Taking the Kids: Time Travel Back to Ancient Egypt and Meet King Tut

Egypt contains one of the oldest civilizations and discovering everything it has to offer can be so rewarding.

Head shot of King Tut. Dreamstime/TCA

Let’s hear it for ambitious kids!

A 12-year-old boy named Hussein was desperate to get a job on Englishman Howard Carter’s archaeological dig in Luxor, Egypt. It was 1922 and Carter was struggling. For years, he’d been searching unsuccessfully for the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun, the “boy king,” who died as a teenager.

His patron, George Herbert, the fifth Earl of Carnarvon, and an avid collector of Egyptian antiquities, told Carter he was cutting off his funding after the season. (You may better recognize Lord Carnarvon because his family are the owners of Highclere Castle, the setting for “Downton Abbey”.)

Carter kept brushing off young Hussein, said our Abercrombie & Kent guide, Essam Zeid, an expert Egyptologist. But the boy refused to give up. Finally, Carter gave him a job to use his donkey to fetch water for the workers.

Then Hussein’s donkey tripped on something—upon further examination it was an ancient step. The workers soon uncovered 14 ancient steps on that hot day in August 1922 that led to the tomb of the “Boy King” Tutankhamun, more than 3,300 years after his death at 18 or 19, likely from sepsis. The sensational find—the only near-intact royal tomb from ancient Egypt—generated tremendous excitement around the world.

Unlike previous tombs that had been found, King Tut’s hadn’t been badly plundered, likely because it was incredibly well concealed and hidden by debris.

There were 5,664 masterpieces, including gold finger and toe sleeves that were placed over the Boy King’s fingers and toes, gold necklaces, and many amulets to help his voyage to the afterlife, as well as earrings he likely wore, even a lock of his grandmother’s hair in small nesting coffins. His inner-most coffin was made of gold and weighed more than 242 pounds. Perhaps the most famous artifact? The golden funeral mask. Zeid noted that when the new exhibit opens, there will be toys Tut would have played with as a boy.

Now, for the first time when the new Grand Egyptian Museum opens in Cairo on July 3, all of the treasures from King Tut’s tomb will be displayed together in galleries stretching over two acres.

According to Abercrombie & Kent it “is meeting traveler demand with two brand-new Small Group Journeys and expanded 2025 departure dates—offering rare, insider access to Egypt’s most iconic cultural sites, including the Sphinx and newly opened Wahtye Tomb.”

All that is left in the tomb now is King Tut’s mummy, extensive hieroglyphs, and wall paintings that depict scenes and religious texts related to the young pharaoh’s life and afterlife. The colors on the wall paintings are remarkably still largely noticeable, including 12 baboons representing the 12 months of the year.

When we visited King Tut’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings, we were in the midst of a guided Abercrombie & Kent tour of Egypt and Jordan. There were 17 in our group, including a family from NYC with two teen girls and their grandmother. The teens were fascinated by all the stories behind what we saw.

The Valley of the Kings on the western bank of the River Nile near Luxor (Thebes), Egypt, were the tombs of the New Kingdom's pharaohs, include pharaoh Tutankhamun and pharaoh Ramses II, were found. Dreamstime/TCA

“They always see things with new eyes and that gives me the opportunity to see things I might have missed,” said their grandmother who was traveling with her son and his family. (Yes, we felt completely safe in both countries.)

Earlier in the trip, we were privileged to get a sneak peek at the new Grand Egyptian Museum, though the King Tut galleries had not yet opened. The museum, with views of the Giza pyramids, has been more than two decades in the making and is guaranteed to be a highlight of any visit to Egypt. It is expected to draw some 15 million visitors a year, most from outside Egypt. There is also a children’s museum but that wasn’t open yet when we visited. (Guided tours are offered in English.)

There were mummies, huge statues, some placed up the central staircase, all varieties of jewelry and anything and everything ancient Egyptians believed they would need in the afterlife, including plates, jars of alabaster, chairs, ornate boxes that held organs after mummification, carvings of sacred falcons, cobras (said to protect the royals in the afterlife), and much, much more.

A fun fact: You will know you are looking at a king’s statue if you see a bee and a goose. Bees represented royalty while ancient Egyptians believed the goose was a messenger between heaven and Earth.

Then there are the different expressions on the statues’ faces. We learned that in the new kingdom (1400 BC) times were good, so the statues were shown smiling; in the middle kingdom (2000 BC) they were shown with sad faces because those were times of trouble for Egypt.

As you enter the museum, you can’t help but be wowed by the 36-foot-tall, 83-ton red granite statue of King Ramesses II who ruled for more than 60 years. The statue is so tall that the museum building was constructed around it.

The GEM is the largest archaeological museum complex in the world with more than 100,000 artifacts from prehistoric times through Egypt’s thousands of years of pharaonic civilization and through the ancient Greek and Roman periods of Egyptian history. Visitors can’t help but be impressed by the unusual building, shaped like a triangle. The building’s north and south walls line up directly with the Great Pyramid of Khufu and the Pyramid of Menkaure.

Cairo is a huge city—some 22.6 million people, making it the second largest city in the world after Mexico City. Traffic is a nightmare and so was the airport. (Read more about our trip here.) We truly appreciated the Abercrombie & Kent staff, drivers and guides who made our trip stress-free. Egypt is the best country to visit for a digital detox, according to a new survey from eSIM provider Holafly. This is based on the number of cell towers, national parks, internet speeds and internet users.

We first stayed at Mena House, now a Marriott Hotel, in sight of the pyramids that has been the site of key summits during World War II and before the famous Camp David Accords. The best part: You can see the reflection of the Great Pyramids in the pool outside. Some in our group ventured inside the pyramids, a tight squeeze!

At the end of our trip, we stayed at the Four Seasons Hotel Cairo Nile Plaza with balconies overlooking the Nile. The hotel has 10 restaurants and lounges (we loved the huge breakfast buffet), multiple pools and a spa with treatments inspired by ancient Egyptian rituals.

There was little downtime, but no one minded on this bucket list trip. “Seeing pictures just can’t compare,” one in the group opined.

“Anytime you can go with the grandchildren, say yes!” the Pennsylvania grandmother added. “It has been the best trip.”

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