We still had restrictions in place when it came to activities that could damage the sites. Flash photography, for instance, was still not permitted and we had a specific number of tripod permits each day — fewer than there were photographers in our group. I would never shoot in an area with restricted photography if I didn’t have special permission. It’s not worth the risk of having your equipment confiscated and it doesn’t show respect for the site or the local people.

Group trips like these are not always conducive to getting good stock photography but it’s cases like this where special access or permissions are granted that make them very valuable to me. You have to balance whether those permissions outweigh the limitations in flexibility (not being able to schedule your own time to take advantage of light and weather, for instance) to decide whether the opportunity is worth it. In the case of my Egypt trip, it definitely was.

Nice set of shots from Egypt. I was there in February and also got some good images of the baloon flight.

I am surprised that you have a shot of the interior of Abu Simbel because there was a strict no photo policy in force whilst I was there, interior shots of temples and tombs was a complete no no. In fact at one of the temples a woman who tried to take a photo of the interior was promptly escorted off the premises and had to erase the images she had taken.

Still, thanks for the memory- it sure is a great site to see.

David