Magic Horizon Balloons, Luxor — Attraction in Luxor City

You need to read this review before booking your air balloon ride.

Update : few hours after writing my google review, mr.Alaa called & said they don’t care whatever I wrote, then started cursing so I disconnected the call .

Me & my young brother took a balloon ride yesterday & I am not satisfied at all. It started by me looking up & finding that Magic Horizon got good reviews. I called them & talked to mr. Alaa , he told me the sunrise ride costs 900 L.E , I negotiated the price with him as I am just one person paying for two people, he said let me check what we can do ? later someone from same company called for arrangements, I said ok we can do that but still I didn’t know the final price, he called later & said 850L.E per each is the best we can do as the sunrise ride is more expensive than other times ,I agreed & insured that it will be Sunrise , he said yes. So pickup time was set to be 5:30 am, I was ready on-time, didn’t find their bus , I called the guy asked me to wait for his call back , 10 min. later called & told me to ask for specific guy that know which bus will take me there , I got on the bus at 5:45 , it started moving at 6:05 (note : sunrise is at 6:30) , we arrived to the spot around 6:20 & waited for the other balloons to fly first, then our’s started to fly at 6:45 , by that time the sunrise was already over ( you can see photos ) , I didn’t enjoy the ride as I was only looking on one direction as the sunlight was direct to my eyes & I cannot see anything. After the ride was over I started talking to people there & mr. Alaa that this isn’t what I paid for & they should give me at least 300 out of the 1700 back , mr.Alaa said he was sorry for that & this was their problem as their 1st ride was late ( which I thought I should be on ) so that ended up that the second ride was late too , also the pickup wasn’t well organized for the rest of the group, all that together ended up that we didn’t catch the sunrise , he offered to give me free ride on my next visit, I explained to him that if I have the money & time I will travel to a new place & not visit Luxor again , I asked him if he can get me & my brother the ride on the second day before traveling to Aswan , he checked & called later that he can’t do it as all were booked. One more thing the certificate they gave us was from company called Alaska & not Magic Horizon , I asked about this too & he said they have two companies to get more ride permissions from Egyptian government. So the summary I spent 1700 , didn’t enjoy the ride , bad experience, they weren’t able to provide any discount or other ride ) I don’t recommend...

Balloon ride was part of our 4 day 3 night cruise package and just happened to be with this company. This review is only for the balloon ride itself as the transfer had issues but I think that was responsibility of another company/party. We arrived late after sunrise and intended balloon was still being blown up and many balloons already up in the air or already coming down. To save time our tour guide was able to put us in one of the Magic Horizon balloons that had just descended. The balloon trip was wonderful and one of the highlights of our Egyptian holiday. Pilot Bob was amazing and apparently a legend- we were later told by tour guide he trained in England and trains new balloon pilots. He masterfully controlled the balloon and gave us multiple 360 turns so everyone could see everything. He made us a little nervous getting rather close to utility poles and electrical lines but we realized he was just playing with us as he always knew exactly what he was doing. Bob was fun and lighthearted and played a variety of cool music. I think our flight time was around 45 minutes. As others have mentioned I think there is considerable price negotiation that can be made for the balloon tour and I’d imagine best pricing would be direct with balloon tour operator. Our Nile cruise tour indicated if balloon tour was cancelled due to weather then we’d get refunded $25 per person so I think that’s around the price you should be able to get for the...

To say that it was my worst experience with Egyptian service providers is to say nothing. My friends and I reserved a place on the balloon a day before our planned ride. Considering that we are in Egypt we ensured to confirm our reservations numerous times. We were set on the time, which was 4:30 am for Magic Horizon to pick us up from our hotel. In the morning we contacted each other to arrange to meet in the lobby. Once meeting our guide and informing him of our number, we went to collect our belongings. From then on, inexplicable events took place. That same guide gathered a group of German tourists and left the hotel without informing us. As soon as we discovered that he had gone, we started calling the company and were told that all balloons were fully booked. Even after making a fuss about it, they refused to come back for our group of 6 and all we were continuously reminded of, is that there was no place on the balloon. As our group was partially Egyptian, we were all charged the Egyptian rate which obviously wasn't the price the foreign group was asked to pay. The incompetency of the firm is what taints Egyptian reputation and makes it difficult to trust any local...