My friend and I booked a five day cruise from a website called Viator on September 17th 2019 leaving Luxor, Egypt on Tuesday October 1st 2019 and arriving in Aswan on Saturday October 5th 2019.
Everything started out perfectly fine, booked our trip before leaving Canada had everything ready to go the cruise, flights to and from Luxor and Aswan, hotel in Aswan etc. I arrived to Egypt a week before my friend Jenna as I was spending a week with my family in Cairo before heading south to the Nubian villages for our cruise. As I arrived in Egypt, Yasser the owner of Yasso travels- Enjoy Egypt Tours (third party Company hired by Viator) connects with Jenna and I Via whatsapp requesting flight/train info to arrange pick up and drop off to and from the cruise. Jenna had put us in a group chat on whatsapp, after Yasser learned I was Egyptian he started to message me separately in Arabic on whatsapp, started out pretty harmless but turned ugly very quickly.
The first red flag for us was when Yasser asked that me and Jenna cancel with Viator and book directly with him, he stated that he gets charged as a third party and offered to give me and Jenna $40 US per person if we cancelled and booked directly with him. I respectfully declined and he proceeded to try and sell me additional tour packages throughout the week, like hot air balloons, beach packages etc. I found this kind of annoying but I get it, he owns a tour company and this is his income. Two day before our flight to Luxor, Yasser sent me screen shots of our cruise tour package which were completely different from the package we bought online from Viator. I asked why the package is different; Yasser stated that packages bought online are similar but not the exact same as packages he gives to clients. At this point I am extremely frustrated with this person in which I said “ listen, I want the package I purchased online and that’s it” Yasser started to attack me stating that as an Egyptian woman I should know better than to tell him to “listen” and that I am being demanding, therefor he will cancel our trip.
I did not believe him until Jenna phoned me crying stating that she is on her way to the airport and that the cruise had been canceled. At this point I lost it on Yasser and cursed him in every language I know. The next day my uncle took me to the tourism police (his relative is a cop) to file a complaint. Officer Hossam Hana assisted me with this matter, he phone Yasser from Yasso Travels and informed him that he canceled the trip without permission therefore must rebook the trip, in which Yasser did, he gave us a discount, it was was $360 Canadian from Viator he gave it to us for $200 US per person (not much of a discount) but it was nice of him.
Yasser picked us up from the airport, apologized for his behavior, BUT then stated that if I write a bad review on trip advisor he would ask Trip Advisor to remove it, which I found was a strange thing to stay to somebody you are trying to get on their good side . When we arrived to the boat Yasser refused to take payment with credit card, demanded cash and stated that we will not be able to stay on the boat until paid. We got into another argument, I called Officer Hossam , Hossam spoke to Yasser informing him that there is a credit card machine on every boat and to stop harassing us. Yasser returned with the machine, we paid, and proceeded on with our day.
Our first tour guide Hassan met us shortly after, was extremely rude at first and gave us a lot of attitude. He took us on our tour; I found that he was constantly on the phone talking to someone which I assumed was Yasser. On our way back to the boat a car stops in the middle of the road, Yasser steps out of the car beside us, opens the door and hands Jenna a gift (a neckless with her name on it) closes the car door and walks away. Next day same tour guide comes to pick us up, when we enter the car Hasan (our tour guide) is on the phone, turns around and says “Jenna, Yasser wants to speak to you” Jenna said “no thanks” I kindly asked that Yasser stop trying to communicate with us, we do not want to talk to him or deal with him at all.
Day 2 in Luxor we are done both our tours, Jenna books an excursion to Bana Island, I had no interest in joining her, asked that she meet me at the boat when she finishes. Jenna returns to the boat, informing me that Yasser showed up after her excursion, she stated that she was afraid to get into the car with him so Hasan joined her.
When she got into the car Hasan acted as an interpreter (Yasser speaks English but not fluently). Yasser stated that the trip cancelation was my fault and that Jenna should consider not writing a bad review because he did not do anything wrong. Jenna responded stating “we will report everything good and bad” also informing him that she booked the package with her credit card, would be impossible for me to cancel it when he and her were the only ones with access to cancelation. After this, Yasser ignored Jenna on the way home, did not even say bye to her as she was leaving. Thankfully that day the cruise took off, we left Luxor on our way to Edfu and Kom Ombo we no longer had to see or deal with this horrible individual.
The cruise itself, AMAZING!! Staff were awesome the numbian villages absolutely beautiful. Lots of history and culture in the south. We sailed on a boat called Lady Mary, had an awesome time. The manager of the ship Saied saw that I was unhappy - I informed him of what happened and he really went over and beyond to make sure we were happy. He accommodated our every need, even sent a bottle of wine and fruit basket to our cabin, and was very kind to us and definitely made up for our bad experience with Yasso Travel- Enjoy Egypt Tours.
In summary: I would recommend Lady Mary cruise, visiting the Nubian villages. I DO NOT recommend booking with Yasso Travel- Enjoy Egypt Tours this company is a big SCAM. This guy Yasser is completely unprofessional and disrespectful.