Mini Travel Sherry Boat Nile River Cruises

We have just had a 7-day cruise on the Sherry (February 2012). The boat is fine for its purpose, our room was good (bigger then the room we had on our previous sea-cruise), the staff were all friendly, the food was reasonable - with three meals a day you could skip the odd course you didnt like without any danger of going hungry ! I have to mention that the boat was only 25%-30% occupied so I dont know what it would be like if full - though I dont see much chance of that arising in the present political/economic climate.

I did feel the drinks on board were overpriced - approx £15 for a bottle of (Egyptian) wine; spirits (locally produced) and cocktails were also very expensive, local lager (roughly £3.00 for a half-litre bottle) not quite so bad but still a bit pricy. Bear in mind you also have to pay for water (even with meals), and for tea/coffee (except at breakfast and tea time).

I hadnt realised how little time we would actually spend cruising - as opposed to sitting in port. The distance between Luxor and Aswan isnt that great, we spent the best part of 24 hours in Luxor at both the start and finish of the week, and 3 nights moored at Aswan. We were however spared the Egyptian 'fancy-dress' night which was a great relief !

It was our first trip to Egypt and while we were expecting to be hassled by hawkers and traders, the Guide explained this was worse than ever due to the reduced amount of tourism to the country. He wasnt wrong; it was quite distressing to see many children effectively begging, sometimes quite aggressively. You sense most people are really suffering in the present climate.

Overall looking back, it was a great experience; looking out at the activities on the river banks you get the sense that life for people on the Nile away from the towns hasnt changed much in centuries. There probably arent that many places left in the world you can find that.

I went to Egypt in November with my father and sister for an experience we had always wanted to do and it was truely the trip of our lives!

We stayed on the MS sherry boat and it was so fantastic I had to write a review and I am still raving about it and cannot believe some of the negative things I have read here!!!

The boat is not the most modern but all the rooms and the fittings are in great order, lovely decor and all working abnd fine. I did not come to Egypt for interior decor!! Besides apart from sleep we spent nearly all our time at the sites and temples or up on deck sunbathing and watching the nile life as we sailed by.

The best thing about the boat is the staff. they were all fantastic, so helpful, fun, polite, they really made the holiday wonderful and could not do enougth for you. Our guide Yasser was great too, he really made all the trips interesting and knew absolutly everything about everything! He also gave us many tips and hints about what to avoid, where to go, what to pay for goods etc.

The food on board was also delicious. Lovely varied buffet for breakfast, then lunch was a 3 course meal, with bread, starter, main and then fruit. Then afternoon tea at 5, although I was often still full from lunch! Then the evening food was amazing. Two nights there was a buffet which had a huge choce of wonderful foods. The other nights was a 4 course meal, which you chose at lunch. The quality was superb and two nights I had a wonderful rare fillet steak with a red wine jus which would have cost a fortune in England. The other good thing about the restaurant is you sit on tables of about 8, so you get to chat to the others n your group and we really got to make friends this way.

You do wake up early the first morning in Luxor; 5.30am but then you miss the stifiling mid-day sun which would not be fun for looking at sites in. You are also back for lunch, and then you have the rest of the afternoon to sleep, or relax which I ofetn did on a sunbed on deck, topping up tan. There is not an early morning each morning so one or two is bearable!

The bar area is nice to relax in; the first night there was a cocktail party, and one night we had a belly dancer which was great fun. One evening there was a glabeya party where everyone dressed up and did fun games etc, we made so many friends and had such a giggle! Other evenings people played card games and chatted etc.

The pool was refreshing and clean which I had to jump into fairly ofetn to cool down as the sun is hot. It was so wonderful to relax on deck and wastch the Nile as you float down it, so amazing, and the waiters come and take your order as you lie there, and bring you drinks which was great.

I would recommend going in November; it was hot but bearable, Summer months get up to 50 degress and it is just so sweltering it is not enjoyable!

We did not do abu Simbel but the people did in our group said it was fantastic, just a very early start. We did the baloon trip on our last morning, even thougth our flight home was at 9.30. This was staggeringly great, we saw the sunrise over the Nile, such a wonderful site for our last morning in Egypt, we were then down in town and transfered quickly to the airport to fly home.

Overall the MS Sherry boat was so wonderful and we have so many amazing memories of it. We had a group of about 22 and we all made friends and everyone said it was the best holiday they had been on and many had been to Egypt Nile cruises several times before. The boat has a lovely personal feel about it, like they care and are friendly. We had such a super time and can't wait to return!

I completely agree with the review written by 'Clippy'. The descriptions of the boat on the MS Sherry website are totally misleading. This boat is in no way ' Luxurious' or 'Majestic'.

The decor is dated and tatty - grubby curtains, cracked wood work, hard slatted bed , peeling cheap vinyl wall coverings.

On the plus side the cabin was a reasonable size and the standard of cleaning was excellent. If I asked for anything to be fixed (e.g.a faulty loo and dripping air conditioner ) it was fixed immediately.

The food was poor - stale bread etc. at breakfast, no choice at lunch and food was often over cooked. There were several meals which, had I been in a restaurant I would have sent them back. Several of us had an issue with the coffee which was cheap weak 'instant' stuff - we ended up paying (about £1 a cup) for better coffee from the machine in the bar, but they wouldn't get it for us if we asked before 8 a.m. as 'the bar not open ...!'

At the end of the week , when we moored in Aswan several of us escaped to a nearby hotel for a couple of lunches (about £10 for 3 courses including wine) and breakfast on Christmas morning (£5.00!)

The food served on the Egyptian evenings was much better - we made a point of expressing our appreciation but it made no difference to the rest of the week.

There was a long gap between lunch -1p.m. and dinner at 8p.m. so afternoon tea was looked forward to - and very disappointing. The same every day - a square of dry sponge cake and 2 tiny biscuits. I desperately wished I'd taken some digestives along!

I'm not a food fanatic but good food is usually a highlight of any holiday , especially on cruises.

We had the same experience(as Clippy) with a late arrival and ridiculously early start on the first day - bed at 2a.m. up at 5a.m. then major sight seeing all morning. Surely this could be better organised?

The rest of the visits were wonderful and our guide - Hussein - was excellent so overall I enjoyed the holiday but if the Sherry had been a hotel I would have asked to be moved .... I am currently in correspondence with Kuoni!

We arrived on board at 02.30am after a flight from Cairo to be told we had a 5am wake up call for the first days excursions to Karnak Temple, the valley of the Kings and Hatchensups temple, not quite the start we had envisaged when booking the trip.

Our room smelt very damp and musty (which was slightly better than the diesel fume smelling basement cabins, who couldn't even open a window for fresh air as we could). The room was quite cramped despite having what I can only describe as having 2 single beds rather than the advertised 2 double beds on the web site.

The food aboard was quite poor. Avoid the bread, toast and danish pastries unless you've left your hammer at home and need to hammer a nail into the wall, they are that stale! However the fresh fruit (melon, watermelon, guava, banana and grapes) is quite nice though having this every morning, then again at lunch and yet again at dinner can be a bit repetitive. So to avoid this I would settle for mashed potato, tinned hot dogs fried with peppers and onions just to break the monotony.

Lunch & dinner was served by the staff who were all very courteous, helpful and friendly. Each table was served a bowl of green salad and another bowel of vegetables (usually chickpeas or the like) to accompany the meal, each table have the same size bowl whether there was 10 on you table or just 2. At lunch there was no choice of food and dinner you had a choice of 1 of 2 diferent dishes. However, if you didn't like the food served they would deep fry some fish if you asked.

There were a couple of Egytian nights where you all dress up in Galibayas which can be brought on the boat. Beware though as the charge around 100 Egytian pounds before the night and 20 or 30 Egyptian pounds after.

The trips are well worth doing. They are all on the hurried side which is a shamje as we would have liked more time at each temple, tomb etc., something which is easily viable as we covered all the itineried visits of the 7 day trip in the first 3 days and also visited Abu Simbel on the 4th, which left the us doing nothing for the next couple of days apart from cruising back from Aswan to Luxor. If you do decide to take a cruise on the Sherry, my advice would be do the 4 day Luxor to Aswan, as cruisingfrom Aswan to Luxor is just that...cruising!

Although the Sherry is advertised as a 5 star boat I would put it no higher than a 3 star. It is clearly very tired and tatty and in dire need of a full refurbishment. The pool can only be described as a large bath and the jacuzzi didn't work, just like the piano! The bar staff were very attentive but they only had 1 beer available throughout the 7 day cruise despite 6 being offered on the menu. Other alcholic drinks were very limited, with no choice of wine for dinner or lunch.

All in all we were very dissapointed with the MS Sherry Boat, which took the shine off a fantastic holiday in a fantastic country. Would we go back to Egypt and cruise the Nile? You bet we would! Would we sail on the MS Sherry Boat again? Definitely not!

Overall this was a fantastic holiday and we met some brilliant people that were also staying on the boat. The staff made the holiday as they were very polite and friendly. We also had Egyptian tea with the captain most nights that was great. The boat was good and I would go back anytime but I would make sure I would buy some snacks for the day.

Overall the boat trip on the Mini Travel Sherry Boat was brilliant. The excursions were early in the morning so no lay ins if you intend to do excursions. The staff never let me lift a finger and we never touched our suitcases from checking in at Gatwick to picking them up at Gatwick. Be prepared to take lots of £1 for tipping off the boat as they are asked for everywhere you go. Also the boat asks you to settle your drinks bill at the end of your trip so take a note of how much your spending as it can creep up to a high amount if your not careful. A thoroughly enjoyable trip and a lovely boat.