Day trips from Cairo
8 h route3 stopsBest: Saqqara on a weekday. Alexandria, by train and all dayUpdated July 2026
The Giza pyramids are neither the first nor the only ones: 30 kilometres away is Saqqara, with Djoser’s step pyramid, a hundred years older and where stone architecture literally began. And next to it, Dahshur, with the two pyramids where the Egyptians learned how to build them.
The other escape is completely different: Alexandria, by train, a Mediterranean, Greek and Roman city, with a beach and not a single pyramid. It’s the other Egypt.
The route, stop by stop
3 STOPS- 01
Saqqara and the Step Pyramid
Djoser’s step pyramid, from 2670 BC, is the oldest cut-stone building in the world and the first pyramid ever built: a hundred years before Khufu’s. It was designed by Imhotep, the first architect in history whose name we know.
It’s a vast necropolis with mastabas, tombs decorated with reliefs of daily life, far better than Giza’s, and almost no tourists.
If Giza impressed you, Saqqara will explain how they got there.
- 02
Dahshur: the Bent and the Red
Ancient Egypt left its best engineering lesson here: the Bent Pyramid, begun at too steep an angle and corrected halfway through, hence the "bend", and beside it the Red Pyramid, the first true, perfect pyramid, the result of having learned from the last one.
Both belong to Sneferu, Khufu’s father. You can go inside the Red one and there’s almost never anybody there.
It’s where you grasp that pyramids didn’t emerge perfect from nowhere: there was trial and error.
- 03
Alexandria
Two hours by train north and you’re on the Mediterranean, in the city Alexander the Great founded and Cleopatra ruled: home of the Library and the Lighthouse, two of the most famous things in the ancient world, of which nothing remains.
What is there: the spectacular new Bibliotheca Alexandrina, the Qaitbay fort on the Lighthouse’s foundations, the Roman catacombs, and a corniche of cafés and fish with a decadent 1930s air.
It isn’t pharaonic Egypt, it’s another country inside the country.
Frequently asked
Which is the oldest pyramid in Egypt?
Djoser’s step pyramid at Saqqara, from 2670 BC: a hundred years older than Khufu’s and the oldest cut-stone building in the world. It was designed by Imhotep, the first architect in history whose name we know.
Is Saqqara worth it as well as Giza?
Very: it’s 30 km away, it has the first pyramid in history and tombs with reliefs of daily life better than Giza’s, and almost no tourists. It explains how Giza came to be built.
Can you visit Alexandria from Cairo in a day?
Yes: it’s about two and a half hours by train from Ramses station, done by leaving early. It’s a Mediterranean, Greek and Roman city, with no pyramids: the perfect counterpoint to pharaonic Egypt.