Far be it from me to diss travel writers–after all, I am one, as are my hosts here at Indie Travel Podcast.  However, I must honestly say that the Cadogan Guides appeal to me because specialists write them.  You never get the feeling as you do with some guidebooks, that the author of a Cadogan Guide just dropped in to survey the high spots.

It is hard to imagine a better-qualified guide than Michael Haag, author of the Cadogan Guide to Egypt and to Cairo.  Haag has written several other books about Egyptian cities, and as you read the Egypt one, it is clear that he knows his territory well.

Like all Cadogan guidebooks, Egypt strikes me as opinionated but accurate, and full of delightful surprises. I read the fourth edition of Egypt (2009), and they published the third edition of Cairo in 2010. Given recent events, it is fair to assume they will revise these before long, but most of the information is timeless. In explaining the “totality of their history”, which stretches over 7,000 years, Haag progresses through Pharonic, Arab, Christian and Modern Egypt.

Some of the most practical information in a guidebook occupies the front and the back of the book.  Here the introduction gives a quick list of high points for each of the important periods and suggested itineraries for a week or two weeks. In the back of the book, I want a guidebook to have a good index, further reading, a bit about the language; and the Cadogan Guide has all of these, plus a glossary that includes illustrations of architectural details. Note: you need to go elsewhere for a comprehensive list of hotels and restaurants.

If I were to go to Egypt, I would be particularly eager to follow in the footsteps of Alexander down the Nile to Alexandria. Haag has written other books on the city of Alexandria, so the book is very strong in this section. You must use your imagination to see Alexander’s or Cleopatra’s city, but the 19th and 20th century city inhabited by Constantine Cavafy and Lawrence Durrell survives. “…the departed cast of this more recent Alexandria joins the ghostly pageant, haunting the cafes, barber shop, hotels and apartments of a gently disintegrating stage set,” Haag says.

I would love to go to Siwa oasis, a place written about with relish by Herodotus, partly because of its interesting sexual history. Today known as a magnet for gay travel, Siwa was the home of an oracle consulted by Alexander, who requested to be buried there.   He was eventually buried in Alexandria in a spot no longer known.

The Temple of Ammon(Amun) at Siwa, says Haag, “…is so small you can be certain of standing exactly on the spot where Alexander himself stood 2,300 odd years ago.” (Pumping fist in air: “YES!!”)

Interlink Books, the U.S. publisher of the Cadogan Guides, provided a review copy of this book.

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This article was written by Vera Marie

Vera Marie Badertscher writes about books, movies and travel at A Traveler' Library.