit and miss". Canada's Big Five Banks (Royal Bank, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Bank of Montreal, Scotia Bank, and TD Canada Trust) all have main branches in downtown Toronto. I have always found that main branches keep a greater supply of foreign currency in comparison to local branches. You may have better luck finding Egyptian currency with the main branches.

blj,

I don't believe that obtaining Egyptian currency should be an issue at all.

We were met by the Spring Tours rep on the airside of customs and immigration at the airport and he assisted us to move through these processes very quickly. In no time at all, we were in the minibus on the way to our hotel. I had some low denomination US bills which I used for tipping initially and these were very welcome. Next morning, we obtained all the Egyptian notes we wanted from a bank branch in the hotel.

At the end of the tour, we used the remaining Egyptian currency at the airport for miscellaneous purchases.

Phil

We are leaving on the Best of Egypt 3/25/05. We are going to get currency at the airport (JFK) before we leave.

Hi there,
As far as we are aware, it is not a case of secrecy it is simply that figures are consolidated in London and offices probably don't have access to these. We have just checked and can tell you that there are 25 on this tour as of today.
I think that the case of the TD only really happens when numbers are small enough to use a driver guide in a private vehcile instead of a coach.
Thanks
Brad & John

I am on the 'Splendours of Egypt' trip that starts the 24th from Cairo too. Any idea how many are on in tour group?. My cousin and I are from LA. We are bringing US currency/ traveller's checks and will convert some when we get there. I have heard from recent travelers to Egypt that the vendors and tour people love lower deomination US currency for tips and purchases. I think we may need some local currency for the restaurants though. Have a safe trip. We'll see you in Cairo. Look for Pele and Alicia.

Hallo Alicia,
There are 34 people.
You will have great time.
Temperatures are apparently running at about 23 Celcius (73 Farenheit) every day at the moment and it is sunny!
Way to go!
Brendan and Linda