The wind rustling through papyrus thickets sounds like crinkling paper. Ships wander down the languid Nile in rows, their white sails translucent in the fierce sun. Large beetles, glossy like gemstones, buzz drunkenly through the air, thick with the dust from ruins which rise from the desert like fists. Between an orchard of palm trees, and over a glittering cyan swimming pool, stands an enormous hotel, a bulwark of Victorian splendour, whose yawning doors coolly invite you inside into mahogany rooms with plush leather chairs. The Sofitel Winter Palace Luxor is an opulent old jewel, and the perfect salve to the searing desert.

There is no place in the world like to Luxor and the Sofitel Winter Palace Luxor is the finest way to experience the incomparable history and mystery of this nucleus of Ancient Egyptian civilisation. Successor to the ancient city of Thebes, which served as Ancient Egypt’s capital for most of the Middle Kingdom (2055-1650 BC) and New Kingdom (1550-1077 BC), Luxor is situated at the very heart of mankind’s most antique past, embedded in five thousand years of Egyptian history.

The guest rooms are draped in burgundy and gold brocade, the beds are spacious and plump, and views stretch over the green artery of the Nile to the scorched cliffs beyond, where the Ancient Egyptians believed the souls of the dead and the cobra goddess Meretseger dwelt. There are a wide selection of rooms, but grabbing a Nile view is essential for a shot of priceless esotericism and beauty alongside your morning coffee. The luxury rooms on offer live up to the hotel’s Romanov ambitions, with additional space and splendour, bedecked with tasteful replicas of Ancient Egyptian masterpieces like statuettes of Tutankhamun or the Gayer-Anderson cat. Relaxing air-conditioning, superb Wi-Fi and spotless marble bathrooms make your room a perfect castle of relaxation after long days playing Howard Carter.

As for the hotel’s other features, the restaurant is a highlight. The kitchen are experts in haute French cuisine as well as offering delicious local items. Anyone with a feel for old-timey grandeur will get buckets of it, with no kitsch or hokum. There are wine-cooler buckets stuffed with bottles of Moët, enjoyed in a sensual glow of candlelight whilst a lone guitarist strums up a spell. The dress code is smart and you’ll want to look as voguish as possible in the reflection of one of the restaurants gilded mirrors. There is also a swimming pool, vast and soothing under its guard of towering palm trees. Cocktails and sun-loungers are obligatory, and you may begin to feel akin to a modern pharaoh, or at least a moneyed emir, as you bask like a crocodile under the holy rays of the sun-disk.

Perhaps one of the finest elements of the Winter Palace’s luxury offering is their generous guidance for and transportation to local sites. Luxor is a historic cornucopia and it is far too easy for a tourist to be overwhelmed by the sheer amount of choice local heritage has to offer. The hotel staff will help you plan and arrange your days, and give you a strong sense of what the essentials are. The Temple of Karnak is a must-do: a focus for worship for over 4000 years, the temple bears columns and inscriptions from every pharaoh you can think of, from Akhenaten, Tutankhamun and as many Ramesseses as you can count, through to Alexander the Great, the Ptolemies, the Romans; even later Christian and Islamic traditions treated the monumental site as sacred. It is easy to imagine, whilst standing between awe inspiring colonnades, etched with the enigmatic figures of ibises, hawks and baboons, the blue mysteries of the pharaonic temple: clouds of incense, the pattering of shaved priests, silent offerings before the golden effigy of Amun. The Valley of the Kings is so iconic that its mere mention should make even the most tepid of romantics froth with excitement although ironically the workers’ tombs at Deir el Medina are particularly well preserved and beautiful. This is before Hatshepsut’s mortuary temple, which looks like a vast stone wedding cake, or Medinet Habu, Ramesses II’s immortal masterclass in narcissism and megalomania, have even been mentioned. That is to say, guidance is eminently useful. Yet for the independent traveller, who buckles on a lasso like Indiana Jones and refuses to be coddled, a good place to start is Luxor Temple: it is a five minute walk from your front door.

Ultimately, there is no finer way to experience Egypt and Luxor than from the balustrades of the Sofitel Winter Palace Luxor. Staffed with world-class employees, it hosts great food, antique lavishness and commanding views of the Nile, the source of the all of the country’s beauty, wealth and mystery. Egypt is one of the oldest places in the world; the fabric of Luxor, the wise, hieratic look of its citizens, the invitation of its monuments; all of it is thousands of years older than the very language which I write in. This trip is an exodus into the depths of the human past and it needs to be done right. ‘Right’ is feeling your toes curl on warm tiles, sipping champagne as the sun softens into blood high above the Nile and realising how glad you are that there is no winter at the Winter Palace.