>Hi Farzanah 
 
Hope you are well. It was a shock to my system to come home to such cold weather. The weather in Egypt was amazing and I have a cool tan to show for it. 
 
Our stay in Egypt was fabulous, we couldnt have asked for a better holiday and it was also our anniversary. 
 
Where do I begin, first I want to thank you for putting together the holiday and package and for dealing with the date changes. 
We were really happy with everything excepting the hotel in Ain Sokhna. I will not recommend anybody to that hotel. I have filed a complaint and the front Office Manager, Adina, at the hotel has it as well as Mina of your ground handler in Cairo. 
 
Apart from that everything was absolutely fantastic. 
 
Mina was / is a star, he is so friendly and helpful and his knowledge of Egypt is amazing. We learnt so much from him and he went out of his way to sort out the one constant problem we had with all our hotel bookings. We always got a smoking room and two single beds. I know you requested a double bed and non smoking. In the end we were accomodated by the hotels and the cruise ship. 
Mina sorted out the problem at Ain Sokhna and made the arrangements for us to be collected and transported back to Cairo to the Oasis Hotel. 
 
Oasis hotel in Cairo is very nice and staff are very friendly and helpfull. It is a pity that it is so far outside Cairo itself. The food is great. 
 
MS Zeina the cruise on the Nile, WOW what an experience. We had temperaturs of 48-52, thank heavens for the pool on board. The staff were all friendly and helpful and the food was excellent. We had a wonderful time on board and didnt realise how big the Nile was in places. 
 
Hurghada, Sea Star, this gets the gold star and award. I will recommend anybody to go there. There is nothing you can find fault with, on the beach, fantastic staff, excellent food everything was great. We arranged a snorkelling package for the day with Wael through your ground handler and it was worth every cent, it was amazing. The guides we had on the boat were excellent and they knew there diving safety. My husband and I are both scuba divers and know how important safety is. They were fantastic. To swim and snorkel in the Red Sea was undiscribable. We took photos underwater and I must still have them developed. 
 
The train from Cairo to Luxor was an experience, nothing wrong with it at all. The food was good and the sleeping accom was good. 
 
I could write pages and pages on Egypt and the fantastic service we received and how much we loved it. We are planning to go back to Hurghada, hopefully next year to do a live aboard diving holiday. So if you have any contacts or packages keep me in mind. 
 
I would really appreciate it if you could send our warmest thanks and appreciation to the ground handler in Cairo. 
 
Mina was amazing. 
 
We had Rehab as our guide for the Pyramids, Sphinx and Cairo museum, she was fantastic and her knowledge is endless. She has real passion for her work and gets along with people really well. 
 
Our guide we had for the cruise was Tarek. His knowledge and history of the temples and Egypt is endless. He was our replacement guide as the first one we had couldnt really speak English and Grant and I couldnt understand him. There again our complaint was taken care of immediately and we went on. Tarek is an amazing person. At Luxor he took us out in the evening and showed us around, out of his own. We really formed a friendship with him during those 3 days. It was sad to say goodbye to him. 
 
Overall, we had an amazing team of people who guided us, took care of us and transported us. If I could do it all again I would, except the Ain Sokhna part. 
 
We would like to thank African Encounters - Farzanah Amod, the Ground Handler in Cairo - Mina , Rehab and Tarek, you made our holiday and absolute dream come true. Through our travel and experiences we formed a friendship with each one of these amazing people and we hope to see them again. 
 
Farzanah if you require any more info please let me know, as I said I can go on forever. 
 
Thanks for everything 
 
Best regards 
Tania Geldenhuys & Grant Magee