Convoy information

[gmadvm]

How does the convoy to Cairo work? Does everyone from the ship, on both private tours and the ship tours all go in one long line? I imagine it would take a while to get everyone off the ship and into their vehicles for the journey if that was the case. Or are there several groups that leave at different times with a security car as soon as they get a large enough group for it to be worth it. I'm getting conflicting info from my tour guide. First he said we didn't need the convoy, but I'm reading where he told other people that they did need to use the convoy.

 

Okay, now for the reason I am asking.... Long story short, I booked a private tour for my husband and myself. An associate of his is going on the cruise with his wife and were originally going to go on the private tour with us. Then some things happened that aren't important to the story, they said they weren't going to go on the cruise and we adjusted our tour accordingly to just be the two of us. After they cancelled, we realized we had dodged a bullet. Now after some other things happened, they have decided that they are going and want to get back onto our tour. For various reasons, we prefer to keep our tour just the two of us. We have made this known to them, politely and diplomatically, but they can't or won't take the hint. I gave them contact information from several of the top rated tours so they could book their own trip. All of this has culminated in my getting an email from our tour guide, all confused because he is being contacted by the other couple trying to 'reconfirm' onto our booking. This is after we told them we preferred to keep our tour private.

So now we are going to have to be a bit more blunt, and less diplomatic, but before we do that, I'm wondering if we are going to meet up with them on the convoy. For example, I know that there are people on our cruise going on private tours with the same tour company. Do the individual tour companies have their own security? Do all the Ramses tour groups travel together, all the Temo together and so on? I don't want to shoot myself in the foot here and then end up going with them anyway. I don't think they are going to bother doing any research into another company after I already did the hard part.

I know we are going to run into them on the ship but we will deal with that when the time comes. To make matters more sticky, my husband works with the gentleman and I work in an office that is frequented by the wife. So we are trying to avoid the awkwardness and hopefully maintain some civility, but we just don't want to travel in the same vehicle with them. I did all the research and the booking months ago, and am happy with the tour company that I booked and would hate to have to cancel it and rebook another company to get away from them.

Can someone help me out in describing how the convoy system works? I would hate to have a diplomatic fall out, only to end up traveling in a little 10 car caravan to all the sites and getting the evil eye.

Word of advice for all of you who have read this far, if you want to travel alone, get that out in the open right away because it is awful hard to take it back. Even if circumstances change....

 

Thanks for any advice from someone who has done a private tour and has convoy experience.

[lambs2]

How does the convoy to Cairo work? Does everyone from the ship, on both private tours and the ship tours all go in one long line? I imagine it would take a while to get everyone off the ship and into their vehicles for the journey if that was the case. Or are there several groups that leave at different times with a security car as soon as they get a large enough group for it to be worth it. I'm getting conflicting info from my tour guide. First he said we didn't need the convoy, but I'm reading where he told other people that they did need to use the convoy.

 

Okay, now for the reason I am asking.... Long story short, I booked a private tour for my husband and myself. An associate of his is going on the cruise with his wife and were originally going to go on the private tour with us. Then some things happened that aren't important to the story, they said they weren't going to go on the cruise and we adjusted our tour accordingly to just be the two of us. After they cancelled, we realized we had dodged a bullet. Now after some other things happened, they have decided that they are going and want to get back onto our tour. For various reasons, we prefer to keep our tour just the two of us. We have made this known to them, politely and diplomatically, but they can't or won't take the hint. I gave them contact information from several of the top rated tours so they could book their own trip. All of this has culminated in my getting an email from our tour guide, all confused because he is being contacted by the other couple trying to 'reconfirm' onto our booking. This is after we told them we preferred to keep our tour private.

So now we are going to have to be a bit more blunt, and less diplomatic, but before we do that, I'm wondering if we are going to meet up with them on the convoy. For example, I know that there are people on our cruise going on private tours with the same tour company. Do the individual tour companies have their own security? Do all the Ramses tour groups travel together, all the Temo together and so on? I don't want to shoot myself in the foot here and then end up going with them anyway. I don't think they are going to bother doing any research into another company after I already did the hard part.

I know we are going to run into them on the ship but we will deal with that when the time comes. To make matters more sticky, my husband works with the gentleman and I work in an office that is frequented by the wife. So we are trying to avoid the awkwardness and hopefully maintain some civility, but we just don't want to travel in the same vehicle with them. I did all the research and the booking months ago, and am happy with the tour company that I booked and would hate to have to cancel it and rebook another company to get away from them.

Can someone help me out in describing how the convoy system works? I would hate to have a diplomatic fall out, only to end up traveling in a little 10 car caravan to all the sites and getting the evil eye.

Word of advice for all of you who have read this far, if you want to travel alone, get that out in the open right away because it is awful hard to take it back. Even if circumstances change....

 

Thanks for any advice from someone who has done a private tour and has convoy experience.

 

We had a private tour for 10 in February 2009 leaving from the port of Alexandria for an overnight tour. There was NO convoy. PERIOD. When our small bus was loaded we were on our way and waited for NO ONE ELSE! Because we were such a small group we got a jump start on most of the other tour groups, especially the large ones. The convoy thing is a MYTH! We did have our own security guard - provided by the tour company. He was a young guy and dressed in a suit but we all saw the gun. He was excellent at keeping his eye on us all and keeping any vendors, etc, away from us all!

 

Hope I helped to disperse that MYTH!!! :D

[lambs2]

Just a bit more: We were with Temo Tours and never ONCE ran into the other groups using Temo! I take that back, we did see one other group at the Le Meredien when we were checking in. (If you want to be absolutely sure you won't run into these folks, find out the order they will be doing their activities and have your guide do your stops in a different order, and certainly a different hotel!) Have a wonderful time in Egypt!! :D

[gmadvm]

Thanks lambs, that's just what I wanted to hear. No dice on the hotel though, I know we will both be at Meridien. I'm currently crafting my latest polite 'no, we really don't want to hang with you' email. Hoping that does the trick. Also hope the tour organizer doesn't share my less polite 'we do not want to travel with these people under any circumstances' email with them. Although maybe that is what they need to hear, diplomacy be damned. :) thanks again. I feel better.

[lambs2]

Thanks lambs, that's just what I wanted to hear. No dice on the hotel though, I know we will both be at Meridien. I'm currently crafting my latest polite 'no, we really don't want to hang with you' email. Hoping that does the trick. Also hope the tour organizer doesn't share my less polite 'we do not want to travel with these people under any circumstances' email with them. Although maybe that is what they need to hear, diplomacy be damned. :) thanks again. I feel better.

A simple "We have decided the two of us will be taking our tour alone" will suffice in an email to the other couple I don't think you need to elaborate any further. Just state it as a FACT! Don't worry, the tour operator will not share any emails you sent him about the other party. Just reiterate with your tour operator that you are contracting a tour for just TWO people. Have a MARVELOUS trip! :D

[oneparticularharbor]

We were with De Castro on a private tour for 2. We traveled to and from Cairo with 2 other vehicles from De Castro. There was a guard in one of the other vehicles. Once we were in Cairo we went separate ways until lunch, which we all ate at the same restaurant. When our vehicle was separated from the others we had our own guard. I think that's the reason for "convoys", the tour company has to provide a guard, so when a large group is traveling together they only need to provide 1 guard.

We saw everyone else again at the hotel for breakfast. As long as your itinerary is different form theirs you won't see much of them.