Viking has officially taken delivery of its latest Nile river ship, the Viking Sekhmet, at the Massara shipyard in Cairo. Named after the ancient Egyptian lioness goddess, the vessel is the second new Nile ship Viking has added in quick succession — the Viking Ptah arrived just last month in August.
The Sekhmet is purpose-built for the Nile and keeps things small and intimate: just 82 guests across 41 outside staterooms. Her godfather is Michael Consoli, owner of the travel agency network Cruise Planners, and Viking CEO Leah Talactac framed the launch as a way to open up more capacity on a route that keeps drawing travellers in.
For anyone eyeing an Egypt trip, the practical draw is the itinerary. The Sekhmet sails Viking's 12-day "Pharaohs & Pyramids" trip, and from 2027 she'll also run a new 12-day "Total Eclipse on the Nile" sailing. Both follow the same smart structure: three nights in a first-class Cairo hotel first, with time to see the Great Pyramids of Giza, the necropolis of Sakkara, the Mosque of Muhammad Ali and the Grand Egyptian Museum. Then it's a flight down to Luxor to tour the Temples of Luxor and Karnak before boarding for an eight-day roundtrip cruise.
On the water, the highlights stack up quickly — the tomb of Tutankhamen in the Valley of the Kings, the Temple of Khnum in Esna, the Dendera Temple complex at Qena, the High Dam at Aswan and a visit to a Nubian village. The trip wraps with a flight back to Cairo for one final night in the capital.
The Sekhmet is also part of a much bigger picture. Viking's orderbook includes 19 more river ships by 2028, plus 11 additional ocean ships by 2032 and two expedition ships by 2031. That will take the fleet to 114 river vessels and 28 ocean and expedition ships — a clear signal that Viking expects demand for small-ship cruising, especially on heritage routes like the Nile, to keep growing.
Why does this matter to travellers? Simple: more ships means more departure dates and better availability on what is one of the most consistently popular cruise regions in the world. The Cairo-plus-cruise format also removes the usual hassle of stitching together hotels, domestic flights and guided tours in Egypt on your own. If you've been waiting for a comfortable, well-organised way to see the temples of Upper Egypt, the options just got wider — and the 2027 eclipse sailing gives eclipse-chasers a genuinely unusual vantage point on one of history's great rivers.
