Egypten

Rugged and starkly beautiful, the Sinai Peninsula has managed to capture imaginations throughout the centuries. The region has been coveted for its deep religious significance and its strategic position as a crossroads of empires: prophets and pilgrims, conquerors and exiles have all left their footprints on the sands here.

Egyptens nya tåglinje kommer göra det möjligt att ta snabbtåget mellan Medelhavet och Röda havet. Det blir även Egyptens första linje för snabbtåg – ett välkommet inslag för den som enklare vill kunna ta sig fram genom landet utan flyg.

The southern coast of the Gulf of Aqaba, between Tiran Island and Ras Mohammed National Park, features some of the world’s most amazing underwater scenery. The crystal-clear waters and incredible variety of exotic fish darting in and out of the colourful coral reefs have made this a scuba-diving paradise. Purpose-built Sharm El Sheikh occupies a prime position here, devoting itself solely to sun-and-sea holidays offering a family-friendly vibe and resort comforts, with world-class diving thrown in.

The Suez Canal, Egypt’s glorious triumph of engineering over nature, dominates this region, slicing through the sands of the Isthmus of Suez for 163km, not only severing mainland Egypt from Sinai but also Africa from Asia. The canal was the remarkable achievement of Egypt’s belle époque, an era buoyed by grand aspirations and finished by bankruptcy and broken dreams. This period also gave birth to the canalside cities of Port Said and Ismailia. Today their streets remain haunted by this fleeting age of grandeur, their distinctive architecture teetering on picturesque disrepair.

Bahariya is one of the more fetching of the desert circuit oases, and at just 365km from Cairo it's also the most accessible. Much of the oasis floor here is covered by sprawling shady date palms and speckled with dozens of natural springs, which beg to be plunged into. The surrounding landscape of rocky, sandy mesas is a grand introduction to the Western Desert's barren beauty.

Low-key, laid-back and low-rise, Dahab is the Middle East’s prime beach resort for independent travellers.

Plucked from obscurity during the early days of the Red Sea’s tourism drive, the fishing village of Hurghada has long since morphed into today’s dense band of concrete that marches along the coastline for more than 20km. Still, it's a convenient destination for combining a diving holiday with the Nile Valley sites. Further offshore there is still superb diving aplenty; local NGOs are helping the town clean up its act, and the southern resort area and Sigala's sparklingly modern marina have brought back some of Hurghada's sheen.

Luxor is often called the world’s greatest open-air museum, but that comes nowhere near describing this extraordinary place. Nothing in the world compares to the scale and grandeur of the monuments that have survived from ancient Thebes.

In its late-19th-century raffish heyday, Port Said was Egypt’s city of vice and sin. The boozing seafarers and packed brothels may have long since been scrubbed away, but this louche period is evoked still in the waterfront’s muddle of once-grand architecture slowly going to seed.

Egypt’s northern coastline runs for 500km along Mediterranean shores. Its sandy beaches and turquoise-hued sea lure floods of Egyptians here during summer and, in recent years, a number of sprawling resorts have been built facing these crystal waters. Most travellers, however, make a beeline straight to the once-great port city of Alexandria. Eulogised through the centuries, this faded old dame of a metropolis is still by far Egypt's most atmospheric city. Alexandria's fresh sea air, fantastic seafood, ancient history and crumbling gems of belle époque buildings give it a spirit distinctly different from that of Cairo.