The year in Luxor, month by month
All the figures are Luxor's: 8.3 millimetres of rain a year over 1.9 days and 3,860.1 hours of sunshine. Since rain does not vary, the scoring crosses three things: the day's heat, the pre-dawn temperature and the crowds.
Most articles about when to travel spend half their text on rain. Here that makes no sense. In Luxor 8.3 millimetres of water fall a year, spread over 1.9 days with measurable precipitation. There are entire months at 0.0.
With rain out of the equation and 3,860.1 hours of sunshine a year — between 80 % and 93 % of the possible maximum depending on the month — one variable remains, and it is temperature. The problem is that this variable has an enormous range, and not only between months.
01 Eight millimetres a year
It is worth pausing on how exceptional the figure is. Eight millimetres a year is less than falls in many deserts, and it places Luxor among the driest spots on the planet. The wettest month is January, with 2.8 millimetres; June, July and December record 0.0.
That dryness has one pleasant practical consequence and one awkward one. The pleasant one is that nothing needs planning around the forecast: it is not going to rain. The awkward one is that there are no clouds to filter the sun either, and at this latitude that shows.
02 Eighteen and a half degrees between July and January
The first gap is between months. July's average high is 41.4 degrees and January's 22.8. That is 18.6 degrees of difference between the best and worst month, against an annual mean high of 33.6.
And it is not an isolated peak. From May to September, five months in a row, the average high stays between 39.1 and 41.4 degrees. The city's absolute record is 50.0 degrees, recorded on 15 May 1991.
At the other extreme, February holds the cold record: −1.0 degrees, on 6 February 1989. It is a curiosity more than a useful figure, but it helps to understand that the desert also cools fast when there are no clouds.
03 And fifteen and a half degrees between midday and dawn
The second gap is the one that usually catches people out, and it is the daily one. In January the average high is 22.8 degrees and the low 7.1: 15.7 degrees of difference within the same day. In December, 24.2 and 8.6.
That means a winter trip to Luxor, which is the good one, starts before dawn at seven degrees and ends at midday at twenty-three. The clothes for a five-in-the-morning outing are not the clothes for two in the afternoon, and both happen on the same day.
In summer the range is a little smaller but starts much higher: in August the average low is 25.6 degrees. That is, in the hottest month not even before dawn does it drop below twenty-five.
The year's four stretches
Highs of 22.8 to 29.1 degrees and lows of 7.1 to 13.4, with 277.7 to 291.0 hours of sunshine a month and rain between 0.0 and 2.8 millimetres. The only stretch of the year when you can be outdoors at midday.
Highs go from 29.7 to 35.0 degrees in a single month and sunshine climbs to 305.0 and 308.6 hours. March is still comfortable; April already means early starts and midday in the shade.
Average highs of 39.1 to 41.4 degrees for five months in a row, with 321.0 to 383.7 hours of sunshine and practically zero rain. The city's record, 50.0 degrees, is from May. August's lows do not drop below 25.6.
Average highs of 35.5 degrees and lows of 19.6, with 316.4 hours of sunshine and 1.1 millimetres of rain. The hinge month: it starts hot and ends up workable.
04 Winter, which here is the season
From November to February the figures are unbeatable for a destination of this kind. Average highs run from 22.8 to 29.1 degrees, lows from 7.1 to 13.4, and sunshine gives between 277.7 and 291.0 hours a month, more than nine hours a day even in the darkest month.
With those numbers you can do what is impossible in summer: be outdoors at midday. Walking a shadeless enclosure at noon in 22.8 degrees is pleasant; doing it in 41.4 is not.
The price of winter is crowds. Luxor receives around five million visitors a year and they concentrate in precisely these months. It is a reasonable trade: people in exchange for being able to move.
05 And summer, which is forty-one degrees
Luxor's summer is not a hotter version of the winter: it is another thing. June, July and August give average highs of 41.2, 41.4 and 41.2 degrees, with 369.9, 383.7 and 366.7 hours of sunshine. July exceeds twelve hours of effective sunshine a day.
There is one nuance that helps a little: humidity is extremely low, 27 % in June and 30 % in July, so the heat is dry. That does not make it harmless, but it is different from the humid heat of a tropical coast at the same temperature. And that same dryness is why there is still paint on the stone here.
If summer is your only window, the trip can be done, but with the timetable inverted: set out before dawn, finish the open-air visits by nine or ten, stop until mid-afternoon and start again at dusk. It is not a comfort recommendation: it is the only way.
06 How to choose the month and the hour
If you can go only once, go in November or January. November gives average highs of 29.1 degrees, lows of 13.4 and 291.0 hours of sunshine; January gives 22.8 and 7.1, with 288.6 hours. November is warmer and January more comfortable for walking all day.
December and February work just as well, with highs of 24.2 and 25.3 degrees. March is the last month workable without restrictions, at 29.7; from April onwards, at 35.0, midday stops being an option.
And in any month, the rule of the day is the same and weighs more than the calendar's: the west bank, which has no shade, is visited at dawn; midday is spent under a roof; and the east bank, with the city and the colonnaded enclosures, is left for the last hours of light.
