Travel

With tensions easing, is it time tourists considered returning to Egypt? Richard Spencer reports

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The magic of Egypt is still there. The palm trees swaying in a warm breeze as the Nile snakes through its green, desert-surrounded valley, the sun setting on the Temple of Karnak, the Red Sea and its bright shoals of fish: all have the same appeal as ever. But how easy is it to experience the magic, after the revolutionary chaos and death of the past few years?

This summer, I spent an idyllic four days recuperating from a busy year in the historic, and now beautifully restored, Old Cataract Hotel in Aswan. It was July, the lowest of Egypt s low season, with daytime temperatures hovering around 105F (40C), but that is how, perhaps unusually, I like it. It is a dry heat, unlike the sticky humidity of the Mediterranean coast, and it makes the cool of the swimming pool, perched on the hilltop overlooking the river, and the balmier evenings all the more pleasant. But most people have different tastes and, more importantly, few are daring to come to Egypt at all at the moment. One or two other families or couples came and went for a day or two, but it felt at times as if we had the place to ourselves. Sometimes my family and I were alone in the place apart from the staff.

It s a shame, but understandable. Egypt has been in turmoil for the past three and a half years, the Tahrir Square revolution of February 2011 giving way to street demonstrations, a coup in summer last year, and an explosive act of violence when the army and police cleared two protest sites in Cairo, killing a thousand people. Since then, there have been sporadic terrorist attacks, mainly in northern Sinai but also aimed at police checkpoints and buildings elsewhere. This is not a normal backdrop for a relaxing holiday.