This is not your typical travel guide about Luxor, Egypt. Rather, I would like to talk about the Scorpion House which has a special place in my heart.
If you are travelling to Luxor independently without following a group tour, you may require a driver who can drive you around to the touristic attractions due to the huge distances between them and the lack of public transportation. However, finding an honest and reasonably-priced driver by yourself may be a challenging task. As tourists, it is often hard to tell whether you have been taken advantage of or ripped off.
Thus, finding a trustworthy and reliable guest house who has all the local contacts and connections could be key to making your time in Luxor a smooth-sailing one.
Warm Hospitality
Warm hospitality is often not found in big, luxurious hotels, but in someone’s home. That’s especially true in Luxor, Egypt.
Tastefully built, designed and decorated by the Scorpion House’s owner, Tayeeb and his fellow archaeologist friends. Before establishing Scorpion House, Tayeeb used to work as an archaeologist, discovering and excavating important ancient Egyptian artifacts alongside with fellow archaeologists from the US and Europe.
The design of Scorpion House derived inspirations from the traditional Nubian architecture. One of the unique characteristics of Nubian architecture is the technique of building arches out of mud bricks stacked without the need of external support structure. The ubiquitous arches and vent holes consisting of a combination of non-inverted and inverted triangles are a main feature in this guest house.
To us, the Scorpion House was like a haven where we could relax and escape from the hustle and bustle of Luxor. It was a really pleasant and serene experience, waking up everyday to the chirping of the birds and crowing of the roosters, surrounded by their pet dog, cats, kittens, birds and roosters.
Other than the beautiful aesthetics and serenity of the guest house, the owner himself went out of his way to accommodate his guests. Upon request, he could find and arrange for local drivers who charge honest and reasonable prices, train or flight tickets, excursions and activities around the vicinity of Luxor. Based on our personal experience, there was a huge difference between the prices charged by taxi drivers on the streets and the drivers recommended by the owner.
Amazing home-cooked food
Since Scorpion House is far from the city center of Luxor and most of the touristic attractions, it may not be that convenient when it comes to dining out.
Thankfully, it is possible to arrange with the owner and his wife to dine in at the guest house up to three meals a day (at approximately 150 Egyptian pounds per person per meal), if you want. That’s what we did. All of the dishes were hand-crafted and prepared personally by the owner’s wife, Doaa.
We travelled around Luxor, Hurghada and Aswan for 9 days. We went to most of the top-rated restaurants on Google Maps in those three cities but throughout our trip we could not find any restaurant which offers such tasty home-cooked dishes! In fact, I dare say that none of the food that we had in all of the restaurants came close to Doaa’s cooking at all.
Doaa was kind enough to let me have a glimpse at her prepping and cooking our meals. At that time, she was preparing Egyptian Shakshuka, cauliflower and aubergine fritters.
Referring to the two pictures directly above, the platter consisted of deep fried aubergine and cauliflower fritters, Shakshuka and fresh Egyptian salad. The batter used to make the fritters was made out of plain flour, dill, coriander, cumin powder, coriander powder, salt, pepper and a kind of all-purpose Egyptian spice mix. The Egyptian salads usually come with fresh, juicy tomatoes, cucumbers, lots of raw garlic, dill and coriander.
In one of the lunches, we were served grilled eggplant dressed with loads of raw minced garlic, fresh coriander and tomatoes, canned tuna seasoned with salt and lemon, fried fish cooked with preserved lemon, tomatoes, onions and pickled green peppers.
All in all, every dish was full of flavors and I could taste the love and effort that went into cooking them. Our stay at the Scorpion House gave us a glimpse and chance to taste these authentic, home-cooked Egyptian dishes which otherwise would not be easy to find in restaurants.
Disclaimer: I am not in any way affiliated with the Scorpion House Luxor. This post represents my personal thoughts and experiences during my stay there.
