Quad safari in the Sharm desert: sunrise, sunset or the full Bedouin evening
Updated September 26, 2026 · 7 min read
The desert starts about fifteen minutes behind the hotel strip, and almost every hotel desk in Sharm El Sheikh sells a quad tour into it. Our catalogue holds 29 desert safaris, from €11.85, and between them they carry more than ten thousand reviews. That is a lot of very similar-sounding listings.
They are not as similar as they look. The differences are not in the desert – it is the same desert – but in how long you sit on the quad, what happens after dark, and which small things you pay for in cash once you are out there.
The price ladder, and what each step buys
| Trip | Duration | From | Rating | Reviews |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ATV quad bike desert safari adventure | 2 hours | €11.85 | 4.6 | 794 |
| ATV quad sunrise & sunset desert safari | 3 hours | €22.50 | 4.8 | 2,426 |
| Super safari: quad, camel, stargazing & BBQ dinner | 7 hours | €27.95 | 4.8 | 1,940 |
| Quad ride & camel ride with pickup | 3 hours | €39.51 | 4.9 | 958 |
Look at the gap between the third row and the second. Five euros more, four hours longer – and the four hours are not quad time. The seven-hour trip breaks down roughly as half an hour in the van, four hours of camp activities including the quad ride, two hours of dinner and show, half an hour back. You are buying an evening, not a longer ride.
The bottom row is the one that looks wrong and is not. It costs the most and lasts three hours, and it has the highest rating of the four. Small groups and private transfers cost money; a rating of 4.9 across 958 reviews is what that money sometimes buys.
Sunrise, sunset, or after dark
The sunset run is the default. Pickup on the most-booked trip is around 3pm, and the listing is explicit that the exact time “is confirmed one day before the trip by the operations team”. You ride into low light, stop at an echo point for photographs, drink Bedouin tea at a desert tent, and come back in the dark.
The sunrise run is the same tour at the other end of the day and is the better one in summer. Between June and September the afternoon desert is hot enough that the ride itself becomes the least pleasant part.
The full evening adds a camel ride, a BBQ buffet in a Bedouin camp, oriental entertainment, shisha, and – this is the part that is genuinely worth something – a guided look through a telescope. The Super Safari listing includes an astronomer alongside the safari guide. There is no light pollution to speak of once the camp is behind you.
The clocks change on 30 October
Egypt put the clocks forward on Friday 24 April 2026 and puts them back on Friday 30 October 2026. Daylight Saving Time 2026 in Egypt
That matters here more than for any other tour type, because these trips are built around a specific point in the sky rather than a specific hour. A sunset safari in late October and one in early November are the same tour with pickup an hour apart. If your booking confirmation carries a time from before your travel date, treat it as provisional and wait for the call the day before.
The four things that catch people out
The second seat. Both of the big listings say the same thing in almost the same words: a double quad is for two people, and “if you book for 1 person, you’ll need to pay for the second seat on arrival”. If you are travelling alone, or you are three people, check which quad type you actually selected before you pay. This is the single most common surprise cost on these trips.
The scarf. On the most-booked sunset safari the helmet and goggles are included and the scarves are explicitly not. You will want one – the dust is the point of the photographs and also the reality of the ride – and you will be offered one in the desert, for cash. The same listing excludes photography. The seven-hour Super Safari includes Bedouin tea and bread. Bring cash either way; the Super Safari listing names it in the what-to-bring list.
The weight limit. “Maximum combined weight for a double quad bike is 150 kg.” Two adults are frequently over that. Nobody mentions it at the hotel desk.
Closed shoes. Both listings ask for closed-toe shoes. Sandals and a sandy footplate at speed do not go together, and this is the item people most often arrive without.
Children: there is a gap in the rules
The listings agree on two points and are silent on what lies between them. Both say the tour is not suitable for children under 3. Both say:
Children aged 5-15 may participate only as passengers on a double quad bike with an adult.
So a child of 5 rides as a passenger, a child under 3 does not come, and nobody writes down what applies to a three- or four-year-old. That is not a trick; it is a gap. Ask the operator directly and get the answer before you pay, rather than finding out in a car park at 3pm with a tired child. The same goes for who may drive: none of these listings states a minimum age for driving a quad yourself, and none mentions a driving licence.
Both listings also say the tour is not suitable for pregnant women or for people with back problems. A quad on a corrugated desert track transmits everything into the spine – that warning is not boilerplate.
If the answer for your family turns out to be no, the alternatives that work with small children are in Sharm El Sheikh with children.
What the desert is not
It is not empty. The tracks are shared, the dust from the quad in front is real, and the photographs that sold you the tour were taken looking away from the other forty quads. If what you want is silence and a horizon, the seven-hour version after the dinner service is the closest you will get, because by then everyone is sitting down.
And it is not the Sinai interior. These tours run on the flats behind the coast, within easy reach of the resorts. The mountains and canyons are a different day out and a much longer one – that is Dahab, the Blue Hole and the Coloured Canyon.
See the sunrise and sunset safari and its options
When we would not book it
If you have back trouble, if you are pregnant, or if you are over the combined weight limit and were planning to share a quad. If you only have one free evening and the sea is what you came for – the boat day fills a whole day and the desert does not replace it, but the reverse is also true. And if your group contains a three- or four-year-old and nobody at the agency will put an answer in writing, book something else. There are 29 desert trips here; there is no need to force this one.
