Flash Magic II

We just came back from a week long trip down the Nile (from Luxor to Aswan) on the Magic II which is part of FLASH CRUISES. It was promoted by Beyond Boundaries Travel which featured daily biking trips to monuments from the ship. We thought this would be fun, but were REALLY disappointed.

We paid $5,400 for airfare to go from San Francisco to Luxor via Cairo, $4,500 for the week long cruise for three (on FLASH Magic II and Beyond Boundaries), $360 for excursions and $800 for hotels and meals in Cairo during transit. We decided we had ENOUGH of this cruise half way through and paid British Airways another $825 to bail and fly out early.

I am sure there will be some people who will enjoy a Flash Cruise up the Nile, but when promising one thing and delivering something else is just false advertising. There are dozens of boats which makes this trip little fun.

s1197.photobucket.com/albums/aa431/Deepak_SF/

The other problem this caused was that whenever we docked, there were hordes of people at the monument sites we were at. There were about 40 boats at Aswan at the same time we were and with approx 200 people per boat, we are looking at about 1000 people - just from the cruise boats - waiting to see the major sites.

So I'm sharing what we experienced last week with others who are thinking of a Nile cruising trip, so that they can be fully informed.

Part of our disappointment was in how Daily Candy (a newsletter) had promoted the trip dailycandy.com/all-cities/article/83969/Trav

The package organizer Beyond Boundaries travel (in my opinion) did a great job promoting a trip which had no semblance to the trip we were provided.

beyondboundariestravel.com/adventures.html

www.egyptbikeandsail.com

Anyway, we learnt our lesson and we are NEVER going back on a Nile Cruise and probably never back to Egypt either. As they say "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." So if this feedback helps just one other traveler avoid the disappointment our family feels, it will be worth it.