Family favourite4.9
Cairo
Fayoum Oasis, Wadi El Rayan Waterfalls and Sandboarding with Lunch
Waterfalls in the desert, dunes to board down, the Magic Lake and lunch in the pottery village of Tunis.
10 hPrivate
€90Beyond
Fayoum Oasis, Wadi El Rayan and Wadi El Hitan
Waterfalls in the desert, dunes, a salt lake and the Valley of the Whales.
- Distance
- 100 km from Cairo, 1.5–2 hours
- Wadi El Rayan
- Two lakes and the waterfalls, protected since 1989
- Wadi El Hitan
- UNESCO 2005; Basilosaurus and Dorudon skeletons
- Lake Qarun
- The ancient Lake Moeris, saline, 40 km long
Fayoum is a green depression 100 km south-west of Cairo around Lake Qarun. Wadi El Rayan has Egypt's only waterfalls between two desert lakes and the dunes for sandboarding; Wadi El Hitan, the UNESCO Valley of the Whales, holds 40-million-year-old whale skeletons in the open sand; Tunis village is the potters' village on the lake. Both are private day trips from Cairo with a 4x4 in the protectorate.
Visiting
The Fayoum has been farmed since the Middle Kingdom, when the pharaohs of the Twelfth Dynasty regulated the branch of the Nile that feeds it. Today it is fields, canals and palms around the salt lake of Qarun, with the Sahara beginning at the edge of the fields.
Wadi El Rayan is where drainage water from the oasis formed two lakes in the 1970s, joined by the waterfalls. Beyond them the dunes rise and the Magic Lake changes colour with the sun. An hour further along a desert track lies Wadi El Hitan, where the skeletons of early whales with hind legs lie where the sea left them 40 million years ago, with a small excellent museum.
Tunis village on the lake shore is where Cairo's potters and artists settled in the 1980s; its garden restaurants serve lunch on both our day trips.
Tips from our guides
- Closed shoes for the sand and the fossil trail
- Swimsuit in summer for the waterfalls
- The Whale Valley trail is 3 km on sand; take water
Best time: October to April. Summer is possible with an early start; the lakes are for swimming then.
Questions
Yes: our Whale Valley tour includes the waterfalls on the way back. The sandboarding day skips the fossils to leave time for the dunes and Tunis village.
Very. The waterfalls, the 4x4 and the sandboarding are the parts children remember from Egypt.
29.2043 N, 30.4157 EOpen in Google Maps
