Egypten

If you’re in a hurry to reach the treasures and pleasures of the south, it is easy to dismiss the places between Cairo and Luxor. But these less touristed parts of the country almost always repay what can be the considerable effort of a visit.

Cairo is magnificent, where you’ll hear an array of sounds from donkey carts rattling down lanes to the muezzins' call to prayer from duelling minarets.

If you want to dig a little deeper into Egyptian culture and history, the area surrounding the capital is home to several intriguing and important sites rarely included on typical Egypt itineraries. Although few can honestly be put in the 'must-see' category – except of course for the majestic ancient site of Saqqara, which lies on the city’s southern edge – those with time up their sleeve will enjoy delving into this lesser-seen region.

El Gouna is a self-contained holiday town and probably the best-run resort in Egypt. The brainchild of Egyptian billionaire Onsi Sawiris, it is built around lagoons and waterways, ensuring there are plenty of beaches and that many places have views of the water. El Gouna is frequented by Egypt's chi-chi set and Europeans on package tours. Boasting 16 hotels, an 18-hole golf course, plenty of villas, and boutique shopping, restaurants and bars galore, it's about as far removed from Egypt's usual hustle and bustle as you can get. The only local experience you are likely to have is smoking shisha (albeit on a marina terrace overlooking some mighty swanky yachts). But if you're after a place to laze on a beach and do some diving, then you'll definitely enjoy your time here.

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.

Siwa is the stuff of desert daydreams. Just 50km from the Libyan border this fertile basin, sitting about 25m below sea level and brimming with olive trees and palms, epitomises slow-paced oasis life. Set between the shady groves, squat, slouching mud-brick hamlets are connected by winding dirt lanes where trundling donkey carts are still as much a part of the street action as puttering motorbikes and 4WDs. Scattered throughout the oasis are crystal-clear springs, which are a heavenly respite from the harsh heat. At the edge of the oasis, the swells of the Great Sand Sea roll to the horizon, providing irresistible fodder for desert exploration.

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.

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.

The ‘Red Sea Riviera’ is a place of many different attractions. On the one hand, it is famous (or infamous, depending on your view) for cheap package holidays – overdevelopment has pockmarked the coastline deeply, leaving a trail of megaresorts and half-finished hotels in its wake. Alongside these are some exceptional exclusive resorts secluded from the hustle of the packages. Dig deeper and you will find other, more surprising sides to the region.

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.